🔶 #14: "Stop pretending journalism matters on its own"

Hello and welcome back to the News Alchemists newsletter!

I'm preparing to fly to Perugia, and my inbox, Whatsapp, and LinkedIn DMs are full of many variations of let's catch up, let's have a coffee, etc. If you are also in Perugia this week, keep scrolling after the seven links to see where we can meet.

Last week, I opened the newsletter by sharing some of my recent struggles with stress and procrastination, and judging by some of the replies I received, I'm not alone:

❝ Thank you for what you shared about procrastination. It is a struggle point of mine too. I didn't realise it was linked to stress, but that makes sense. I am looking forward to listening to the podcast.❞

❝ I really like the newsletter. Firstly the content is good, but secondly, I really like the honesty of it. Like how in the last one you talked about your procrastination: that sounded very familiar.❞

❝ Ah man, sorry to hear about the procrastination and stress. So hard to get a newsletter out the door and maintain everything else in life. Also hear you on the 'financial concerns' part. It's really hard for people trying to pursue less conventional routes, build up their own organisations without major outside funding etc. I've struggled a lot with that.❞

I don't know if it's really true that 'a trouble shared is a trouble halved' but your replies made me feel less alone. Thank you.

Time for the links, which this week are even more amazing than usual. Believe me, I picked them.