It's official: Everyone can use Substack Notes(opens in a new tab) now.
This new feature from Substack, a newsletter platform, allows anyone with an account to share links, images, thoughts, and snippets from their Substack posts. It looks almost exactly like your Twitter home page — without Elon Musk, and with a lot more newsletters.
"Notes also marks the next step in our efforts to build our subscription network — one that puts writers and readers in charge, rewards great work with money, and protects the free press and free speech," Substack wrote in a blog post. "This work is at the core of the Substack model, and we believe it will be an important part of a new economic engine for culture."
This comes in the middle of one of the dumbest social media battles to date. The day after Substack announced their new Notes feature, Twitter began blocking likes, retweets, and comments on tweets that include a link to a Substack newsletter and blocked Substack writers from embedding tweets in their newsletters.
As tech reporter Casey Newton wrote in his Substack newsletter Platformer(opens in a new tab), which was "restacked" onto my Substack Notes feed(opens in a new tab): "Musk's chaotic overreaction to the mere development of Notes served to elevate an unreleased feature, overnight, onto an even footing with one of the most import social feeds in the world. And it will surely mean that more people play close attention to the product with Substack does launch Notes to the public."
It's unlikely that Substack Notes will replace Twitter — Substack is a place specifically designed for writers, whereas Twitter is open to a far larger audience. But if Musk was hoping to neutralize Substack Notes, the war between the two platforms is likely having the opposite effect. Instead of driving Twitter users and Substack writers to Twitter's newsletter platform, it's sending those(opens in a new tab) writers right into the warm(opens in a new tab) embrace of Substack(opens in a new tab).
