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by crocodiletears 1976 days ago
A few of Substack's writers wouldn't be allowed for long on a Twitter-owned platforms, and they know it. Writers like Greenwald, Yarvin, and Taibbi are all to varying degrees, transgressive enough and critical enough of social media to perceive the extra cut Substack takes as a reasonable ask in exchange for a greater level of platform security.

Substack will certainly lose a lot of writers, but I think it'll be safe as a profitable niche alternative.
2 comments
dragonwriter 1976 days ago
> A few of Substack’s writers wouldn’t be allowed for long on a Twitter-owned platforms, and they know it.

Maybe, but two of your three examples clearly would be allowed, and quite active, for quite a while "on a Twitter-owned platform":

> Writers like Greenwald,

https://twitter.com/ggreenwald (1.5M followers, since Aug 2008)

> Yarvin,

The only one without an obvious verified account on Twitter. There's a no-activity @CurtisYarvin regular account, though.

> and Taibbi

https://twitter.com/mtaibbi (0.5M followers, since May 2009)

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crocodiletears 1976 days ago
You're conflating mantaining a presence on the platform, with the willingness to make it your source of income. It's a matter of risk mitigation with consideration to Twitter's history of moderation.

I cited them not because they've been deplatformed, I cited them because they've at various points commented on media and platform censorship.

Considering Twitter's response to the Hunter Biden NYP story, and the fact that Greenwald left The Intercept over its inwillingness to publish his opinion piece on it, I doubt he would trust a company under Twitter to host his content.

Yarvin is an obvious no - being a neoreactionary who makes often despicable-sounding commentary, Twitter would be unlikely to keep him online and commercialized with pressure from activist groups.

Taibbi is quite moderate, but from interviews, I'd place him in a similar to bucket to Greenwald in terms of demanding editorial independence, and a durable revenue stream from his host platform.

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kixiQu 1976 days ago
Aren't they all active on Twitter? Greenwald certainly is. It's a major part of their brand-building effort already at the very least
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crocodiletears 1976 days ago
Yarvin isn't, to my knowledge. It's a matter of how they communicate on the platform, vs off. It's entirely feasible for them to present their more anodyne content on the platform, while still expressing a wider range of ideas and opinions off of it. This has been the smartest strategy for a while. Twitter doesn't usually care what you do outside their platform.
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dragonwriter 1976 days ago
> It’s a matter of how they communicate on the platform, vs off. It’s entirely feasible for them to present their more anodyne content on the platform, while still expressing a wider range of ideas and opinions off of it.

Greenwald’s Twitter is no more anodyne than his substack; the only real difference seems to be the usual kinds of adaptation to microblogging vs. long-form.

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