Launch, Today.

Dear Full-Subscriber,

We made it through 2021. Thanks for joining me for the ride. This post happens to be the final one before the new year. Now seems a better time than ever to start a new annual tradition — an end-of-year sign-off. So here’s me signing off.

On December 10th, 2020, I mentioned to a friend, Josh Janousky, that I was considering starting a Substack newsletter. At the time, I was losing interest in magic, powered by the pandemic forcing magic and magicians into a very odd realm. The idea of writing about my time consulting for magic television excited me.

Josh mentioned the idea to another mutual friend, Jeff Prace, who went away and found my Substack writer account without telling me. The following day I woke up to an email congratulating me on my first paying subscriber.

I think I sent Jeff a frustrated sounding text;

Well, shit, now I need to actually write the thing.

Today, having written at least one post every week for an entire year and found a passionate group of dedicated magician readers — I need to thank Jeff.

My story of how I accidentally built out this One Ahead community after a friend found its mock-up page and prematurely subscribed isn’t all too unusual.

Derren Brown has expressed how silly it is that he must name his theatre shows many months before he even starts writing them. It’s why his live shows can have rather generic names — It’s because they need to sell tickets in advance. Eventually, Derren, along with Andy and Andrew, his co-writers, get into a room and go;

Right then, “Miracle”… *rubs hands together* what could that show title mean, eh?

James Acaster shared a similar story this week when Seth Meyers asked him how he came up with his show title. His agent was pushing him for a title so they could start selling tickets for a show he had not yet written. So, Acaster forwarded his agent a drunk text he sent to a group chat the night before. Cold Lasagne Hate Myself 1999 is quite the show title.

What I would like to say to you, as we speedily approach the new year together — is that whatever it is you’ve been putting off doing, well, I think you should launch it. I think you should launch it this week. Even if it isn’t finished, even if you haven’t started yet. Send one text to a family or friend group chat, and;

Sell one ticket to that live show you always wanted to do.

Sell one copy of a book you haven’t started writing yet.

Sell a zoom show to a family friend at a huge discount.

“2022 is going to be a great year. Let’s kick it off right together. I learned this past year that nothing motivates you to get started quite like prematurely selling the final product.”—Rory, rn.

Some notes on 2022:

PTO policy: This year, I will take four individual weeks off. During those weeks, you’ll receive no new posts. However, during other weeks, you’ll receive two or more issues. This way, you will receive at least 52 posts over the course of the year. The time off helps me recharge and write better stuff the rest of the year.

The Podcast: We hit the 22 spot in the UK Apple Charts for our podcast category. Safe to say that the podcast is here to stay. One Ahead is a newsletter first and foremost. I’ll continue to invest the majority of my time writing the best content, and employing the help of AI Teller to read the newsletter.

Socials: I’m going offline. I write the best content when I’m unplugged, fully detached from magic drama and focussed on writing. I will no longer be promoting the newsletter in Facebook groups, Instagram stories or Tinder DMs. I’ll rely on the quality of the content and the occasional share from you, the reader, to grow this community.

Posting schedule: We tried a few formats in 2021. The best workflow was weekly subscriber-only posts (6-10 min reads). You can always access the archive whenever you wish and listen to the audio versions if you don’t have time to read the posts. I set aside time every week to reply to post comments.

The price to join One Ahead went up several times during 2021. The rate will never be as low as when you joined. The good news is that you’re grandfathered in — which means you’ll always pay the reduced rate for as long as you stay subscribed.

Now, something exciting;

Following my own advice…

I’m building a Secret Steno Library. You can save 100+ hours and download pre-built iOS indexes! Get instant access to a growing library of popular books.

I’ll steadily add ready-to-go indexes for popular books to this library, and there are indexes in there ready to download today. You might want access to save the time and hassle of building your indexes from scratch. Maybe, you want to perform Steno at a moments notice with borrowed books?

This impromptu, impossible, borrowed version excites me. I want to add well over one hundred popular books to the library, so you’ll be able to do incredible mind-reading anytime with books you find in most homes, offices, colleges and coffee shops.

Due to the ongoing work involved, it will live separately to One Ahead. I’ve already paid $350 to subscribers who contributed indexes. It’s a one-time purchase for lifetime access to an ever-growing library.

I’ve set a discounted price that will increase after the next batch of books arrives. This is the cheapest it will ever be for lifetime access. Give the library a look today.

“Well, shit, now I need to actually build the thing.”

— Rory, after sending this post.

If you missed it, you can learn Steno, here.

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