Different Garden, Different Yield

The internal calls to ramp content moderation on Substack's Notes has already begun. This shouldn't even be an argument.

With a headline like that, some of you may think I’m about to go in on my plan for our 2023 backyard garden boxes. But I imagine you all know me better by now. I enjoy trying to find analogs that help illustrate my points and this piece is no different. It’s been less than a week with Notes but it’s definitely been an interesting experience so far. In the beginning it was almost unreadable because it wasn’t actually being used for discussion. Days 1 and 2 were what I can best describe as “shill city.” 

Many of the already enormous newsletter authors spent those early moments sharing links as if every user of Notes was there to shop for newsletters to subscribe to rather than just checking out a new platform feature. I’ve certainly been guilty of link-sharing as well in various ways, but it was rough when it was the only thing I was seeing. It’d be like if every single comment on a Substack post was people sharing unrelated links rather than talking about the post.

I’m glad that’s over. You know what I didn’t do? Bitch about it. I just didn’t use it. Simple. But I’ve been popping in and out and watching the development of this fun new canvas. I’m pleased to see that Notes posts are much less saturated with overt subscription marketing and that shift has made it a far more interesting area into day 6. We’re getting real discussions now and that’s a good thing. 

The Digital Garden

Notes is a big moment for Substack. If the users and the company do this right, it has the potential to seriously challenge Twitter as the place where people find news. Notes is the first UGC social platform that I can think of where the large, trusted publishers can live natively within the app rather than through some other website. 

For example, The Charlotte Observer is a newspaper that has been serving the Charlotte, North Carolina market for over 100 years. In the age of social media, The Charlotte Observer has had to use platforms like Twitter or Facebook to share links to the digital versions of its news stories. Those story links lead to a separate website that is owned and controlled by the publisher. 

Now, Charlotte news-seekers also have The Charlotte Ledger. A local news source that lives completely within Substack. As broad Substack readership grows, the team behind that publication has the ability to grow its subscribers natively through Notes. And while the aggregate users of Notes are currently not in the same ballpark as those of Twitter, the Notes users could potentially be more valuable because they’ve already shown an appetite for long form publication subscriptions.

But beyond just a tool within the larger Substack ecosystem, Notes is quickly becoming a battle ground. And the calls for protection from those with more delicate sensibilities are actually coming from within this ecosystem.

Different Farmers, Different Soil, Different Yield

Unlike many other social media platforms, Substack has repeatedly committed to allowing creative control at the user level. This upsets some people because they are convinced bad actors will use Substack to spread “hate.” What “hate” is hasn’t clearly been defined. And, frankly, it can’t be defined because what is determined to be “hateful” is different for everyone. There are really great authors who are holding the line on this. Many of them you already know and follow.

Some of the other authors on this terrific platform have been sharing clips from comedians like George Carlin, and those clips work wonderfully to illustrate this point. But in the interest of making the exact same point without sharing the same clips, here’s Steve Hughes’ equally impressive take:

He’s right. Without question. If the adults in the room would like to take control back, then Substack can not fold on this. Notes offends you? Fine. Just block the people who you don’t want to see.

Can we please have this?

Do we really need to baby everybody on the internet? Is it so difficult to just leave a platform if something is bothering you? Coming to Substack and then demanding Substack change moderation policies that were already clear from the jump is a bit like knocking on a tobacco farmer’s front door and demanding he/she start farming cucumbers instead because smoking isn’t healthy.

The tobacco farmer: “how about you GFY instead?”

We need to be okay with policing our own experiences. It’s that simple.

Cuban cigars taste different from cigars from other countries because there is something inherently different about the mineral makeup of the soil. I’ve touched on this concept before here on this blog.

But the point is some farms and climates are best suited for growing certain things. We wouldn’t expect Nicaraguan leaves to taste identical to Cuban leaves. And we shouldn’t even want that. Because then life would be dull and uninteresting.

Substack doesn’t have to be the same garden as Twitter, Facebook META 0.00%↑ , LinkedIn, or whatever other established social platform one wants to compare it to. There are plenty of newsletter services. If a writer doesn't like Substack's content moderation policies there is a wonderful solution that requires no internal pressure or disruption to other people. Publish somewhere else.

The reality is no garden is the same in nature and we don’t need to have the same gardens online.

Don’t cave on this.