Four years ago today, Bill Bishop launched the first-ever Substack publication. It was his newsletter about China, Sinocism, which he had been writing for free for five years for an audience of policymakers, diplomats, academics, investors, executives, and journalists.
I had known Bill for almost a decade from my previous life as a reporter and was a regular reader of Sinocism. Around the time that we came up with the idea for Substack, Bill had been telling his readers that he was planning to introduce a paywall for the newsletter. I jumped into his inbox and suggested that he be Substack’s first publisher. Happily, he agreed!
Chris and I promptly flew to Washington, D.C., where Bill had recently relocated after 10 years in Beijing, and started figuring out how we could build the first version of the product around his needs. By October 2017, Bill was ready to launch, and on the 15th of the month he enabled paid subscriptions. By the end of that day, he had brought in six figures of revenue, heralding the arrival of two businesses at once: his own, and Substack’s.
To mark the four-year anniversary of the launch of Sinocism, I interviewed Bill for a special episode of the Substack Podcast (there it is, up there, behind the big play button). We talked about the early days of Sinocism, what he has learned from four years on the platform, and why he set sail for the world of paid-newslettering in the first place.
Says Bill: “It just really felt like there was a moment where the internet and consumers were ready for this kind of a model.”
I think he was right about that.
I began my Substack 'Beijing Baselines' in late July 2021, imagining it was a brand new hosting service. Yet I have been aware of Bill Bishop's 'Sinocism' for years. Shows my peripheral vision is not all that hot.
In fact I met Bill on his 2005-13 stint in Beijing (where I and my better half, Philippa Jones, lived from 1999-2019). We started an info service, 'China Policy' [policycn.com] in 2009. It still runs with 50 percent of its staff in the PRC, despite COVID and much else. We are still unable to get back comfortably, having left on a family trip before the lockdown.
Among English-language info services running out of the PRC, Bill's is (or are) pretty much the gold standard. Our frequent expression of praise to our staff was, 'Bill says so too'. We probably told Bill this back in the day, but it's worth repeating.
I recently discovered Substack after listening to an episode for Rising on YouTube and configuring my Matter app to receive, ta-da, forwarded newsletters from my Gmail. I just signed up not really knowing anything about Substack but getting a feel for it as something similar to Medium. The headline for this post caught my attention, so naturally, I gave it a listen.
The podcast episode was very informative as it gave me an "almost" insider view of the history of the platform, its influence, and its potential. I will definitely carve out some time in the next few weeks to do a deep dive, so I can learn how to leverage this powerful new service. Thanks for posting this discussion!
And if you are interested in Russia, please read The Russia Report. https://therussiareport.substack.com/p/coming-soon
Sounds fascinating! Subscribing now
The background in Doodle Jump changes as you climb higher. https://doodlejump2.io/
I listened to him in a podcast about substack. Sinocism is a much larger niche compared to what I'm writing right now. Obviously, there aren't many people interested in a tiny tribe somewhere in Borneo. The few that read my substack are retired professors, young researchers and there aren't many of them out there. Interested to learn more about how to overcome the problem, I listen to the podcast. If you are like me, in a tiny niche, would be interested to know how you grow your subscribers, particularly paid subscribers. https://omandodo.substack.com/
Great interview. And insights.
Excellent interview/discussion. I am fairly new to substack. Still trying to find my way round it. Congratulations Bill on 4 years of consistency
Try it for 6-8 months and if is not for you, you delete it and people forget about it in a couple of months. That is funny. Thank you for this great interview. I took good notes.
Very insightful and interesting. Thanks, Bill!
Great time
Thanks Bill and Hamish for being clear communicators about the process
Bill thanks for reinforcing the importance of the work required to make a difference
This CREATORS (Conspiracy Realist Educator Activist Truther Organizer Reader Socializer) commends ya’ll.
This was a great interview! Thanks!
Question for Bill: Have you read 2034, and if so what do you think?
not free now, so pass on this article as well, just fyi, thanks
Amazing story. Congrats on 4 years!