Presented by Stripe
Presented by Stripe
Ben Thompson explains why a once-small, solo subscription publication can now sell sponsorship: its paying audience has grown, and it has a team to handle a second revenue stream. Stripe will appear on the site, in emails and on podcasts, including for subscribers. He says the contract gives him editorial independence, while adding an ethics disclosure and admitting that his existing business ties and friendship with Stripe’s founders already shaped how he approached the company.
He plans to invest the revenue in more products, starting with an in-person video version of Sharp Tech and a second subscriber-only audio episode. The announcement describes a funding and trust trade-off, not measured improvement for readers. It has no finding about coding agents or software teams; the open product-outcome question is whether the promised additions become useful enough to justify the extra claim on subscribers’ attention.