After more than twenty years of operating a fully independent progressive website (first Booman Tribune and then Progress Pond) I have moved my operations to Substack. I resisted this move for years even though it’s been clear to me for a long time that it made financial sense. Ultimately, I did not have much choice.
Last November, I suffered what I believe was a malicious attack on the database here. It forced me to do a bare-bones rebuild of the site, but one that lacked all the functionality of the original. Try as I might, with my limited resources, I haven’t been able to get the site back to an acceptable level. It logs people out routinely, it crashes constantly, and it loads slowly. To fix all of this would entail an investment I’d have no realistic chance of recouping.
Moving to Substack is the right choice for me now. It’s a powerful platform that allows me to also integrate the podcast and incentivizes me to create some video content as well. One stumbling block has always been my base of subscribers who are collectively responsible for giving me any voice at all. All subscribers to Progress Pond have been granted an immediate full subscription to https://martinlongman.substack.com. It’s my hope that you will continue the support you’ve provided for me here at the new place, and that you’ll get a much better experience and value.
As was the case here before the database attack, the content there will be a mix of free and paying subscriber-only material. You can become a free subscriber there, too, which should allow you to comment, and it’s a way of helping me reach a bigger audience.
For those of you who’ve been with me through the long, strange trip since the early days of the Progressive Blogosphere, I hope you aren’t sad to see another of the original blogs succumb to the realities of the modern media environment. We’ve been through a lot and had as many victories as defeats. Historians will write about the impact we had. But all good things come to an end, and it’s my time to move on to the next thing.
I’ve considered walking away from political writing altogether, but the times we live in require me to keep up the fight. Everything I’ve tried to do for the last twenty years was not aimed at my enrichment or my status, but at trying to warn against and prevent the moment we’re in now. That it’s come to this is frustrating and demoralizing and frightening, but I don’t feel like a failure because I always did what I could. I think that’s the only forward for me now.
I want to thank all my readers and supporters, and I ask you to follow me to the new place and help me keep this life project going. It’s really about saving our country. That’s what it has always been about.
Martin, do we need to change the way we send monthly contributions?
no, I don’t think anything changes on that end at all.
A very understandable move. I’ve absorbed a hell of a lot of really good information, gotten a lot of support from you and the community here, not to mention learning so much from everyone who has passed through here over the last couple of decades. So I’m in, Marty. I’m sticking with the team, whatever happens.
That all makes sense. We don’t (imho) talk enough about the importance of money for any movement/organization/social change. One reason Gandhi became a one name superstar is he was an excellent organizer of money. (E.g., the Salt March movement was financed in large part by the Indian National Congress harvesting and selling salt*.
I look forward to learning from you (and your commenters) for many years to come.
*Salt was a necessary food preservative in a pre-refrigeration tropical society. Selling salt without collecting the British-imposed tax on it was, of course, illegal.
This is a good move. Substack is a strong medium for the reporting and opinion we need in these times. I follow others on Substack and will continue to follow you as well. Good Luck.
I went ahead and signed up for a year on substack. To be honest, I’m not sure if I was still giving you subscription money here or not. It was kind of unclear.
I’ve considered if I shouldn’t write more on my own on substack. I’m nowhere near as prominent and wouldn’t consider it some sort of source of revenue. But I’m not sure the world needs another egghead condemning MAGA. On the other hand, I have some expecting
Ok and this is another reason to be glad of the move. I accidentally hit post on that last comment and I can’t edit it. Oh well
I’ve never used substack but I’ll give it a try to keep reading your stuff