Survey: Help this newsletter determine its future!

I'm making changes to The Onion: 20 Years Later, and I need your input!

Hey y’all. Thanks so much for reading The Onion: 20 Years Later and going down the rabbit hole of one of the great American humor institutions.

Programming note: We’ll return with a regular newsletter next Sunday, June 20.

I’m writing today about my future plans for this newsletter — and seeking your input!

I encourage you to read further, but if you want to take the survey now, here it is:

What’s next for this newsletter?

On July 27, 2025, we’ll publish our 250th review of The Onion’s print past. It’s been a joy to do this, and I can’t wait for the next 250 reviews.

This publication has focused on the print newspaper, which was the only original writing from The Onion for many years.¹

But around Aug. 31, 2005, The Onion started publishing online-only content, too.

I’d love to review the online jokes, too! I’ve sort of become an archivist of The Onion’s history, and the web-only jokes matter just as much as the print.

But I’m a one-person team who spends ~4-5 hours each week on the regular newsletter (plus promotion, etc.). And as a full-time freelancer, every hour I’m not billing is an hour I’m not making money to cover rent, health insurance, etc.

Why I’m (probably) turning on payments

I don’t need (or want) The Onion: 20 Years Later to be a core source of income. But if I’m going to spend extra hours each week investigating The Onion’s past, I wouldn’t mind recouping even a fraction of that time spent.

The most obvious way to do this is through Substack:

1. Substack makes payments easy to set up.

2. Paid newsletters seem to get an algorithm boost, and I always want to attract new readers.

3. You can offer paid subscriptions without having to paywall anything.

That’s important to me. This newsletter should always be free because it’s a service for Onion fans everywhere. As a paid subscriber, you’d be supporting an expansion of my work rather than getting exclusive content.

I’ve also considered how people could support me on a one-off basis, instead of Substack’s monthly or yearly subscriptions. So I’m exploring services like Ko-Fi or Buy Me A Coffee, which could function as “tip jars” for this publication.

How you, the reader, would benefit

To reiterate: All content would remain free.

Paid subscriber support would help me expand my publishing to include:

• A 2nd weekly email covering the online-only content (including, eventually, The Onion’s video content).

• Occasional deep dives into decades-old Onion issues (I have print copies of dozens of issues from the 1990s and 2000s).

• Occasional interviews with Onion-related figures.

• Occasional reviews of the new print issues.²

I’m open to other ideas, too, but that’s my plan for now.

What happens next?

I want to know what you think, so I’ve prepared a short survey, also linked below.

I want to understand your interest in additional writing and/or financially supporting my work. Plus, there’s an open-ended question where you can offer additional feedback.

When/if I turn on paid subs, I’ll probably do so in August 2025. I’ll share any other platforms I’m offering, like Ko-Fi or Buy Me a Coffee.

In the meantime, I’ll turn on the “Allow readers to pledge subscriptions” option to gauge interest.

Thank you, and please take the survey!

I’m grateful to all of you for being here, as well as for your kind words and support. This newsletter is a labor of love, and I want to keep it that way.

I’d be thrilled to explore more of The Onion’s jokes and history with y’all. But I want to ensure I can do so without jeopardizing my regular income — or overwhelming you with writing you’re not interested in.

So, please take the survey! And keep liking, sharing and commenting! Thank you.

1. Technically, there was some paywalled content for Onion Premium subscribers in 2004-05, but I’m not sure how much paywall-only content was published or whether much of it exists today.

2. I reviewed the initial few print issues, but haven’t done so since. Mostly, it’s because I don’t get my copy in the mail until the following month (the June 2025 issue arrived around July 7, for example).