HELLO, I'M SETH WERKHEISER

LISTENING WITHOUT A STREAMING SERVICE

Since cancelling my YouTube Premium subscription, I’ve had to find alternative ways to listen to my ambient music for work and sleep. Thankfully Focus Soundscapes isn’t just on YouTube, but they’re also on Bandcamp.

I don’t have a membership to Spotify, Apple Music, or YouTube Music now either, so last night’s run on the treadmill was a challenge. Thankfully the Bandcamp app did the trick, and I was able to pull up the albums I’ve purchased over the years and continue running.

Now I need to find a straight MP3 player app for my iPhone, or maybe look into a dedicated MP3 player that isn’t tied to the Apple iOS ecosystem. Man, I just want to plug things in and move files around, you know?

KUTZTOWN STRAND THEATER

I just love the patchwork colors of the local Kutztown Strand Theater.

1,000 DISPLAY ADS

We’re in 2025 and websites are still jamming as many ads as possible onto every nook and cranny. There are eight display ads on this one page, every three paragraphs.

Absolutely boggles the mind that this is the best we’ve come up with, the only way we can make it work.

Consider 1,000 true fans? Fuck no, how about 1,000 display ads? That’s all this is.

SCREEN TIMES

The last three days I’ve been putting my phone away. Out of site. Going for walks without. Reading a book while making coffee. Checking for anything urgent when I get home from the gym or grocery shopping.

My average for the week us under an hour, a definate improvement from the week prior of five hours per day. It all adds up, watching YouTube clips while eating lunch, checking emails while on a walk, or getting off the treadmill, or getting in the car from the gym, or then checking again when I get home. Too. Much. Input.

I’ve been sleeping like a champ, and I think lower the level of inputs has been good for recovery from my runs. I ran over 5 miles on the treadmill the last two nights, when in the previous few runs I could barely muster 3. I was just wiped out.

All that to say – put your phone away. Delete stupid apps. Stop checking for emails. Read a book while waiting for your water to boil.

ODDS AND SODS

Some website housekeeping;

In the last week or so I’ve finally got the site for Social Media Escape Club up and running. It was actually my Close Mondays site, and I switched the domain name to socialmediaescape.club with my buddy who runs I Heart Blank – heartily recommend him for all your WordPress hosting needs.

Found Senja last Thursday via this post from Brand Burnout. I set it up before my weekly Escape Pod Zoom call to collect testimonials, and included the link in the follow up email that Luma sends out after a call. I got two testimonials from that one call, including this one, which I think is a definite win.

I also started uploading all my Social Media Escape Club videos to YouTube, just in case Substack goes sideway. I’ll be posting all interviews there, and video drops like this:

BTW – I love the format of this video: https://frontofficeco.substack.com/p/opening-a-menswear-store-by-myself

I wish I could embed it here, but it’s only on Substack – womp womp!

META WANTS MORE SPEECH

Meta (the homebase of Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and Whatsapp) is rolling back their ‘third party fact-checking program.’

As The Verge is reporting, “Meta’s policy changes allow calling gay and trans people ‘mentally ill’ while removing a ban on referring to women as ‘household objects.’”

“But it’s how I keep in touch with family!”

I know Facebook has entangled many families and groups in their walled garden, but that’s the point. And the Meta environment is just gonna get more toxic, most likely on Instagram and Threads, too.

It’s okay to have boundaries around what services you use, and establish healthy ways to stay in touch.

Give friends and family your cell # and / or email address (or don’t) and log out if you need to.

INDIE ARTISTS NEED SPOTIFY

From Queen Kwong in ‘Why Quitting Spotify Won’t Help Indie Musicians,”

“indie artists like me can’t afford tо ignore and abandon Spotify, nо matter how much we despise it. If I want tо book a live gig, a promoter will check my streams first. If I want tо get label interest, A&R will glance at my numbers before deciding іf I’m relevant enough tо even respond to.”

This is also true for social media – some media outlets won’t feature you if you don’t have a big enough social media following. See, they think when they publish your feature, then you’ll share it with your big social media audience.

Which is fun, since we all know barely 5% of anyone’s audience will see that feature from the band’s social media feed.

But then, with Spotify numbers – they can be fudged, right? You can artificially boost those numbers. Make a song called “lofi-beats playlist” and hope for the best.

I wrote this a few years ago:

Right now Spotify is for the masses. Easy to consume. It’s a never ending buffet, and while your music is on the menu, you’ll never make enough to buy groceries for the week.

BELIEVE IN THE MAGIC OF SHIT GOING SIDEWAYS

When things don’t work out, best to just take it as a lesson and keep moving forward.

Easier said than done, of course, but life is short.

SEEKING LESS NOTIFICATIONS

See, the thing is I like Substack Notes. I really like the people and the connections that can be built there. But as I near 5000 subscribers (!!!), the mental load required to keep up on Notes has begun to tip.

I really enjoy answering people’s questions that are posed to me in the comments, sometimes even with video. But that’s not the load. I relish that!

It’s the “17 people liked this post,” or people re-stacking things, and being notified as such. Sure, knowing 57 shared a recent post is nice and all, but I don’t need to know that in real time.

And if it’s at this level with 5,000 subscribers, what it like at 10,000?

This is why comments are turned off on this blog. I am still reachable, but there’s friction.

A wonderful human reached out to me a week or so ago, asking if I was okay in regards to a sort of somber Christmas time post I made. That was wonderful. I welcome that.

Will someday I get too many personal emails? Maybe. But that’s a problem I haven’t had in quite some time.

Most of the “too many emails” came from when I was an editor of a music blog, with very many one-sided asks from various industry people, and multiple internal emails from the mega corp I was working for.

But I like emails with people, talking about these anti-social media things. I like my weekly Zoom calls with people talking about these anti-social media things.

I guess it’s a matter of energy.

Checking the notifications of LIKES and RESTACKS on Substack benefits the people who make Substack while zapping my energy and enthusiasm.

If you’d like, send me an email. It’s easy to find.