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If you follow the tech news, you will know that Elon Musk has gone to war against Substack. He wants to punish it for launching a feature called Notes, which he fears may compete with his increasingly rickety Twitter platform.
Yesterday morning I found that no one could retweet Substack links to my pieces. By the evening, Musk had lifted the ban. But if Twitter users clicked on a link, they received a warning that made it sound as if they were about to enter the dark web.
I had put up a tweet about a long read on the fascistic nature of the Russian state.
The link brought up this message.
Because of the subject, some readers thought I was the victim of Russian dirty tricks. I explained it was Elon Musk’s dirty tricks we needed to worry about, but given his support for the Kremlin line on Ukraine, it was hard to distinguish between the two.
Substack tweeted a reproof, which was remarkably mild given that they are on the receiving end of an attempt by Musk to weaken their business.
True to form, Twitter refused to allow anyone to reply, like, or retweet Substack’s message. So Musk is not only suppressing free speech, he's also suppressing discussion of his suppression of free speech. Way to go, tech bro.
Since launching Writing to London in December, I have become committed to Substack, and made producing this newsletter my fulltime job. When Substack unveiled its new notes feature this week, it offered a mission statement that strikes me as wholly admirable.
We were dismayed with the clickbait and content farms, the listicles and liars, the cheap outrage and culture wars. We thought there could be something better if writers and readers were given more control and treated as a higher priority than advertisers, and if culture makers could find financial dignity without needing to sublimate themselves to attention games and corporate marketing budgets.
So we set about building a system that fosters deep connection and quality over shallow engagement and dopamine hacks. We turned away from advertising and the attention economy and toward subscriptions and direct relationships. We believed that something beautiful could emerge from marrying the internet’s powers with a business model that puts writers and readers in charge, that rewards great work with money, and that protects the free press and free speech. We came to believe that this model — a subscription network — could form the basis of a new economic engine for culture.
If I must choose between Twitter and Substack, I will choose Substack without a moment’s pause. But I will not pretend that Musk’s games won’t hurt me and hundreds of other Substack writers. We used Twitter to promote our work and attract new free and paid subscribers. Until the ““free speech absolutist” relents, we are in a bit of a bind. Could I ask you to consider
Upgrading to a paid subscription if you are a free subscriber
Gifting a paid subscription to friends who may enjoy Writing from London.
Sharing my pieces with your social networks
Many thanks for your support. Without it, I would not be able to write.
Nick
What was that HL Menken quote? "Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one?"