Nathan Weaver's Blog

Substackers Against Nazis

This is regarding Substack's refusal to moderate harmful content and choice to platform and monetize Nazis. And that is a choice an organization makes when they refuse to moderate harmful content on their platform. It isn’t about standing up for free speech or debate but it’s choosing to allow your users to be abused by bad actors. I could write forever about my time spent moderating social media content, but that’s not the point of this post. The point of it is to call out leadership at Substac...

New FREE 4k desktop wallpapers in the Ko-fi Shop

I've added 4 desktop wallpapers to the Ko-fi Shop. They are available in 4k and are Mercedes Masterson Detective Stories images (my book series). They are available for free or name your own price. I put these together myself and they feature Heather Jackson, my dear friend, and Mercedes Masterson actress. Images were taken in 2020 with the help of my spouse. 

The featured image in this post is one of them — though low-resolution.

Here's the link to download in 4k: https://ko-fi.com/s/1388f79db7.

L...

Young Hearts Run Free: Friends, the Found Family

Believe it or not, last year on November 16, I published the first edition of Weaver's Deep Thoughts. So today, it's one-year anniversary time! The first edition was called First! Moderating social networks and other deep thoughts and tackled social media content moderation in the wake of Elon Musk buying Twitter on October 27, 2022. Here's a sample from that first newsletter:

I've been a moderator in various places on the internet for social networks off and on for years: a writing forum, Google...

A Kate of Their Own

Author’s Note: You may use this monologue for auditions. All I ask is you credit me as the writer of the monologue when introducing it. And if you make a recording of your performance, please send me a link, I want to see that. No commercial use though.

(Scene opens with Kate sitting comfortably with a diary and pen in hand. She speaks what she writes into her diary. Note: Kate is the famous character Katherine from William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew.)

KATE: I see now what I must become...

What are your Halloween traditions? (discussion)

With Halloween almost upon us, I’m curious if you have any Halloween traditions. Are there certain horror flicks you rewatch every year at this time? Do you have fun games you play? How do you decorate or handle trick or treaters? Sound off.

Be weird and give each other a story to tell

I turn 40 tomorrow (October 12). And I wanted to do something unique and different here in celebration of it. And this is part of that.

I recorded audio of myself discussing how we all have different perspectives of the same impressions we give each other, and those perspectives shape how we tell our version of the event. When I was doing standup at open mics before COVID, I had a lot of stories to tell that were my perspectives on events in my life. This is the flipside of that. In this story, ...

My birthday fundraiser for The Trevor Project

Off and on for the past several years, I've run fundraisers in October for The Trevor Project. Why October? Because my birthday is October 12th. Why The Trevor Project? Because they do a lot of work trying to help trans youth who may be suicidal. As someone who almost took their own life at 18, it's important to me. No young person should have to suffer with suicidal thoughts. Consider following the link and dropping a little something. ✌️

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In my March newsletter I had an encouraging note fo...

What it's Like - RE: "FREE is killing indie. (An urgent warning)"

I read this blog post titled “FREE is killing indie. (An urgent warning)” written by Paul White, and it got me thinking about some of my recent decisions about my story sharing. I’m greatly summarizing this article, but basically, giving away free stories is bad for the indie industry overall and it devalues your own work. There’s actually a lot to unpack in the article, and I don’t disagree with all of it, and most of it just makes me think. But it did inspire me to write about what I’ve been d...

We have 18 subscribers now: Let's dance!

When Weaver’s Deep Thoughts hit the 10-subscriber milestone, I threw together a little dance video here. A few days ago, I said I’d put together a new video when we passed 16 subscribers. Well, we now have 18.

And true to my word, I’m dancing again.

I’m featuring public domain music, as I love the original blues and jazz artists, and I hope you can appreciate their work as well. And because it’s public domain, which is important. I’m a firm believer in public domain.

But I’m also just trying to ...

Battle Flag: “I’ve Got this Great Idea for a Book”

We moved into a new home in June. This is my current workspace setup in our unfinished basement. We have plans to morph the basement into something cool, it’s a big canvas.

I’ve been dying to get back to work on the newsletter, but time has just not permitted, and if I’m being honest neither has depressive thoughts. Depression is like Sally Pinkerton: she has an inflated sense of self-worth and yet still invades your waking thoughts like a parasite.

One of the ways that I prepare for my monthly ed...