It has never been easier to make new things, and it has never been harder to get people to care.

As an early employee at both Shopify and Substack, I’ve been lucky to work directly with thousands of internet businesses over the last decade to help define their voice online. Now, I write an industry newsletter at the intersection of those two worlds: in an increasingly noisy world, how can brands and startups build better media properties?

If you work at a growth-stage company, I’m confident this newsletter will help you do your best work.

For $12/month or $120/year, you can expect:

I. GAME TAPE: Weekly analysis on the most interesting new media properties. I’ll highlight and critique a stunt, show, or other new media property, so that you can remix what’s already working elsewhere.

II. STRATEGY: Insights on building your own branded entertainment property. Paying subscribers will get a weekly post with frameworks, strategy, essays on relevant trends, and anything else I feel may help you build your media property. If the case studies are an outline of what’s working today, then think of these as an outline of what will work tomorrow.

III. CHAOS: Watch me fuck around and find. In obnoxious tech parlance, I will forever be an “operator.” I’m going to try some dumb stuff on the internet1 to test/prove whether my theories actually work. Some stunts will land and others will not, but either way, paying subscribers will get to read about what I did and how they might apply it to their career.

(I love my trickster fox stealing fire from the gods)

Publishing schedule and holidays

Pay Attention publishes every Tuesday (Game Tape case study) and Thursdays (strategy series).

Expect to get more than 100 issues in your inbox every full calendar year.

Exceptions to the standard publishing schedule are 15 total business days off a year. In 2026, the remaining days are:

• May 18th-22nd

• July 20th-24th

• December 21st - January 1st

Thanks for letting me not burn out <3

This schedule can be changed in case of unexpected events, but you’re guaranteed at least 100 issues a year. Last updated: Jan 1, 2026.

Change is afoot online, and it’d be wise to pay attention.

If there’s something you think I should cover, or would like to work together, you can reach me at shaiyankhan@gmail.com