Holy Stop the Presses, Get Me Off This Damn Newsletter Deluge, Batman!

Out of nowhere, two of my email accounts were inundated with FREE! LAUNCH! NEW! UPCOMING! READ MORE! All from authors I never heard of, writing in a variety of genres, all reeking of desperation to be noticed, loved, appreciated and… recognized!

After the first dozen or so, I came to the conclusion I must have inadvertently clicked on something or other during one of those Book Blasts or Launch Parties authors and their fans run in Facebook.

All of the newsletters appear to be powered by mailchimp. They’re fairly standard, with visuals and links that look and act cookie-cutter-ish. I’ve seen worse.

But what I’ve not seen so aggressively shoved down throats is the relentless tactic of reeling a potential reader in by offering up a boatload of free content. Invariably there are series, lots and lots of series, and numero uno is always FREE. Fine. Your book, your decision to give away your hard work. But beyond that, if you follow the link to their websites, these authors are also offering up a dizzying selection of additional FREE content. Usually in PDF—which I won’t touch with a ten-foot-pole because… my laptop fried under the assault of a worm/virus/nasty-assed bug that rode in on a PDF.

For the last month, I’ve been averaging more than 12-15 newsletters per day. At first I deleted them, like you do. But then some of the authors’ newsletters reappeared, asking why I wasn’t taking them up on their generous offer and didn’t I realize I was missing out… yada yada yada.

Talk about cheek!

At that point, I looked for the “unsubscribe” button, which isn’t always readily apparent, depending on the newsletter layout. I came across a few where it simply wasn’t there!

Yeah, that’s smoke coming outa mah ears.

I know we’re told/instructed/advised that newsletters are THE NEXT BIG THING in author promotion, that direct mailings GUARANTEE SUCCESS AND NAME RECOGNITION AND PLUG DIRECTLY INTO A READER’S CEREBRAL CORTEX, AFFECTING THE BALANCE OF THE UNIVERSE… AND SALES!

Whew, sorry bout dat!

I’ve had to spend time I can ill afford to hunt down and unsubscribe, one newsletter at a time, up to 15 per day, and It. Never. Effing. Stops.

A few things:

1. I am so damn alienated you can bet yore bippy I’m never ever gonna buy a book from one of those authors, because… subcategory a) I’m foaming at the mouth incensed at having to deal with this deluge of unwanted, unsolicited garbage, and also…
2. Why should I buy when every damn thing is FREE?
3. I am NEVER going to participate in a Facebook book event ever again. Sorry, but once burned…
4. I PROMISE to never ever do a newsletter and inflict this level of hubris and narcissism on my own set of loyal readers. Y’all know where I am (right here, so if you want to see what’s new, check out the book carousal >>> or the tabs up there ^^^^ or *gasp* a post!)

This, and Facebook’s newsfeed that disabled Ad Blocker+, resulting in a stream 75% cluttered with ads—for fucking games and all manner of crap—means I’ve just about had it with social media.

And yes, I’m still coughing, but not quite as badly… thanks for asking.

To close off, I usually say… Peace and Goodwill and Be Kind… but…

Today ain’t that kinda day.