Depuis que nous avons commencé Nouvelles intimes, nous avons reçu toutes sortes de demandes. Certaines ont donné lieu à des résultats vraiment intéressants (voir: 24 heures avec Alexxa Von Hell), d’autres ont généré des sentiments autrement plus glumeux (salutations non distinguées au monsieur qui nous a écrit qu’il aimait beaucoup les massages érotiques, mais pas les filles qui ressemblent à des putes. Whatever that means.)
Je suis plutôt… disons méfiante face aux demandes médiatiques, sachant, de l’intérieur, comment les sujets liés au travail du sexe sont trop souvent, presque tout le temps, traités.
(«-Tu veux couvrir quoi? Les AVN Awards? Nous caches-tu quelque chose?!
-Pas plus que lorsque vous m’avez demandé de couvrir le douloureux spectacle de la Fête du Canada au Vieux-Port.»)
Mais bref. Je digresse.
Mélodie est beaucoup plus optimiste, ou du moins, pragmatique que moi. Elle me répète toujours que si on ghoste un journaliste, tout ce qu’on aura en retour, c’est une avalanche d’articles du type «Est-il possible d’être féministe et d’aimer la pornographie?» et entre ça et nous enfoncer collectivement des mines de crayon dans la paume de la main jusqu’à la fin des temps, dieu seul sait ce qui est plus douloureux.
Toujours est-il que appelons-le-John nous a un jour envoyé l’une de ces demandes d’entrevues en nous disant qu’il avait vraiment loved our last newsletter. Appelons-le-John voulait donc know our opinion et surtout would you like to take part in a survey?
De plus, si nous étions interested, il nous proposait de nous feature dans sa selection of interviews with newsletter writers.
Parce que, comme nous l’a rappelé Alexandre Skarsgård dans Succession, les données personnelles, c’est la domination mondiale, nous ne souhaitions absolument pas take part in le survey, mais nous voulions bien répondre à ses questions.
Nous avons pris le temps de répondre à ses questions.
(«Yo comment on dit ciseaux de coiffure en anglais.»)
Nous n’aurions probablement pas dû être surprises en apprenant que, bien qu’il se soit présenté comme un BIG FAN, appelons-le-John n’avait clairement jamais lu nos textes. Le pauvre a probablement eu un petit stress en lisant des mots comme «nice legs» dans nos réponses à son très tendre questionnaire.
Peut-être aurait-il fallu envoyer un trigger warning à appelons-le-John? Mais les lettres T et W n’ont jamais empêché une catastrophe d’arriver et la Terre ne cessera pas de brûler parce qu’on met un avertissement pour prévenir qu’on parle de sujets sensibles dans une infolettre dédiée aux sujets sensibles.
Des mois ont passé depuis que nos rêves d’expansion à l’international sont partis en fumée (ha). Appelons-le-John ne nous a jamais répondu, même pas «j’apprécie votre temps mais pas vos gros mots» ou «sorry mais je suis trop occupé à investir en crypto» - et nos réponses n’ont jamais été publiées (même si celles d’autres newsletter writers qui écrivent sur les voyages et le jardinage oui. Nous avons quand même vérifié qu’il n’était pas, genre, décédé).
Nous nous sommes dit que vous qui étiez habitués à lire nos histoires pas toujours immaculées, comme celle-ci, ou celle-ci, seriez éventuellement contents de découvrir la gentille genèse de notre NAISSANCE en version doublée et franchement zéro choquante (sauf peut-être pour nos fautes d’accord).
Natalia x
«John»: Hello! Who are you and what newsletter did you start?
Mélodie: I am Natalia Wysocka’s best colleague ever and soul sister. We started Nouvelles Intimes together. I have worked in the sex industry for a long time and I am a future librarian.
Natalia: I am a journalist - and I approve of Mélodie’s statement, she truly is my best colleague ever. I met Mélodie when she released her diamond-studded Emmanuelle-meets-The-Hills novel, Juicy. We started by working on a podcast project together in 2019. It was supposed to be called Intimes. Intimate. But you know what happened in March of the following year... In-person interviews became impossible to do, and since the subjects we talk about are very sensitive and delicate, we didn’t want to do our interviews by Zoom or, God forbid, Teams. Someone super close to my heart told us about Substack, calling it “the OnlyFans for writers”. Intimes became Nouvelles Intimes. Intimate News.
How did you launch it and what did you do to get the first 100 subscribers?
Mélodie: We drank vodka-sodas at Natalia’s place. I asked people to love us on different social media profiles. We waited to have an article that we were proud of. Our first one was about a champagne room hostess in France who did not know at first that her job required sexual activities.
Natalia: It was back in December 2020, when Québec was under strict lockdown. We wrote a short post announcing the birth of our Substack, at my place. Mélodie brought a pair of scissors in her purse because she was afraid of getting stopped by the cops on her way to my apartment, and she thought that if ever she did, she could always say she was going to cut my hair, which was somehow permitted. (It all sounds so very surreal now.) ((She never ended up cutting my hair.))
I really dislike social media, but Mélodie’s awesome at it, and she uses it for the greater good. She created an Instagram page for our newsletter (@nouvellesintimes), and a lot of people who love her work, her activism, her vision and her convictions, subscribed. We also got a write-up in a québécois newspaper by a well known columnist - she said the themes we explore would “unsettle sensitive souls”.
What does your process for creating the content look like?
Mélodie: We have genius ideas and we get really excited about those. I’m an Aries, so I want to do everything the moment I think about it – or never. Natalia is a Libra; she calms me down and makes me see bravery and professionalism in waiting. Natalia does a lot of interviews with searchers and a fascinating and diverse group of people. I sometimes conduct interviews, but I often write a lot about my obsessions and myself. We read each other's articles and suggest some changes or clarification. Natalia corrects all the names in my content, because I never forget a cock, always names.
Natalia: Mélodie’s a real writer. She thinks in writing. She lives in writing. She breathes in writing. She’s completely, entirely, devotedly a writer. I write a lot - in my head. Getting everything on the page takes me a lot of time. So much time. I always have two or three or four articles in progress. Each of them has two or three or four versions. My phone is filled with half-sentences, title ideas, possible leads to explore. Even when i finish an article, I still find it unfinished. I often feel something is missing: a quote, a reference, a link between ideas. What if the person who trusted me to tell her story doesn’t recognize her voice in the article? What if the readers don’t understand what i mean? Deadlines are the devil. Mélodie is patience.
What tools are you using to create, send, and grow the newsletter?
Mélodie: Mostly social media. I show our legs and drinks on Instagram.
Natalia: We pour all our soul into our project, for real.
What have you tried to monetize the newsletter and how well did it work?
Mélodie: We are approachable, and we don’t let down our readers. We create content frequently, content that is quite rare, because journalists don’t have the access and trust of sex workers like we do. They are the best people ever, but the media has a history of looking down on them and discrediting their experiences and feelings.
Natalia: We just started a series of collaborations. Every couple of months, we send out a newsletter by an invited collaborator on the theme of “intimacy”. We use the money we generate from paid subscriptions to remunerate them for their work. We’re so happy and honored to receive these words and stories and to be able to share them with others.
Since launch, what has worked to attract and retain subscribers?
Mélodie: We proved that we were an open and reliable source on sensitive subjects. We also have nice legs and an incredible friendship. It shows when we talk about each other and our projects.
Natalia: So many incredible people have agreed to interviews! People like Liara Roux, who talked in detail about her memoir, Whore of New York, with us. Or Dr. Angela Jones, who answered our questions about her book, Camming. Or journalist Melissa Gira Grant, who said yes to an interview about the Pornhub controversy even if we had only published one or two newsletters. We will never forget that, black heart emoji.
How are you doing today and what are your plans for the future? Always interesting: subscriber count, open rate, revenue etc.
Mélodie: We are doing good, but I would like us to be more known in French media, where we can provide a more nuanced look on a badly known industry. I also wish for nice legs and cheers forever. And nachos. We always eat nachos together, while we meet to talk about Jennifer Lopez and developing our newsletter. I can only hope for more paying subscribers, because we are working really hard to give everyone information that is mostly nowhere, but in sexworkers hearts and in our recorders.
Natalia: We would love to do more in-depth reporting on location, and continue exploring important issues in a respectful and impactful way.
What’s one piece of advice you’d like to share with someone who wants to get started or is just starting out?
Mélodie: Think about consistency and get some vodka and soda. Find a best friend.
Natalia: Work with someone you can text at 2ham asking if this adverb is more accurate than this adverb - and who won’t get upset at you for doing so:)
Where can we go to learn more?
Mélodie: In Tres Amigos if we talk too loud, which I always do because I’m an Aries.
Natalia: On Mélodie’s social media pages - and in your favorite bookstore (she’s releasing an incredible novel called La Mécanique des désirs in November - we’ll write a newsletter about it soon!)
Ce texte fait partie de Nouvelles intimes, un espace de liberté et d'exploration de sujets plus tabous en société. Pour ne manquer aucune édition de cette infolettre signée Mélodie Nelson et Natalia Wysocka, et pour lire nos parutions précédentes, suivez-nous sur Instagram au @nouvellesintimes et abonnez-vous au nouvellesintimes.substack.com. Des commentaires, des questions, une histoire à nous partager? Écrivez-nous au nouvellesintimes@gmail.com.