A little over one year ago, The Lunduke Journal officially formed as a full publication — a combination of the long-standing “Lunduke” podcasts & shows… with the regular articles that were written for publications like “The Linux Journal”.
When the written Lunduke Journal publication launched last year — on Lunduke.Substack.com — I had confidence that it would be at least somewhat successful. My past articles for Network World, Linux Journal Magazine, and others have always done well… drawing in significant readership. If I could manage to attract a small percentage of those past readers to The Lunduke Journal? Success.
Here we are. One year later. Here’s how it’s gone…
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The articles of The Lunduke Journal regularly get read more than any publication I have ever written for.
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Subscriber growth has been positive, every single month.
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The Lunduke Journal is completely self sustained — read: no debt and fully funded — and worked on full time.
Not too shabby for Year 1 of a publication! In fact… shoot. It’s almost unheard of!
Let’s look at a few accomplishments of “Lunduke Journal Year 1”. I’m pretty proud of this stuff.
Full year without advertisers, by choice
Not only is The Lunduke Journal profitable and debt-free, but we’ve accomplished that without any sponsorships or advertisers of any kind.
This means that the content and opinions of The Lunduke Journal cannot be purchased. The ideas presented within this publication are honest, unfiltered, and free from influence from any corporation.
Heck. We don’t even run Google Ads. Neat, right?
The Lunduke Journal Monthly PDF
On a regular week, The Lunduke Journal publishes 5 new articles, and 2 new podcasts, on the following schedule (with the occasional day taken off here and there):
Monday - Computer History
Tuesday - Computer & Linux Satire
Wednesday - Podcast (Subscriber Exclusive)
Thursday - Computer History (Subscriber Exclusive)
Friday - Wildcard day! Anything goes!
Saturday - Linux, Alternative OS, & Retro Computer News Article
Sunday - Linux, Alternative OS, & Retro Computer News Podcast
And, starting this last August, all of those written articles are being collected together in a monthly PDF. A nice, DRM-free way to download and read everything published in any given month.
Consider this “Lunduke Journal Magazine”.
Once again: No ads. And free for full subscribers.
These PDFs are released at the end of every month, with back-issues being quickly filled in for past months.
“Linux Sucks” & The Lunduke Journal bigger than any Linux / Open Source Conference
Earlier this year I made a rather hefty gamble.
I took my annual “Linux Sucks” video — which I typically performed at an in-person Linux conference and then posted to YouTube — and moved it entirely over to The Lunduke Journal.
No support from a conference. No using the distribution and recommendation system of YouTube. Self-published on ad-free platforms that I control (such as Substack and Locals).
All of my YouTube publishing friends said I was crazy.
So. How did that go?
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Less views, in the first 90 days, than the best performing “Linux Sucks”.
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But more views, in the same period, than the worst performing “Linux Sucks”.
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In other words: “Kinda in the middle in terms of views”.
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More revenue earned, from new subscriptions, than all videos in the “Linux Sucks” series have ever earned via YouTube ad revenue. Combined.
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And all without YouTube… or their “algorithm”.
In other words: Success. “Linux Sucks 2022” proved to me the viability — and distinct benefits — of publishing big shows like that to The Lunduke Journal. Both in terms of audience size potential and revenue.
Best of all: No YouTube.
Fun thought of the day: “Linux Sucks 2022” has been viewed more times than any keynote address published from any known Linux Conference: Including those from The Linux Foundation, FOSDEM, the Southern California Linux Expo, or any of the corporate conferences or regional Fests. More than any of them. In fact, more than almost all of them put together. And that’s just the 2022 edition.
This means that the audience of The Lunduke Journal is bigger than any Linux or Open Source conference in existence, in terms of audience size. Even without the help of YouTube.
I consider that to be a very, very fun thought.
A Dozen Books (& Counting)
Over the last 12 months, I’ve released 12 books. An even dozen.
All released as DRM-Free PDFs as part of the perks for all subscribers.
Some of those are new books, some are older books. And just simply all over the map in terms of content and style. Joke books. Satire. History. Paper Dolls (seriously). It’s kinda crazy. In a good way.
It’s a lot of reading, that’s for darn sure.
The Lunduke Journal Community
The community side of The Lunduke Journal (Lunduke.Locals.com) has continued to mature and grow nicely. In the last year, it has seen:
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6,513 Posts
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32,162 Comments
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130,608 Likes
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Over 4,000 members
Love it. It is of the most amazing places on the Internet to hang out, and seeing it steadily improve and grow just warms my heart.
The Subscription Options Grew
When The Lunduke Journal started, we had just two kinds of subscriptions:
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Free
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Monthly / Annual (with the books, videos and whatnot)
Then, a few months later, we added the “Founding Member” subscription level with some extra perks.
Now we also have a “Lifetime Subscription” options (which is like “Founding Member” but, you know, for life).
All pretty awesome.
The Lunduke Journal is here to stay
I think it’s fair to say that the state of The Lunduke Journal… is strong.
So… begs the question… What’s next for The Lunduke Journal?
Well… More.
More articles. More podcasts. More big shows and events. More fun in the community.
I expect that “page of subscriber perks” to keep on growing ever longer, and the community to keep expanding. More things joyously celebrating the awesomeness of computing.
The Lunduke Journal is officially a success. Not only is it self-sustaining, but working on it brings a smile to my face. Every day.
A huge thank you to all of you who have helped make this possible. The subscribers, the community members, the people who help spread the word. Couldn’t do this without you.
-Lunduke
