1/ šŸ‘‹ Excited to share what weā€™ve been building at https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t + we are going to tweetstorm our progress every week!

Week 1 highlights: getting shortlisted for YC W2019šŸ¤ž, acquiring a premium domainšŸ’°, meeting Substack's @hamishmckenzie and Stripe CEO @patrickc šŸ¤©

2/ So what is Brew?

brew / bru : / to make (beer, coffee etc.) / verb: begin to develop šŸŒ±

A place for you to enjoy premium content while supporting your favorite creators. Sort of like a ā€˜Consumer-facing Patreonā€™ cc @jackconte

(weā€™re still working on the pitch)
3/ So, why be so transparent? Two words: launch strategy.

jk šŸ˜… a) I loooove doing something consistently for a long period of time b) limited downside and infinite upside (feedback, accountability, reach).
cc @altimor, @pmarca
4/ https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t domain šŸ»

It started with a cold email. Guess what? He was using BuyMeACoffee on his blog, and was excited to hear about what we're building next. Within 2w, we signed the deal at @Escrowcom's SF office. Youā€™re a pleasure to work with @MichaelCyger!
5/ @ycombinator's invite for the in-person interview arrived that evening. Quite a day!

Thanks @patio11 for the thoughtful feedback on our YC application, and @gabhubert for your directions on positioning the product ā€” set the tone for our pitch!
6/ Dinner at Stripe HQ. Thanks for having us, @andylouisqin! It was an amazing coincidence to meet @patrickc. We look up to you, not just for what youā€™ve built at Stripe, but for your thoughts on immigration, rationalism, internet economy, etc. + please do more podcasts :)
7/ šŸ’” There are ~15mm creators (US only) spending a significant amount of time creating great content.

They have more distribution than ever before (thanks, youtube, instagram, medium, tumblr, twitch, 500px, deviantart, soundcloud, podbean et al.).
8/ šŸ‘Ž Now the sad economics of the internet fame ā€” $1 is the avg earnings per 1000 views (RPM).

Imagine a stadium full of people and the performer making 50 bucks from that ĀÆ\_(惄)_/ĀÆ
9/ Given most types of content canā€™t even make money from ads without scale (podcast, newsletter, photography, etc.)

Whatā€™s worse, creators are forced to optimize for maximum eyeballs (not quality), incentivising clickbait titles and fake news.
10/ So, will people pay?
ā€” we are increasingly paying for good content
ā€” online payments has become frictionless
ā€” we love supporting small creators
ā€” podcast is a $7B market in china, driven by subscriptions. US in comparison does $300mm, mostly from - you guessed it - ads
11/ https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t will launch as invite-only for creators. Weā€™ll give early access to the 30k creators on https://t.co/7zcGHHtYGM <3 If it wasnā€™t for listening to them, there would be no Brew.

Attaching some screens, lmk if you like it (and especially so if you donā€™t).
12/ Next week:
a) Brew sneak peek šŸ‘€
b) top lessons we learned building https://t.co/7zcGHHtYGM
c) why itā€™s incredibly important to democratise Paywall tech (NYT is set to do $600mm šŸ˜², while most publishers canā€™t even afford to set up a paywall https://t.co/WGJbd501YA).
13/ Since you're here: we accept support in likes, RTs, feedback ([email protected]) and internet karma ā¤ļøāœŒļø

And thanks @joannapedrina for assuring me that this tweetstorm thing is not a crazy idea šŸ™ŒĀ #brewingup

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