Substack co-founder Hamish McKenzie discusses why Substack chose a hands-off content moderation model rather than following the policy rulebooks of major social networks.
Assertion Not checkable as stated
McKenzie: Musk offered to buy Substack and make Chris Best Twitter CEO
“And he responded by getting Chris on a call and saying to him, well, how about Twitter acquire Substack, and you, I'm looking for a CEO to run the company.”
Insight
McKenzie: Media succeeds when readers replace advertisers as paying customers
“The core insight he had was that you should make readers the customers instead of advertisers the customers. And if you change that core dynamic, especially if you monetize the relationship over time through enough subscription, then different things are possi…”
Opinion
McKenzie: Tesla had a messy, cut-throat, throw-under-the-bus culture
“It's totally different from Tesla, which was messy and cut-throat and had to, like, throw everyone under the bus kind of culture.”
Assertion Not publicly verifiable
McKenzie: Ben Thompson was earning over $1M annually from Stratechery in 2017
“We figured out, you know, through napkin math and guessing, basically, that he was already making more than a million dollars a year from that.”
Opinion
McKenzie: Patreon proved audiences will pay directly for creators they love
“Yeah, Patreon, I think, is a hugely important company because it changed the culture. It showed not only that people will be willing to pay for content online, they'll be willing to pay for the artist or creator who they most love or trust.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
McKenzie: Tech sector believed a billion-dollar company for writers was impossible
“2017, writers were not the sexiest customer base in the world. No one thought they were going to build a billion dollar tech company by serving writers. In fact, people were forsaking writers, forsaking the media, turning their back on that, they'd given up on…”