Substack Notes

✋✋✋I Can Name Twitter in One Note — Substack✋✋✋

Twitter’s Elon Musk throws a tantrum at Substack, and Twitter Files’ Matt Taibbi leaves Twitter for good

Twitter drama, never ends. And if you think today, you are on the good side of Elon Musk, think again. Elon Musk only cares for Elon Musk.

Breaking News — Matt Taibbi is leaving Twitter.

A few months ago, he was Musk’s golden boy alongside with other journalists given access to what they collectively called the — TwitterFiles.

But it only takes very little for the world’s richest man to throw you off the bus, especially if you no longer serve his purpose.

Earlier this afternoon, I learned Substack links were being blocked on Twitter. Since being able to share my articles is a primary reason I use Twitter, I was alarmed and asked what was going on.

It turns out Twitter is upset about the new Substack Notes feature, which they see as a hostile rival. When I asked how I was supposed to market my work, I was given the option of posting my articles on Twitter instead of Substack.

Not much suspense there; I’m staying at Substack. You’ve all been great to me, as has the management of this company. Beginning early next week I’ll be using the new Substack Notes feature (to which you’ll all have access) instead of Twitter, a decision that apparently will come with a price as far as any future Twitter Files reports are concerned. It was absolutely worth it and I’ll always be grateful to those who gave me the chance to work on that story, but man is this a crazy planet.

Have a great weekend, everyone. I’m off on vacation with my kids next week, but I’ll check in. Best and take care, Matt — Full statement by Matt Taibbi on Substack

Substack Notes

What is it? A Twitter copycat? Substack defines notes as — Post short-form content, recommend anything.

It hasn’t officially been released yet.

And yet, Musk is already boiling mad with another “Twitter copycat,” it could be a knee-jerk reaction to the failure of Twitter Blue.

Nobody wants to pay Musk $8 a month, not even New York Times is willing to pay.

And Musk retaliated by removing The New York Times’s blue tick.

Again, if Musk can do that for $8, imagine if you suddenly dump the app in favor of its competitor after he gave you exclusive access to material that you can profit from as a journalist.

And you wonder why he doesn’t take your calls.

The war is on

If you search for Substack on Twitter, you will be redirected to #newsletter in the search results.

And when something like that happens on Twitter, it only means one thing, the world’s richest man woke up a Twitter engineer in the middle of the night and demanded a new feature — change the code.

Techcrunch had this to say,

So much for “free speech absolutism.”

Twitter is censoring Substack links by making the posts impossible to reply to, like or retweet. While quote-tweeting works, simply pressing the retweet button surfaces an error message: “Some actions on this Tweet have been disabled by Twitter.”

The timing of this action doesn’t seem coincidental. Two days ago, Substack launched its Notes feature, which looks a whole lot like Twitter. Unlike other new Twitter alternatives, Substack has a huge advantage: people actually use the platform, and many writers already have massive followings there. Such writers include Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss, who Twitter owner Elon Musk partnered with to publish “The Twitter Files.”

Under Musk’s ownership, Twitter has also taken steps to suppress content from Mastodon, an open source social network that gained a sudden influx of users when Musk took control of Twitter. In December, Twitter temporarily suspended Mastodon’s account and banned posting links to Mastodon servers. On its formerly banned Twitter account, Mastodon said, “Not a good sign if you need to build a wall to keep people in.” — Excerpt, Twitter won’t let you retweet, like or reply to Substack links

Over at Twitter,

Elon’s pettiness is boundless. Searching Twitter for the word “substack” now returns search results for the word “newsletter.” Elon is as big an asshole as I’ve ever come across in my life. And I’m a Trump biographer. — Seth Abramson

Searching for substack now brings up a search for newsletter. An unspeakably petty move that he’s yet to address publicly. Is Substack Notes really that scary a feature to Elon? — Ed Zitron

Substack

Twitter shut down Revue the newsletter platform it bought before Musk's buyout of the company.

It happens all the time.

Same ideas, or copied ideas in the tech industry are nothing new.

Substack remains unbeaten as a newsletter platform. It boasts over 35 million subscribers, with 2 million paid subscribers creating a healthy creator economy for its writers.

There are more than 35 million active subscriptions to writers on Substack, including more than 2 million paid subscriptions. Readers have paid hundreds of millions of dollars to writers on the platform. There has been a Cambrian explosion of great writing, and writers have been saying (unprompted, we promise) that Substack has changed their lives. Encouraged by this early progress, we’ve become excited by the prospect of pushing the subscription network into new territory. — Excerpt, Introducing Substack Notes

Twitter is a behemoth compared to Substack. For Twitter to engage in a petty display of its size and power only makes the case against Musk’s leadership of the beleaguered social media platform.

Twitter Files

Twitter Files was supposed to be an explosive exposé. It turned out to be a dud.

But Musk and his fanboys savagely used Twitter Files to undermine and threaten ex-Twitter employees before Musk’s takeover. One employee had to flee his home after Musk tweeted ad hominem attacks against the guy.

Twitter Files shared internal conversations between Twitter executives. And when the likes of Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss willingly allowed themselves to parrot conspiracy theories that many of Musk’s fanboys on Twitter loved, they have become Musk’s pawns against anyone he considers as his enemy and that included every ex-Twitter employee who resigned or he fired.

In the same way, he used Twitter even before he owned it to create drama or weaponize it against anyone he disliked, and that included Bill Gates and former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal.

Twitter’s founder Jack Dorsey who once hailed Elon Musk as the only ‘singular solution’ to run Twitter had to apologize a few times to Twitter’s ex-employees affected by the changes made by Elon Musk since the buyout, he also wrote a long essay about what he thinks of the Twitter Files,

… in his post that “mistakes were made” at Twitter, but that he believes the company had “no ill intent or hidden agendas, and everyone acted according to the best information we had at the time.” — The Verge

Even the Twitter employees named in the Twitter Files admitted that it was a mistake when they took out the Hunter Biden story as so did Facebook days before the 2020 US elections, as it turned out the Hunten Biden story, first shared by The New York Post was “true.”

Final thoughts

Elon Musk’s leadership while hailed by his fanboys is widely seen by his critics as his Achilles’ heel.

His new enemy is Substack.

We can only watch in anticipation what will happen if one day Facebook launches a Twitter copycat.

Not even Mark Zuckerberg is untouchable when it comes to Elon Musk’s Twitter show.

Thank you for reading.

Here are some of my stories, all complimentary.

👉Why Elon Musk Fired Twitter CEO Who Asked for A Hand Raise Emoji✋ — Free Reading.

👉Back the F*CK Off, Tom Hanks — Free Reading.

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