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Dept. Dispatch #006
Filed Under: Low-simmer anxiety. Reputational drift. Low-sodium dopamine. Strategic delusion.
It's 12:33 PM. Somewhere between “I got this” and “Please no.”
Status: Mildly coherent. Highly caffeinated. Under surveillance.
📍 Previously in the INFO CREATOR DEPT.
YELO! Reader
A woman with purple-yellow brand and glasses showed up in my feed last week.
She said, “Your stuff is weird… but smart.” (probably)
I replied, “Thank you. That’s also how my mom describes me.” (most definitely)
The sun was hanging on the edge of the balcony like it was waiting for permission to set. My inbox was melting. My dopamine had left the group chat.
But I was still writing.
Today is Day 26 of my 100-Day Info Sprint — a chaotic public experiment in long-form writing, late-stage capitalism, and psychological resilience.
So today’s dispatch is a little shorter.
Fewer fireworks. More flares.
You’re getting the real-time scribbles of someone sprinting through the fog.
Smell the metaphorical ink. Share it if you survive.
And if it moves you in any way—let me know. I’m lurking on LinkedIn, X, and Instagram. Probably too much.
📂 ICYMI: Filed Reports
Missed this week’s research drops? Here’s what’s bubbling:
✖️ Scarcity tactics to make your Info product compelling
Discover ethical scarcity tactics—price anchors, urgency methods, and FOMO strategies—to make your product compelling without manipulation.
👉 Read it here.
⚙️ Info Design: How to architect your info products
Structure isn’t optional. Learn how to design info products that teach better, retain longer, and sell harder—without overwhelming your audience.
👉 Read it here.
🔨 How to Build Learner-Centric Info Products
Reframe info product creation with design thinking. Go beyond courses to craft user-centric learning experiences that feel tailor-made.
👉 Read it here.
Sometime in 2021, I joined the Efficiency Cult.
You know the type.
“Build a course in a weekend.”
“Automate your revenue in your sleep.”
“Just repurpose it, bro.”
And for a while, it worked.
But then?
Completion rates plummeted. Refunds rose. People bounced.
It turns out: Most of us are building info products like tech bros, not teachers.
We optimize for delivery, not depth.
Speed, not rewiring.
Funnels, not friction.
But learning is messy. Human. Slow.
And when we worship speed, we turn learners into users—and knowledge into vapor.
"Efficiency turns your info product into a vending machine. Real learning feels more like a maze—with snacks."
This isn’t a war on structure.
It’s a war on forgetting what it’s for.
📡 Proof of Work: The Posts, the Panic, and the Proof
After a ten minute breakdown which consisted of panic, excitement and downright blasphemy in this past weeks LinkedIn performance
One Katelyn Bourgoin said, “Ok, this is friggin cool…”
Because I finally whipped out the “VALUE DELIVERY” card on my profile
- One on helping a $100K educator scale
- One spicy truth about “value delivery”
- One that took 200 hours of research and included the phrase “brain trap”
Only one of them flirted with the algorithm.
But guess what?
The other two pulled in co-founders. Strategy nerds. Creators looking for depth over dopamine.
Insight: Metrics are mirrors. But they lie about who’s watching.
Also, Katelyn Bourgoin commented: “Ok, this is friggin cool.”
Which is… maybe the closest I’ve been to heaven in weeks.
🧪 Big Finds this week
Metrics are mirrors. But they lie about who’s watching.
Most creators obsess over reach.
But reach doesn’t mean resonance.
And resonance rarely means revenue.
Here’s what actually worked:
✅ Borrowed Authority — I name-dropped people I’ve worked with, not just admired.
✅ Personal Stakes — I didn’t sound like a guru. I sounded like a guy barely holding it together.
✅ Specific Results — Not vague “growth.” I showed how I helped a creator scale without burning out.
The real signal?
Founders don’t want dopamine.
They want systems that scale without melting them.
They want leverage, not landing pages.
Structure, not sprints.
Depth, not downloads.
🏴☠️ Dept. Internal Memos
Here’s the part I didn’t expect:
I thought I was building for 0 → 1 creators. The freelancers. The fresh starts.
But lately, it’s the 1 → 2 crowd knocking.
The people with some traction. Some scars.
They’re not lost. They’re just tired of guessing.
And apparently, I’ve been designing for them all along—by accident.
So now the mission’s expanding.
Better support.
More narrative scaffolding.
More behind-the-scenes failure logs.
And eventually… frameworks disguised as fiction.
Because this industry is weird.
And it deserves a newsletter that acts accordingly.
🗣️ Help Me Build This Thing
I don’t want this to become another dusty email you open like a breakup text.
I want this to feel like a case file.
A taped-over VHS.
A dispatch from the underground labs of the knowledge economy.
So tell me what you want more of:
- Behind-the-scenes chaos?
- Raw creator case studies?
- Spicy rants and “WTF is happening?” takes?
- Notes from the front lines of burnout and business model reform?
Reply. Comment. Yell into the void. I’ll probably hear you.
This is only Day 29 of building The Dept.
And I’m doing it from inside the mess—between the invoices, drafts, and cold cups of coffee.
More dispatches coming.
Probably weirder. Definitely more precise.
Until then—
Stay curious. Stay slightly unstable.
As the story continues…
And for the love of god, stop selling your brain like it’s iced tea at a WeWork demo day.
—Sudhanshu “burnt-toast-but-building” Pai
Chief Info Creator
PS - If you've gotten any value from this newsletter, I'd be honored if you'd leave a testimonial so others know this content is valuable.
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