Moonshots Beyond the Cloud

I started the new blog Paolo Amoroso’s Journal . In the new journal, I write about the same topics of my main blog Moonshots Beyond the Cloud , but with more frequent and mostly short entries . My new blog, Paolo Amoroso’s Journal. The journal is hosted at the Write.as lightweight, distraction-free, Markdown-based blogging platform with good support for technical writing . Blogger, which I use for my main blog, is good for ordinary content. However, Google no longer releases new features and I’m actually happy the product is alive at all. I’ll continue updating my existing blog but I wanted to complement it with a journal. And I wanted to use a platform with much less friction than the clunky old Blogger. Researching a blogging platform was harder than I thought, so I’m happy I found Write.as. The new blog is at journal.paoloamoroso.com You can subscribe to the RSS feed or sign up to receive the posts via email as a newsletter.

I include below the text of the last issue of my Practicing Google newsletter, in which I announced I discontinued the publication and explained why. It feels at the same time sad because it's a failure, and energizing as the it frees up resources for new projects. This is the last issue of Practicing Google. I’m ceasing publication of the newsletter, or at least suspending it indefinitely. I might resume at some point, but not in the short term. If so, I’ll notify the readers still subscribed or announce related projects. I discontinued my Practicing Google Newsletter. I’m sorry this comes out of the blue, but it was inevitable. I’ll explain below why I took this decision I had been considering for a long time. Thank you very much for your attention and support. There's no interest With billions of Google users, without research or validation I assumed at least a few hundred would subscribe to Practicing Google. Almost two years and 87 issues later, the subscriber count has b...

Issue 162 of TestingCatalog featured my newsletter Practicing Google. The TestingCatalog newsletter. TestingCatalog , one of my favorite newsletters , provides news, updates, and insights on Beta and unreleased Android apps. It's a great resource to feel the pulse of the Android apps world and keep up with what developers are experimenting with. Thanks TestingCatalog!

Issue #008 of The Slice featured my newsletter Practicing Google. The Slice is a weekly newsletter to discover new and emerging creations such as SaaS products, podcasts, and newsletters. It offers actionable resources for founders and makers. The sign-up page of The Slice newsletter. Listory’s interview with The Slice’s author Nic opens with «The Slice highlights the underdogs of the tech world». I love this characterization and focus because typical case studies and success stories highlight the most successful entrepreneurs, authors, or products. The outliers, the unicorns. I’m actually more inspired by smaller, realistic achievements such as newsletters with a few hundred subscribers, or ebooks that make hundreds of Dollars a year. They are closer to where I am in my journey, more approachable. These are goals I can see myself reach given reasonable time and effort. I don’t even bother thinking how to imitate the outliers. Therefore, I’m extremely please...

Growing your newsletter can be challenging. Especially at the beginning, when few know you or your work. Having your newsletter listed in specialized directories that attract potentially interested readers is a valuable discoverability opportunity. The InboxReads newsletter directory. These directories are databases that let readers search or browse newsletters by category . Sometimes the directories share the newsletters to their social channels or in email updates. The continuous flow of subscriptions coming from directories, even if small, adds up. Maybe it's just an impression. However, I’ve been noticing a small but steady flow of subscriptions since submitting my newsletter Practicing Google to several directories. It's just a trickle right now. But noticeable. I have been bookmarking and keeping track of directories since working on my newsletter. I share them here and I’ll keep the list up to date. Open directories You can submit your newsl...

To get the RSS feed of a newsletter hosted at Revue , enter the URL of the newsletter’s sign up and archive page into your feed reader . This returns a partial feed with an entry for each issue. An article in the RSS feed of my Practicing Google Newsletter in Feedly. If the reader doesn’t recognize the feed, add ?format=rss to the newsletter’s URL. For example, the URL of my newsletter is http://newsletter.paoloamoroso.com and I can get the RSS by rewriting it as http://newsletter.paoloamoroso.com?format=rss Another trick is to append ?format=text to the URL of an issue to get the ASCII text with some HTML formatting. An example is this URL of one of my issues http://newsletter.paoloamoroso.com/issues/freeing-up-storage-on-android-deleting-youtube-s-watch-history-and-more-252454 that returns the text via http://newsletter.paoloamoroso.com/issues/freeing-up-storage-on-android-deleting-youtube-s-watch-history-and-more-252454?format=text The usual way of receiving a ...

It’s been almost four months since I launched Practicing Google , my weekly newsletter about practical resources on Google products and related technologies. The newsletter is a spinoff of my efforts to learn about and keep up to date with the Google ecosystem. I share links from my readings and content consumption habits. I wanted to focus on the entire Google ecosystem with a practical angle, an empty niche I thought there would be interest in. As a byproduct of activities I already do, I hoped producing the newsletter wouldn’t take much work , and I’d be able to keep the overhead low. This proved to be the case, thanks to a combination of tools and workflow. Here is how I produce, edit, test, and publish each issue of the newsletter Tools I use the Revue newsletter publishing platform. My primary production tool is Revue’s issue editor that allows to add rich text, links, media, and embeds. Revue also provides tools for integrating with and importing content ...

I don’t like the social platform algorithms that decide what ends up in my feed. That’s why for my content consumption I want tools that, instead of filtering , deliver all the content only from all the sources I want. My information hub is an RSS feed reader, Feedly. In addition, since before starting my own email newsletter Practicing Google, I have been subscribing to a growing number of newsletters on a variety of topics . From technology and software development, to content creation and publishing. The week in newsletters, a newsletter I subscribe to. Here are the newsletters I subscribe to. I prefer niche, obscure, or unique sources, so I hope this list will help you discover valuable content that’s not mainstream . 8bitnews : Retrocomputing news, resources, and projects. Blogging for Devs : Tips, content ideas, and relevant news about growing technical blogs. Creator Tools Weekly : Apps or tools to help create, publish or sell content. Draft Mode : Tools and tips t...

The members of OnEBoard interviewed me for their  On E Board Home series. I chatted with them about why my blog is my online home, how I started my newsletter , my space outreach activities, understanding and keeping up to date with the Google ecosystem, and more. Here's the preview of the interview . Watch also the full interview . OnEBoard is a network of creators who collaborate over the web. The group has its roots in projects they started on Google+. Thanks to Bob Danley, Peggy Kolm, Monika Schmidt, and Nina Trankova for having me as a guest and for their questions. Nina and Peggy are also fellow members of the Google Product Experts Program. These questions were an opportunity for thinking about and reflecting on my work and interests.

If you own an Internet domain, you can create subdomains for your properties such as a blog, a newsletter, and books. The URL of my blog starts with the blog subdomain of my domain. For example, my domain is paoloamoroso.com and my personal website is www.paoloamoroso.com  I set up the subdomains blog.paoloamoroso.com for my blog , newsletter.paoloamoroso.com for my newsletter , and books.paoloamoroso.com for a list of my books . blog points to my Blogger-hosted blog. newsletter and books are redirects. The former to my page on the Revue newsletter publishing platform, the latter to a page on my personal site. These URLs are good mnemonics and a branding opportunity . They are easy to remember and say when talking in person or in phone conversations. And you can include the URLs in business cards or promotional material. blog.paoloamoroso.com has another benefit as it allows to rename the blog without changing the domain, should I ever need to. The specifics o...

I launched my newsletter on Product Hunt . A few weeks earlier I had announced the newsletter , Practicing Google , and later sent the first three issues. How did launch day go on Product Hunt? It was a dud. Practicing Google on launch day in Product Hunt’s list of the newest submissions. Early results These data summarize the outcome of the launch, which added 2 subscribers to the 30 I had: 3 upvotes on Product Hunt (including the default upvote) 1 user comment on Product Hunt (including the maker’s comment) 0 reviews on Product Hunt 53 Twitter interactions 2 new newsletter subscribers This is not unexpected. Why? Because of an inescapable Catch-22: it takes a platform to build a platform . I don’t have a platform. Twitter is the only social network I use ( Facebook is a deal breaker ) and my over 2700 followers are just not enough. Such an audience generates an average of a few interactions per tweet, not enough for any substantial promotion. This blog is 7 month...

A few weeks ago I announced my newsletter Practicing Google: Weekly practical resources on Google products and related tech . Now that it’s picking up subscribers and engagement, I’m ready for the next step. I’ve launched Practicing Google on Product Hunt . The Practicing Google page on Product Hunt. Product Hunt has a community of tech-savvy makers, creators, and entrepreneurs. Many likely use Google products, so there’s a good overlap with the audience my newsletter addresses. I hope they will find the newsletter interesting and relevant enough to subscribe and share it. I have been thinking about, researching, and tweaking the newsletter for the past year . While I always wanted to publish a newsletter, I started working on it in early 2019. Deciding on a format and picking a topic I know well and I could consistently write about took months. But the hardest part was coming up with concise and descriptive text for the name and tagline . My brain remained empty for mo...

I’m starting the weekly email newsletter Practicing Google: Practical resources on Google products and related tech . I’ll send out the first issue on January 24, 2020. The newsletter will help you do more with Google. I encourage you to subscribe, it’s free and you can unsubscribe at any time. About the newsletter Each Friday I’ll send you links to tips, tutorials, apps, in-depth information, and other practical, actionable, or hands-on resources . This content will expand your toolbox and help you do more things with Google products and related technologies, such as web apps and tools. The logo of the Practicing Google newsletter. The value of Practicing Google is it distills my extensive experience with all things Google. I’ve been using Google products since 1998, starting from the search engine. Besides a Google early adopter, in 2009 I was an Android early adopter . As a member of the Google Product Experts Program (formerly Top Contributors Program) since 2014, I ...