I have already mentioned one possible development in our publishing activity this morning, providing an explanation here, and publishing the first in what might be a long series of articles under the generic title 'Richard Murphy's view on'.
This, however, is not the only development that we are working on at present. Whilst I have absolutely no intention of giving up publishing this blog, we have recognised, as a team, that we need to reach wider audiences.
The move into YouTube two years ago helped achieve that goal in one way. There are a great many people who are unwilling to read blogs who are more than happy to watch YouTube videos, as we have discovered, and our reach on that channel is now considerably bigger than it is here.
At the same time, the Substack phenomenon has developed over the last couple of years, so that, for many people, independent blogs like this one are now a little-known phenomenon, and Substack is their preferred source of independent reading. We think it would be foolish of us to ignore this trend, and so we are planning to invest more in that channel, partly to assist the publication of long-form content, to which it is particularly suited, partly to assist the presentation of material in a different way to that used here, and partly to reach different audiences.
Our experiments with this suggest that we can reach new audiences in this way, and that there is significant room for growth as a result. We have had 7,000 views on posts on Substack over the last couple of days, and now have almost as many subscribers to our email list there as we do to the subscriber list for this blog. And that has happened before we have put any serious effort into the design or presentation of the content, which we are now beginning to do.
The consequence is that some more essay-based material will now be appearing on Substack before it does here, and it may be that in future I will only provide links here to Substack material rather than reposting it, which is not always a good idea as a result of Google search algorithms, which get confused by the same material appearing in two places at once.
The first post of this type appeared yesterday and was itself the first of a three-part series on Reform, why it has grown, the challenges it creates, and the ways in which those challenges can be addressed.
Substack seems ideally suited to this series-style approach, and the remaining articles in this series will appear over the next few days before I move on to a series on the Greens, most of which is already in draft.
I will provide links to these materials here, but it may be worth your while looking at Substack for some content from now on because we are expecting it to become a major part of our publishing programme over time. If things work as planned, just as Thomas has a major role in the YouTube channel that we publish, I am expecting James to play a similar role in Substack content creation, although I will remain the primary content author and retain final editorial control in both cases.
That first Reform essay is available here, and the second may be out later this morning.
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If people are put off by the this blog because of its basis on economics, even accounting and tax, then you will rope in different (more) people under the new branding so to speak, so this makes sense.
Interesting to see the ‘like’ from you on the Substack and presumably it works the same way with others
What are the personal financial implications for your devoted readers on this blog, some of whom make a monthly donation? Will this continue unchanged? Will the Substack blog need separate payments? (some I follow do, some don’t). I agree that working out these implications comes seconf to the strategy, but we’d like to know this bit of tactics.
I will post on this soon.
Do be aware that Substack has a nazi problem. I do undesrstand that it’s a fine balance between supporting a nazi-supporting platform and increasing your reach!
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2026/feb/07/revealed-how-substack-makes-money-from-hosting-nazi-newsletters
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/11/substack-extremism-nazi-white-supremacy-newsletters/676156/
Paper has a nazi problem
So has the web
And society
As well as Westminster
The rise of substack is mainly due to the failures of journalist institutions doing their job correctly. They are the ones that have withered to such extant that the post-ww2-order is out in wilderness with the nazis.
Jenrick is advertising for an economic adviser:
Robert Jenrick
@RobertJenrick
I am looking to hire a chief economic advisor. As Reform prepare for government we are looking to expand our growing team of policy advisors. I’m after an exceptionally talented individual with a strong grounding in macro economics. If you’re passionate about getting growth again in the economy, and have ideas to shake up our stale economic debate, this role is for you. We have a once in a generation opportunity to build a new economic model that transforms this country for the better. If you have the energy and determination to do that with us, this role is for you. The job will involve: -policy development -modelling -in-depth research No experience in Westminster is required. Business experience is preferable. The pay is highly competitive, but variable depending on the candidate. Please email your CV and a cover letter to jenrickr@parliament.uk Applications close on the 29th May but will be reviewed on a rolling basis.
Business centric, focused on growth. Got it. Absolutely nothing transformative about that.
That job description sounds exactly like you, Richard! The pay would help fund this blog, YouTube and Substack.
🙂
It looks like Streeting is doing his best to encourage Reform voters to come out and defeat Burnham, with his line today on rejoining the EU. Dirty business, politics.
People seem to forget streeting ‘crossed the floor’ it certainly wasn’t because he held labour values was it….
He hasn’t crossed the floor…
I am not sure to what you are referring
The 2018 Brexit rebellion against Jeremy Corbyn over single market and customs union membership, maybe?? Odd way to describe it though.
Will be sorry to see this site decline. Hopefully there will be a way of indexing it to consult the accumulated wisdom in future! Thanks for doing this and good luck in the new environments!
I would not be planning to invest in this site if I was going to let it decline.
There is google advance search :
https://www.google.com/advanced_search
for example enter site domain https://www.taxresearch.org.uk
in all the words enter meadway
and you get 7 pages of references to Meadway and his deliberate playing down of the significance of MMT (Modern Monetary Theory) ie. how the government really creates money…
and there are words to exclude, types of files wanted, etc. that you can use as search criteria.
Thanks for this. We now use it. You pointed me in this direction.
I’m very satisfied to read your content, Richard, which I believe I can absorb more thoroughly in written form than by video.
There’s a risk that if you commit to YouTube, and or other streaming platforms, you become susceptible to being blocked or otherwise affected by the vagaries of their algorithms. You own and control your data on Substack and your email content will still be propagated even if your streaming accounts are compromised.
Precisely