Local Media Is Thriving in E-mail Newsletters

"When I first moved to Brooklyn, in 2010, a small, stapled, glossy print product became my guide to my new neighborhood of Bushwick and beyond. The L Magazine covered the hipster-ridden stretch of the L train into Williamsburg, listing happy-hour deals, chronicling restaurant openings, and reviewing art exhibitions. Given out for free in streetside orange boxes and in stacks at cafés, The L was stylish and well-informed, highlighting locally famous names and haunts, and establishing a sense of shared community for the corridor."

"Recently, I moved back to Brooklyn after a years-long stint in Washington, D.C., to Boerum Hill, and this time around my guide to the neighborhood has not been a print magazine but an e-mail newsletter. The "Boerum Bulletin," launched on Substack last year, is the very part-time work of Edward Dornblaser, a health-care-industry consultant, who jots down observations during dog walks. "Boerum Bulletin" has informed me about the beloved bar Montero being sold, the successor to a closed Blank Street Coffee location, and the price of a last-minute ticket to see Bruce Springsteen at Barclays Center."

"Dornblaser's project started as an e-mailed list of recommendations for friends moving to Boerum Hill; now, as a newsletter, it has more than a thousand subscribers. The endeavor is "extremely no frills and very intentionally not built to scale," Dornblaser told me. "If it can help an area feel more like a neighborhood, that's worth it to me.""

""Boerum Bulletin" is one of many new local newsletters within the borough. Brooklyn readers can also subscribe to the "Court Street Journal," the ""

A free print magazine once guided a Brooklyn neighborhood by listing local deals, restaurant openings, and art reviews, helping residents feel connected along a transit corridor. After moving back to Boerum Hill, neighborhood guidance shifted to an email newsletter, Boerum Bulletin, launched on Substack. The newsletter is produced part-time by a health-care-industry consultant who writes observations during dog walks and shares practical updates such as bar sales, coffee shop changes, and event ticket prices. It began as recommendations for friends moving to the area and grew to more than a thousand subscribers. The project intentionally avoids scaling to help the area feel more like a neighborhood. Similar local newsletters exist across Brooklyn.

Read at The New Yorker