Jeanna Kadlec on Threads

Substack is completely gutting their business right now. Every writer I know is seeing our subscriptions plummet as our “follower” count rises. The whole value proposition of Substack is that it’s a newsletter and writer hub. This latest intervention is indicative of their efforts to transition to a social media hub where they can sell ad space.

For a few years I could get behind the idea that Substack was just an infrastructure company that writers could use to quickly build and monetize a newsletter. Hell, I used them for a year or so!

But the last couple years have shown time and time again that they do make moderation decisions and they want to be the platform writers and readers both log into to create value for Substack. One can like Substack, but pretending they’re just like DigitalOcean or open source blogging platforms is pure silliness.