This issue of the newsletter is going to be a bit different and I promise not a regular occurrence here. As an avid reader of OTHER newsletters, I know I get a bit annoyed when newsletters start to get a bit meta and write more about themselves than the actual topic I was originally invested in - we’ll be back to our usual BS next week, I promise.
That said, I do think it’s important to reflect these things publicly from time to time. I write this newsletter largely to get this junk out of my head but also because, shockingly, it seems there are people who want to read it - making sure those two things are aligned means having the occasional conversation about it.
As a reader of many newsletters myself, I sometimes wonder - how many people am I reading this with? If I was in a room and looked around, how many people would be in this room with me? So - here’s a bit of a snapshot of that room.
State of the Union Newsletter
As of this week, this newsletter is officially 8 months old! With this one written and sent, I’m now sitting on a stack of 20 published newsletters which would be just shy of 3 per month which is pretty on target for what I wanted to be doing (though terribly inconsistent).
In terms of readership, I’ve been pretty blown away by the slow and steady growth of the audience here - largely thanks to my fellow newsletterer
and the community over at /r/PrinceGeorge but also because you folks continue to share it around to people who are interested - something I really appreciate.I’ll note that there’s a funny thing I sometimes notice where I’ll get a subscriber from a domain like Jane@placeofemployment.ca and then I’ll get like 4 or 5 others from the same email placeofemployment in the next couple hours and I can kind of diagnose someone at work shared it in a Slack or email or something.
Readership is generally pretty consistent and between reddit and email subscribers, there’s an average of about 800 unique views per newsletter - it gets a little bit murky because I know some people might open it on their phone and their work computer so this number might be a bit inflated but that’s about the best data I have.
So that’s your room!
Transparently, when I decided to start writing this newsletter - largely a result of Elon’s changes destroying the little PG Twitter community we had - I didn’t set any hard targets but I would say I was really hoping I could reliably write for a couple hundred people and that would make me pretty happy.
You can then maybe understand why I say “blown away” and definitely grateful for this.
Where’s this ship heading?
Honestly, business as usual for the summer.
This is a busy season for my work - for those that don’t know, I’m a freelance videographer/photographer and summer is definitely the time where my calendar fills up.
I’d say you can expect the same sort of sporadic pace and then once Fall hits, my hope is to A) tighten up on a regular schedule and B) expand the North of Somewhere Cinematic Universe slightly.
Spoilers but one area that I think I’m uniquely positioned to move toward would be a video podcast - because of my work, I already own all of the necessary equipment and the workflow would be pretty familiar for me. It would really be carving out time which is the finite resource these days.
The vision for the podcast would be a bit of a divergence from the regular PG podcast subject matter which seems to largely be entrepreneurs interviewing other entrepreneurs about being entrepreneurs - and instead, focus on talking to folks with expertise on the subject matter this newsletter regularly concerns itself with: urban planning, local politics, parking, and other PG-centric/Northern BC issues.
Much like this newsletter, this would be a maiden voyage for me so kind of a learn-as-we-go kind of thing so I would say let’s manage expectations across the board.
My question for you folks - the readers - would that be interesting at all? Would you tune in? Or is this a stay-in-your-lane kinda situation? I’m wide open to opinions here.
Being a business owner and a guy with opinions.
Despite the relatively small size of the audience of this newsletter, I do regularly (and disproportionately) somehow get recognized for this newsletter specifically. Just today, I had a great chat with a reader who saw me staring into the abyss of golf accessories (a new hobby of mine) at Sportchek.
(Hi Connor, great to meet you).
Being a freelancer, I have a weird relationship with the responsibility of airing so much of my opinion publicly, so regularly. On one hand, this newsletter exists because I don’t really have a “boss” or an “employer” but on the other hand, at any given time, I have several Clients who may or may not be subscribers to the newsletter or who may choose or not choose my business because of my opinions.
My hope is that prospective and current Clients of D. Rigo Media can separate that my ability to make a cool video is separate from my opinions about the size of our sidewalks downtown.
Nevertheless, it is something A) I think about and B) you, the readers, should be aware of and C) the reason we really do need true independent journalism at the local level in PG.
Alright. That’s it. That’s the meta-newsletter for this week. As I said at the top, don’t expect many of these self-reflective newsletters but from time-to-time, we may check in on each other and I hope that’s okay. Okay? Okay.
This week’s recommendation?
Well this is going to be a bit ironic given how much I’ve just talked about separating my work from my newsletter but I’m currently working on a self-produced mini series about some of my favourite restaurants in PG called PG EATS.
Ep. 1 came out last week and featured sandwich extraordinaire Wall of Fame.
Check that out here:
If you haven’t been, you REALLY gotta go. Their sandwiches are unreal and the vibe in there is super fun.
Okay. TAKE CARE.
Love the idea of a local podcast!! It would be so cool to hear opinions on all this local stuff that you don't read about in other media. Things that are important but aren't necessarily "news." Would you interview people?
I am definitely interested in your podcast idea! I share your urban planning and design mania, in my case from a cultural heritage concern and always enjoy your comments. I'm new to PG and you've helped me sort of figure the place out...