Generosity is a strategy

Hi there,

Read on for some recent links I've saved, highlights I've made, updates on Buffer as well as a topic that's been on my mind.

As a reminder - I'm Joel Gascoigne, Founder CEO of Buffer. My goal with this newsletter is to learn in public and share insights into how I'm building a long term, independent, profitable business with big ambitions.

What caught your eye from this edition? Let me know - just hit reply. I read all the replies and strive to respond to most of them too.

💬 My recent posts

I've spent a lot of time thinking about interfaces recently. What is the value of a great user interface in a world with AI-assisted and agent-driven work? Since ChatGPT, Claude and other chat-based AI assistants were introduced, some have suggested that UIs are not necessary or optimal anymore. I have a slightly different take.

I believe what's really going on is that chat-based AI assistants give you so much power and flexibility that generally isn't available in most UIs, and due to this fact, we would often choose a chat-based interface over something else.

… view post on: LinkedIn • 𝕏

A healthy freemium base is a growth savings account. Every month a portion upgrades. Remove the free plan and you get a one-time cash-out that looks like growth, but you're really just stealing from your future.

… view post on: LinkedIn • Threads • Bluesky • 𝕏 • Mastodon

I just got home from the 13th Buffer retreat in Barcelona, and what an incredible week it was.

We've been working remotely for most of our 15+ year journey, and we've found that our company retreats are an essential part of the recipe for working effectively together and forming bonds that lead to a strong culture and results.

… view post on: LinkedIn

🌍 Links I saved recently

23 Learnings on Building Community and Holding Space
→ In a world with AI, the human connection matters even more. This wisdom from Patricia Mou is invaluable if you're looking to start and grow a thriving community.

How Generative and Agentic AI Shift Concern From Technical Debt to Cognitive Debt
→ This reflection from Simon Willison back in February has continued to stick with me. As we utilize AI more and more to build faster, we need to be mindful of the risk of losing a mental model of what we've built, and how the whole system is connected. Without this, we'll lose confidence and conviction for how to keep growing the system over time.

At What Point Does Delegation Become Self-Erasure?
→ I really appreciated this reminder from Todd Curtis that as you choose to delegate more to AI, there are certain categories of human activity where by handing it over for AI to build and maintain, you might lose more than you gain.

📚 What I’ve highlighted recently

The more successful an organization is at that first step, the more valuable it becomes as a target. Profits attract predators. This is where the gravity of our financial system buckles most standard structures. To resist requires powerful and carefully designed defenses, and a whole new theory of corporate governance to match. We must rethink corporate purpose, board composition, voting rights, and—eventually—embrace entirely new corporate forms.

– Eric Ries in Incorruptible

People find it hard to balance work with family, family with self, because it might not be a question of balance.

– David Whyte in The Three Marriages

We often find that the harder we try to get rid of emotions and thoughts, the stronger they become. This is because parts, like people, fight back against being shamed or exiled.

– Richard C. Schwartz in No Bad Parts

🧠 Something that's been on my mind

Generosity is a strategy

For most of my time building Buffer, I've felt called to be generous in the product, pricing, and our customer service. I simply believed it was the right thing to do, and in many ways that's enough of a reason. Over time, I've realized that not only does generosity feel great, it's also a strong strategy.

Freemium was perhaps our original expression of generosity, and is one I've enjoyed doubling down on in the past few years. Giving away a meaningful part of your product for free is an inherently generous act: you give up revenue you could collect today. But it's also a strong strategy and for us has led to long-term sustainable growth. A great free plan leads to more overall users, which drives word of mouth, builds a stronger brand, and steadily grows a pool of users who reach our free plan limits over time and upgrade.

One of my favorite acts of generosity happened in 2025, when we proactively cancelled the subscriptions of customers who hadn't been using Buffer. Recently, we launched our API on every plan, including free.

Another way to think about a strategy of generosity is taking an approach of under-extraction. One of the ways I sometimes think about it is: if Buffer was acquired by a Private Equity firm (don't worry, that won't happen), how many immediate changes would they make to extract more revenue? The longer that list, the more differentiated we are from purely growth-focused competitors. I love how Tobi Lütke from Shopify put it: "Your customers notice if you're going into value extraction." The way he describes his job is inspiring: "adding as many levers as possible to the room and then not pulling any of them."

Our ability to be generous is directly connected to our ownership structure. We do not have pressure for short term growth and results. We can utilize this advantage to lean further into generosity. Many of our acts of generosity are decisions that would never enter competitors' minds, and would almost certainly never get board sign-off. This is also why I'm comfortable sharing this aspect of our strategy: it's very challenging for others to encroach on this position. And ultimately, if more businesses felt pressure to be more generous, I'd see that as a great contribution for Buffer to make.

👨🏻‍💻 New and noteworthy at Buffer

Introducing Buffer's API with MCP and CLI
Buffer's API is here. Whether you want to build workflows and agents for your social, build social sharing into your product, or a tool on top of the Buffer platform and userbase, we've got you covered.

We're building the API to become the primary layer of the product rather than an afterthought. We believe that going forward, people want to work with Buffer through many interfaces: MCP, CLI, our official apps, and 3rd party apps. Our launch today is a major commitment to this direction.

When we chose to invest in a platform a year and a half ago, we knew we wanted to get it right. We use the same GraphQL API to power our web and mobile apps, so you'll get the reliability benefits of our testing, monitoring, partner relations, and infrastructure, which already handles significant scale.

The Buffer API is available on all plans, including free, and includes MCP and a CLI. It's easy to get started, just head to your account (or create one for free) and go to API in your settings. You can create a personal token or OAuth app right away and make your first API call instantly.

I can't wait to see what you build with the Buffer API!