If you've been here a while, thank you. If you're new — welcome. I'm Amber Kalilah McClendon, Founder and CEO of Melanin Bliss Media, and this is The Melanin Memo.

Today's note is a little different. I want to walk you through what The Memo is becoming, because the publication has changed enough since you first subscribed that you deserve to know what you signed up for.

What Melanin Bliss Is Now

Melanin Bliss Media is an independent cultural digital media platform. Not a newsletter. Not a niche site. A publication built bottom-up starting with the person, the community, the lived experience and working upward through the systems and institutions that shape Black and Brown daily life.

MB covers what the rest of the field doesn't, won't, or can't. The Piedmont Henry doula case during Black Maternal Health Week 2026 was the documented test: a story a friend personally asked me to cover because no other outlet would touch it. MB delivered. The Name Your Price investigation is in development for the same reason. MB is the platform people call when the story has to be told and no one else is willing to tell it.

That work has a frame. I'm reimagining media as public health. Information is care. Truth-telling is healing. What mainstream outlets distort, omit, or sensationalize about our communities isn't just bad journalism it's a documented driver of mortality, morbidity, and economic harm. MB closes that gap.

Five Pillars + Investigations

Going forward, every issue of The Memo lives in one of five pillars:

HEART — Where we feel it. Mental health, maternal health, reproductive justice, family systems.

HUSTLE — No handouts. Just Grind. Economic health, medical debt, employment, financial literacy as a public health issue.

KNOWLEDGE — They didn't tell you. We will. History/Historical facts, Receipts politics, scientific literacy.

CULTURE — Made by us. For us. Black creative production, faith, food, music, and community ritual.

HEALTH — Our health. Our future. Health equity, Health policy, hospital administration, hospital policy, and public health both its own pillar and the lens through everything else.

Plus a sixth space: INVESTIGATIONS. Multi-part work. Sounding the Alarm. The Hospital on Your Block. Name Your Price. MB Rate My Bill. Source-protected, legally reviewed, solutions-first reporting on the systems failing our communities.

If you only want some of those topics, you can now subscribe to specific sections. Click into any section page to manage your preferences.


Free, Paid, and Founding

Three ways to read:

FREE — The Memo. M/W/F. Politics, health policy, culture. Free forever, for everyone.

PAID — The Insider. $7/month or $70/year. Full archive access, MB Exclusives, subscriber-only investigative drops, and the members-only digital community where readers and I talk through the stories.

FOUNDING MEMBER — The Blueprint Circle. $250/year, capped at 100 founding members. Insider tier plus your name on the Founding Members page (if you opt in), early access to investigations, an annual virtual roundtable with me, priority editorial consideration for MB Spotlight, and recognition in MB's annual impact report.

If you've been reading free for a while and you're ready to capitalize the work — every paid subscriber compounds MB's editorial independence. Independent journalism isn't free. The cost of integrity is exactly why MB needs readers who can fund the work.

What MB Doesn't Do


Standards matter. Some of you have asked me to be clearer about them, so here they are in writing:

MB does not cover celebrity drama or gossip.
MB does not exploit pain.
Every claim is fact-checked before publication.
Every problem MB names includes a resource, a tool, or an action step. No trauma porn.
Source protection is absolute.
Editorial independence is non-negotiable. No partner — at any tier — buys coverage.


If those standards are why you're here, you're in the right place.

How to Reach Me

amber@mbmedia.co · 914.497.1480 · melaninblissmedia.com


If you have a story MB should be investigating, reach out. Source protection is absolute. If you want to support the work financially, the Partners page on melaninblissmedia.com walks through every option. If you just want to write back and tell me what you think of The Memo, hit reply. I read everything.

That's it for today. The next regular Memo lands Friday. We're going back to the work.

Thank you for being here.

— Amber

We challenge. We investigate. We restore the truth. Journalism for the culture. Reimagining media as public health. Not a brand. A blueprint.