Picture this. You’re at a bar, someone leans over, and she asks you the one question nobody ever dares to ask: “So YOU have a million subscribers? But why do they read YOU?”
That really happened to the author of this LinkedIn post, a French guy living in Tel Aviv who writes the How to AI newsletter on Substack. His answer in the moment? Basically a babble: “Aha! I don’t know. Anyway…” I loved that. It’s about the most human thing I’ve read on LinkedIn in months, and it’s what made me stop scrolling.
Because then he sat down and actually answered her. And the answer is way more useful than you’d expect from a milestone post.
“She’s right. I am not gifted.”
That’s where the creator lands. No secret funnel, no magic growth hack. He says he doesn’t know how to code at all. He’s 29, and he has no tricks or secrets to sell. So what’s actually behind a million email subscribers? Here’s his own list, and I’d read it slowly:
- Obsessed over useful + practical AI.
- Curious about how to best teach humans.
- Chronically online (so you, my audience, aren’t).
- Against AI hype news (so I can focus on ‘how’).
- Willing to write twice a week, no matter what.
- Optimistic about technology. I reject doomerism.
- A risk taker. I might be wrong, but I’ll try anyway.
- A French guy living in Tel Aviv writing in English?
- Someone who doesn’t know how to code (at all).
- Dying to know how the world will evolve with AI.
- Never stopping until everyone masters AI easily.
- On a mission: AI isn’t hard & can make us better.
- A 29-year-old with no tricks or secrets to sell.
- Happy to go to work. Major advantage in life.
- Working 6 days a week, 9-to-6, no cold plunge.
- Keeping my computer at the office. Never home.
- Paying for most AI + testing them (so you don’t).
- Not thinking of ‘1 million’ but rather ‘1 person’.
The “no cold plunge” line made me laugh. But look at how boring most of this is, in the best way. Twice a week. Office hours. Testing tools so you don’t have to.
The objection he saw coming
Of course, the expert knows what some people are thinking: “Why a newsletter? No one reads. Go on YouTube.” And he doesn’t fight it. He flat out says they’re right, and that YouTube has 100x the audience of Substack or any newsletter.
So why stick with writing? He’s focused on education, and he found the format that best teaches his testing and learning. He doesn’t learn much from YouTube himself. He reads more, so he figured, “maybe others do too, I will write for them.”
He never thought a million people would. Tel Aviv, where he lives, has 400,000 inhabitants, and he says he can’t wrap his head around the number.
I think this is the part worth stealing. He didn’t pick the biggest platform. He picked the one that matched how he learns, then trusted there were people like him out there.
How it started
The whole thing goes back to December 7, 2022, a week after ChatGPT came out. That’s when he wrote “Master AI before it masters you.” He says he was both so afraid and so excited about LLMs (the large language models behind tools like ChatGPT). They could talk like us, think like us, and give us superhuman powers the same way electricity or fire did.
He also admits he doesn’t know how to end the post. He rarely celebrates or shows his face, and he thinks teaching is more interesting than storytelling. He even refuses to plug his own newsletter, and apologizes to his team for it, since he knows it’s tempting. Which is funny, because the story is exactly what got me.
Back to the bar
So he ends where he started, with the woman and her question. If he could swap out that babbled answer, here’s what he’d say:
“You are right. I am not gifted. Maybe you should write one too!”
That’s what stuck with me. If a non-coder can get to a million readers by testing tools and showing up twice a week, your thing might be closer than it feels. Try these from his playbook:
- Pick a schedule you can’t wiggle out of: his is twice a week, no matter what.
- Skip the news, teach the “how”: practical beats hype.
- Test things so your reader doesn’t have to: that’s the value.
- Write for one person: not for a big number.
He’s also very grateful to every one of those readers, and you can feel it when you read it in his own words. Go check out the full LinkedIn post, it’s a quick read and worth your time.