After 17 years, a fresh start

Names, brands, and the language of commerce--in your inbox or mobile device.

Blogging about names and language has been fun. But it’s time for a change.

I launched my blog, Fritinancy—originally called Away With Words—in June 2006. I envisioned the blog as a place to share “news, ideas, and opinions about names, brands, and the quirks of the English language.”

For many years it was a writer’s dream gig. Current events provided a steady stream of blog fodder. Comments were plentiful, courteous, and witty. And blogging fostered community—not only through those comments, but also through conferences and informal meetups with other bloggers.

I still have plenty to say about those subjects. But the community I once enjoyed has evaporated—gone, among other destinations, to Substack.

Welcome to Fritinancy, the Substack newsletter.

A Substack book stack. Photo: Nancy Friedman.

I’ve been subscribing to a wide variety of Substack newsletters for a while now. (My gateway publication: the historian Heather Cox Richardson’s superb Letters from an American. I’m also fond of Sari Botton’s Oldster, Jack Shepherd's On Words and Up Words, the Popehat Report, and James Fallows’s Breaking the News.)

But I haven’t yet discovered a Substack about my subject: names, brands, and the language of commerce. I’m hoping the Fritinancy newsletter will fill the gap. And I hope you’ll follow along.

What’s in it for you?

For readers, Substack offers some clear advantages over blog-reading. The format is more flexible and, in my opinion, livelier and more appealing. It’s optimized for mobile and app viewing—the app is available for iOS and Android—but still looks great on a laptop or desktop screen. Commenting and sharing are easy.

If you’ve subscribed to my blog through FeedBlitz, good news: This newsletter will arrive in your inbox blessedly free of advertisements. (I had no control over those ads, by the way, and couldn’t share in the revenue.)

More good news: This newsletter will be free, at least for now. If I eventually switch to a paid-subscription format, I promise that half of my posts will remain free to view. I’m aiming for two posts a week, but I’m open to your suggestions.

What’s in it for me?

Thanks for asking! Frankly, I’d become frustrated with Typepad’s clunky, outdated interface. I expected better from my $50-a-year fee. Substack gives me a smoother bridge from thought to word, and a more elegant-looking result. And unlike my Typepad blog, writing for Substack is free until I switch on paid subscriptions. Which, as I said, I’m not rushing to do.

What will happen to the blog?

It’s still there—all 17-plus years of it. I’m paid up through June 2024. Enjoy trawling the archives; I’m pretty proud of what I’ve accomplished there, and would love for you to enjoy it. UPDATE: As of September 2025, Typepad is defunct. I moved my 3,000 blog posts — along with images and comments — to WordPress.

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