Substack

The Internet has led to remarkable and fast change. Local and national newspapers, magazines and other content have moved online. The problem is making money. One such method has been subscriptions. Substack is the website of writers. It explicitly provides a platform for writers to sell their work. Substack take a cut. 

One-way writers have promoted their Substack content is via Twitter.  A link to work with a suitable headline. To help discussion with writers, Substack now have a feature called Notes. This allows readers to comment on articles and have conversations. 

Elon Musk exploded. Substack links appeared to be blocked. Were they blocked or was this just another Twitter glitch? The media sent Twitter email and got a customary poop emoji as a reply because Twitter no longer has a media department. 

With Twitter billions in debt and Musk in charge the problem could have been anything. Substack is making a good try of finding a business model for writers. 

Musk is making a dog's breakfast of finding a business model for Twitter. Advertisers are fleeing the platform and there are few subscribers to Twitter Blue. Blue is a Netflix subscription price for permission to have a blue check mark beside your identity. Good value for scammers on the platform. Less useful for most people. 

Substack links were re-enabled. It's up to you whether you believe it was a technical error or you think it was Musk's erratic management that switched them off. Whether Twitter can establish a subscription model like Substack is down to the users. So far, it's not promising. 




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