My friends, it’s been about a year. I’m happy to say that, so far, it’s been a success!
I want to give you some stats, some stories, and some info about the next big projects that I am working on.
First, the basics. I started writing full-time in September of 2014. By January, I’d written my first book, which has sold several hundred copies (with universally great reviews). Once I finished my book, I began publishing weekly articles on this site. I am up to 60 posts, most of which are a few thousand words long.
Since January (10 months ago), the total number of unique visitors to my site: 106,770.
The total number of visits: 153,818.
That averages about 15,000 visits a month – or 500 per day.
I’ve just recently started posting my content on Medium, and I’ve already gained over 7,500 more views there, too.
I’m very proud of these numbers, considering the subject matter.
My success comes with a catch, however – a big one.
Banned from Reddit
When I started writing, I would post my material onto Reddit, in r/philosophy. All of my stuff did extremely well. It would be on the top of the subreddit, with tons of comments and views. This drove an enormous amount of traffic to my site.
Until the mods decided that my work “Didn’t engage enough with the literature”, and was “of marginal relevance and quality”. At first, I was upset, but then I couldn’t help chuckling. To say my work wasn’t up to par – but this work was – speaks for itself. I think part of their beef with my work was the content – the average post in that subreddit is vehemently anti-rationalist, while my work is vehemently rationalist.
They also didn’t like that I was the author of the posts. Had somebody else posted on my behalf, I suspect it would have at least taken longer to get banned.
So, around three months ago, my work stopped appearing on r/philosophy. I can’t say I’m too beaten up about it though – the quantity of traffic was huge, but the quality of traffic was poor.
And Then Some
In the last 10 months, I’ve not just written articles. I’ve also done nine interviews (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here).
I’ve also started writing my second book entitled, “Square One: Foundations for a Critical Worldview“.
And I have – no exaggeration – over 1,000 notes stored in Evernote, about 80% of which are ideas that will eventually be written about. (I’d estimate at least 200+ articles worth of unique content.) Right now, most are rough-draft stage, but they won’t stay that way forever.
I am a long, long, long way from running out of content.
I’ve also started posting on my youtube channel. For the past couple of months, I’ve been posting a new video every Thursday. 19 videos, 7,000+ views. In the future, I think youtube will be a great outlet for my content.
What’s Next?
Besides my book, I have another big upcoming project. This one is so big, it will be life-changing. But, I can’t reveal too many details just yet; it will begin in the spring of 2016. For me, it’s a dream come true (you’ll see why!).
Also, I will be overhauling my website. To date, it’s served me well, but at this point, I have too much content that gets buried, and it’s hard to navigate. All of that will change (and it will incorporate my secret-project as well!).
If you like the content I am producing, please do consider patronizing my work. Right now, I am not self-sustaining – my wonderful wife has been subsidizing my work from the beginning. This can’t continue forever. I have worked on occasional video contracts to bring home money, but my contribution will need to increase.
Unless I spend considerably less time on philosophy, this project will be impossible to sustain without financial support from people who value my content.
So, thank you to all of my supporters (financial and otherwise) who have helped my first year become a success. To the next year!