The Ankler

The Ankler is Ankler Media’s independent flagship publication, covering the business of Hollywood and the lively intersection of entertainment, media, and technology. With a bold editorial voice and a growing family of newsletters, it has become a trusted read for people who want to understand what’s really happening behind the scenes of the industry. What makes The Ankler especially notable is its commitment to independence, owning its content, its audience relationships, and the full reader experience from start to finish.

To take that ownership even further, The Ankler moved 15 newsletters from Substack to a fully owned WordPress site, migrating tens of thousands of posts and media files along the way. The team rebuilt its paywall boundaries and mapped a single paid tier to six distinct Passport membership audiences, all while designing directly in a block theme and thoughtfully codifying the results into templates, patterns, and a bespoke child theme. It’s a wonderful example of WordPress serving as real infrastructure for independent media, giving publishers direct control over their content, subscriber data, revenue logic, and design, no matter how large and complex their operation grows.

Presented at WordCamp US 2026: Own Your Audience: How The Ankler Outgrew Substack and Built An Independent Platform on WordPress