There has been an unprecedented rush of people canceling their subscriptions to this blog the last five days. Not one person has given any reason, and where there have been messages, they have been of this unfriendly but uninformative nature. This is a real example:
I wish to cancel my payments of £2 per month with immediate effect. Please ensure this happens. Thank you.
Of course, all the people canceling had previously provided invaluable support, and I am grateful to each of them. There is always a daily churn of cancellation and subscription. But cancellations are running at about thirty times their normal level, starting very suddenly, and I just cannot think what has caused it. There has been no obvious controversy and I have not expressed any views I had not expressed before.
The obvious concern is that some information is circulating about me and being given credence by people who have supported me, in a manner invisible to me, and I have no way of knowing if it may be untrue or unfair.
If anybody has any ideas on what is happening, I should be grateful to know.
I was thinking about unsubscribing.
Plus I suspect many followers don’t like your take on Ukraine. I do. Truth shouldn’t always be a caualty in war.
Or ever, so I’m sticking with you. (But if you hooked up with the Byline Times or anyway reduced my multiple subscriptions I wouldn’t complain)
There’s maybe a bit of fatigue too. It seems the Assange battle is lost. Maybe blowing life into a punctured Salmond is a lost cause too. Both great causes though so maybe you are fatigued too. Maybe breathe a bit and post refeshers.
Everyone reviewing their monthly budget due to national increase in gas and electric prices in October.
“It seems the Assange battle is lost.”
It’s not looking promising, but that’s not a reason to give up. Those who studied WW2 history know that the situation for the Allies looked lost in May 1940 (indeed the French expected Britain to negotiate an end to the war; the situation was so bad that it was the logical thing to do), but even an apparently hopeless situation can be turned around.
The evil people who have silenced, and wish to destroy, Julian Assange must never be allowed to think that their despicable crime can be swept under the carpet and forgotten. We may lose this battle. But the “war” is for nothing less than our right to find out what the politicians are doing in our name. In our sham “democracy”, we cannot control, or even influence, what the politicians do; but at least we should be allowed to discover, after the fact, what they have done.
Craig,
Probably because your blog has lost its way & it has become all rather boring.
I certainly am not observing many of the issues you discuss from the same telescope…let alone the same end of the same of the same telescope.
If Craig has become boring, can you suggest what else he should be talking about?
A personal (and frank) view: I’ve supported this blog for many years, but today there are so many claims jostling for my less-than-grand contributions, including some excellent left-wing ones.
But what tipped the balance for me was your making peace with Nicola S. After weeks of courageously documenting the corruption and lies of the Scottish administration, when you emerged from Saughton you suddenly buried the hatchet, apparently prepared to sweep all that under the carpet. I couldn’t believe what I was reading . . .
I’ve enjoyed reading your blog because of its critical edge and willingness to be thoroughly honest. But over the past months that seems to have become . . . a little blunted . . .
Craig, I’ve cancelled quite a few of my subscriptions this month because my budget – which has been plentiful – now looks tight. I need to cut down my spending! Perhaps this is the same for your supporters?
I think the responses to this thread are right. There are a number of adverse individual issues and one very large economic one. Businesses rarely fail from one screw up; it’s when a number come all at the same time, the cumulative effect can be devastating. People donate to things they agree with, provided they can afford it.
Hi Craig. I cancelled PayPal £5/m and switched to a standing order of the same amount. You would only see the cancellation.
Hello Craig,
I love your blog and appreciate most of your thoughts. But I am a pensioner on a tight budget. Every Pound (or Euro) is important. I have to save for the scholarship of my little niece in Udon Thani, I am confident that you understand.
GP
Hi Craig. Sorted it out at the bank and they assured me that your monthly contribution were continued.
But money gets short when hedgefund managers short the pound.
My best to you and family, take good care.
Craig,
Sorry to hear that your subscriptions are down. I don’t think it will be anything you have said and the way it has happened seems a bit dodgy.
I am a pensioner with a limited budget and now not a subscriber. I did provide donations around the trial time but also stopped my subscription as there is a lot of competition and I couldn’t subscribe to all bloggers and websites that I follow. If my memory is correct, I did stop subscriptions when you didn’t post anything for about two weeks, at a time when world events were, in my view, becoming pretty important.
However, I do appreciate your views and wish you all the best.
Silence is not a full house. The ‘extra’ edition is key here… We all must read to stay sane, informed and conversant.
Sorry to hear this, I always enjoy your insights so I’ll increase my sub tomorrow !
I am not a subscriber but have sent the occasional £20 when I thought you needed or deserved it. e,g. court case, imprisonment and Assange support. I also like to read your expert views on foreign affairs. But I have not contributed for a long time. Reasons:
1) Calling ALL Conservatives scum (maybe that was not the exact word but similar). SOME is correct.
2) Your ignorance of economics and belief in socialism.
3) Your similar belief that capitalism is evil. You seem to believe the current government is capitalist which is laughable. In short capitalism cannot exist concurrent with fractional reserve banking and fiat currency. You would do well to apply your quite clear intelligence to this subject.
4) I suspect that the 60% tax I pay on some of my income already goes to you in the form of a lavish government pension.
You and many lefties here are correct, the system does indeed stink and is unjust but you have the wrong end of the stick. With respect to (3) governments do not run the world, certain banks do and this is easily explained: imagine how rich you would be if you could loan out at interest ten or twenty times the money you had and do this at compound interest for not just decades but over hundreds of years. Suppose 300 years ago you started with a £1,000 and lent out 10x that at 7% compounded for 300 years, you would now have £10 trillion or about 4x the total UK government debt. This money brings great power. Unimaginable power.
Over simplified but not much. Sure there would be administrative expenses and other costs such as a few million to Churchill and Blair plus the occasional regime change to fund. When Johnson joins the speaking circuit as Blair did at $100,000 a pop who will be paying? This tells you all you need to know.
Murray Rothbard was the best writer who made all this fraud easy to understand. I read these about 2002 and it completely changed my world view although it took me a long time to join other dots.
https://cdn.mises.org/Mystery%20of%20Banking_2.pdf
https://cdn.mises.org/What%20Has%20Government%20Done%20to%20Our%20Money_3.pdf
You seem to believe the current government is capitalist which is laughable.”
Just to pick the most risible statement from your post…so the government (not just this one, but every one) believes in the communal, not private, ownership of the natural resources of the UK and the outlawing of profit (which is unpaid labour as you will know*, being an economist and all), amongst other things.
*Here’s how Capitalism works as a “wealth-creating” system:
150 years ago, Karl Marx had the sheer bad taste to explain how the capitalist mode of production works in his 3-volume, 2,000+ page work Capital. The fundamental breakthrough in understanding was the production of what is now referred to as the “labour theory of value”, with the three forms of surplus value (profit, interest, rent) being the modes of exploitation of labour-power under Capitalism.
In commodity production, the capitalist obtains surplus value from the difference between the value of the product and the value of the capital involved in the production process. The latter has two parts: constant capital, corresponding to the value laid out in means of production which is simply transferred to the product during the production process; and variable capital, corresponding to the value of what the working class sell – their labour-power. Variable capital is so called because its quantity varies from the beginning to the end of the production process: what starts as the value of labour-power ends as the value produced by that labour-power in action. Surplus value constitutes the difference between the two – the value produced by the worker which is appropriated by the capitalist without equivalent given in exchange. Labour-power is thus the commodity uniquely able to create value – remove it from the production process and profit becomes impossible.
Capitalists have understood this empirically (if not theoretically) in the realm of intellectual labour since the invention of the printing press, and the reproduction in new ways of the products of intellectual labour since then has repeatedly caused problems of creating a profit with processes involving low variable capital input. To ‘solve’ this problem, artificial value has been created for mass-produced books, recorded music, film, computer code, drugs, etc., by a system of licensing, patents, copyrights, etc. This ‘problem’ is now starting to arise in the field of material production, where a combination of AI and mechanisation threatens to eliminate human variable capital from the production process altogether, thus eliminating the possibility of profit. Goodbye Capitalism? Not necessarily because, although they still don’t understand the theory, capitalists are already talking about ‘licensed production’ via robots, 3D printers, etc.
Hi Fred
Good explanation.
It appears that what is in workers heads (intellectual property – but the thoughts are not owned by the thinker) is a commodity that can be exploited.
Gates et al have done this all their lives and despite the Chinese making the material hardware to realise this thought process the capitalists claim this and exploit this to the nth degree.
Not sure what Marx would have thought about the current crop of Adam Smith’s legacy followers (in the guise of Truss, Kwateng, etc.) ruining the already non-productive and thereby non-exploitative, non-capital-producing coupon-clipping, ‘entrepreneurs’ who claim the mantle of capitalists these days in the UK and across the Pond.
One thing is for sure is that the defenders of capitalism have no idea as to the nature of the business they defend – and this is why in the current collapse of Western Neo-liberalism that is occuring before our very eyes is so comical, but serious for the victims, as the Temple collapses around them.
Yawn!
Real problems arise when the true believers get hold of power, whatever ideology they subscribe to be it communism or capitalism. Humans and their societies don’t all fit in the same box; flexibility is required otherwise inconsistencies arise and lead to either corruption or authoritarianism or both.
People should be aware of Marx’s theories and of capitalist economic theory but neither is going to fix anything
Spot on!
I am not a subscriber but I do donate by bank transfer from time to time.
As an aside I sometimes buy ordinary culinary and medicinal herbs online from a UK supplier. There is one which I am unable to buy online and I have to make a telephone order to the same supplier; this is because PayPal have banned it. Nobody knows why. In my opinion no-one who values freedom should have anything whatsoever to do with PayPal.
Craig’s blog is a valuable source of informed opinion. Although I disagree strongly with some of Craig’s opinions (Pfizer!) I would not like to see content continuously-variably modified in order to mollify subscribers and keep the spice flowing.
I cancelled a couple of months ago. Nothing to do with the content; I had been ponying up monthly for four years, and never intended to for more than a couple of years.
I’m not part of a movement; nobody suggested to me that I should unsubscribe. I’m not on Twitter, I don’t see pile-ons.
Maybe it’s to do with the comments? Commenters are *very* diverse in outlook, which is one of the things I appreciate, and we’ve been dealing with controversial subjects. But others may have found some of the strong views expressed in the comments offputting.
I think with the partial mobilisation in place last week, and where cities are within easy range of the border in Russia, Russians themselves are more frightened than before. I wonder whether they are now communicating that to Western friends who for the first time question the logic and management by Putin. So since you present an authoritative and balanced view you are seen as pro-Putin and hence giving support to your blog is encouraging that.
I feel that you are one of very few voices that speak in the UK, and you have demonstrated that with courage, and you will continue to get my £2/month so thank you for what you do. Like Julian you are a one-man show, but thank God for voices like the late Robert Parry, his website, editor and contributors (which occasionally yet naturally includes you).
Courage to you , you are an example to us all.
Best wishes
Michael Piercy
I continue to support you Craig, though I neither get emails notifying me of your latest posts nor indeed see anything from you in my Facebook feed. I’ve written to you about this twice, but so far have had no response. Could that be why some people are unsubscribing?
Try blogtrottr.com
Works for me.
You are surely aware that many people have been cancelling their PayPal accounts in protest over that organization’s actions which seem politically motivated: primarily, censoring those opposed to covid restrictions? e.g. Toby Young’s FSU, lockdown sceptics, also left lockdown sceptics and UsForThem who campaigned over school closures. The timing of your observation seems to tally with the PayPal row.
Given that it’s also a particularly difficult time economically it may be a perfect storm of people making those cancellations but not feeling they have the resources to restart payment via other channels.
Craig,
I think part of the issue is a conjunction of squeezed budgets and a feeling that the blog has gone stale and devotes too much time to flogging dead horses. However, as it happens I did hear a rumour from 2 separate sources – one SNP and one Labour
Well, J. Macadam, enlighten us – what are these ‘rumours’? This is precisely what Craig is looking for.
My modest monthly subscription via Paypal suddenly stopped for some reason not agreed by me. I have just reinstated it but this sounds like a Paypal problem and the wording of the ‘request to cancel’ note sounds suspiciously clinical although I have never sent such.
I think it’s fair to assume that anything purporting to be inside information about another person is probably malicious, covert interference by the state.
All.of your subscribers are known to ptb , who can target them individually with malign fake information . I see this as an essential component of 24/7 spying, the ability to destroy their opponent’s credibility. When I was 15 a school friend told me he knew all the sexual preferences of all the boys in our part of the school. What about Now?
Also when a Tory government, the ones who made you invest in a private pension announces a budget that deliberately intentionally and immediately cuts 30% of the value off your pension , most sensible people would reach for the earplugs.
Maybe half of your readers are gullible enough to believe our security services are well meaning , honest people, and the other half trust the financial markets as benign , prudent custodians of our money.
It all goes back to Thatcher’s illogical theory that paying bankers more would cure their insatiable greed.
I went into PayPal to check. I cannot find any record of my monthly sub, or contact, except in the payment record. That is odd. It was paid on 16 Sept and I will check it gets paid on 16 Oct.
I have not been contacted and have not heard anything, but then I would not. You have always been consistent, so I do not credit any of the reasons that have appeared.
Hi Craig, I don’t think there’s any mystery. If Ukraine doesn’t pursue this war to the bitter end the Russians will kill them anyway. If the before and after photos of Mariupol and the mass graves being unearthed haven’t convinced you that this is a genocide then perhaps nothing will.
How can you treat with Putin when his word is not his bond?
Your dispute-at-work analogy doesn’t hold up because no-one in that situation was a psychopathic sadist.
Regards, Neil.
You overlook the 15,000 Russian speaking Ukrainians killed by Ukraine’s own army over the course of eight years.
We likewise intervened in Iraq, Syria, and Libya because we asserted they were killing their own people.
So if Putin wants to liberate them, well why not?
It was Zelensky’s fascists who created this.
Most Ukrainians did not want to be part of NATO, any more than they wanted to be part of Russia.
The idea that he will kill every single Ukrainian makes no sense. He could have nuked them already if he wanted to do that. He obviously hasn’t, so he obviously doesn’t.
It’s because the quality of your articles has decreased to the point where they’re no longer worth reading. Which I’m writing with some sadness because I used to like reading them and I was a subscriber as well, but it’s not worth my time and money anymore.
I think your altercation on Twitter about the voting in Donbas surprised many people. You overstated and maintained your position and accused one of the election observers of lying. I don’t know if this is why people ceased subscription. I was not and am not a subscriber. I just looked you up on the blog to try to understand you better. I was disappointed by the way you managed that interaction ending in a slanging match. Never too late to aim for peace.
Alas, with the personal, communal and even corporate bankruptcies coming this winter, you ain’t seen nuttin’ yet! It’s only a question of time. Which will collapse first — the global economy? its polity? its ecology?
P.S. Unlike some of those who have commented, I value the fact that you do not force your blog into a rigid schedule but speak only when you have something to say.
I suspect there will be a correlation with readership visits and subscriber support.
At the height of the Salmond affair will have attracted much interest. However, your blog is much more than just the Salmond issue and of course there are dark forces who would do you down. Moreover, with the state’s ability to hack, influence, attack, modify all things electronic, there could well be tunes being played in the background.
Keep up the good work. Truth and fair comment are scarce commodities these days. Moreover, many people are fickle and quite complacent to what is happening around them. The ability to look the other way, no matter what, is in large part why we are the way we are today.
A bit like 1930s Germany if I may draw a comparison. The slide into fascism is ever so anodyne. The Germans found that out too late. And we will do so too.
I’ve done a monthly payment to you for years, and cancelled it a couple of weeks ago. Nothing sinister, I haven’t read anything negative about you, and I continue to agree with you on most matters. It’s just that there’s a chill wind blowing through the country, and budgeting has become far more important. I suspect this is a common feeling, and reaction.
I read the responses below and found them rather shocking.
if there is an economic crisis, I can understand that many have done an audit on their subscriptions.
“You’re a bit boring” doesn’t take into account how popular the Murray blog is.
Any objective measure of views, shows that this blog is more popular than many mainstream news sources.
Murray is not only unusually thorough in his analysis, but he tends… to be right. He was right about Salmond, right about Sturgeon,
and was so accurate, he ended up going to jail for it. So he has a particular credibility to talk on behalf of Assange.
If anyone thinks the Assange situation is over, they’re wrong, it’s just beginning.
If anyone thinks Salmond is a “tired” subject, how come the mainstream makes steady trade out of Sturgeon, who continually confirms she knows what exactly what her voters want her to and whose actions are exactly the opposite of that.
I disagreed with Murray’s initial assessment that Putin was wrong to invade, because I remembered the Cuban Misile Crisis and honestly can’t imagine Putin not doing anything about it. Murray’s attitude has changed and I approve. The rest of the media is doing “Putin is doing bad things because he is bad”. I’ll stick with Murray.
deserves all the support we can give him.
We may actually need more truth while we receive less money.
Craig, I sent you an email about 6 years ago saying that my subscription had been cancelled without my consent and I wonder if this has been happening in these recent cases. Keep up the good work, nao pasaran¡
Craig,
This is what I received today from PayPal : Your automatic payment is no longer active
You’ll need to contact Craig Murray for more details or to reactivate your automatic payments. Here are the details: