After Asking My Twitter Followers to Subscribe to My Substack, Twitter Flagged My Account as Spam and Shadow Banned Me, Again.
This isn't the first time that I have been under attack by Twitter, however, this time my account is essentially nuked (or at least nuked like Japan was).
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Twitter, now called X because its man-child owner is obsessed with the letter but doesn’t realize the name Twitter represented something, has essentially nuked my account. And I don’t mean it’s nuked like, completely gone, no I mean it has been nuked like Nagasaki.
So while technically not completely destroyed, it’s just a sad reminder of something that once was, and now it looks like a neutered dog; you know when you look at a neutered dog and it just makes you feel bad every time you see it.
I’m unable to get any traction on my posts, comments aren’t viewed, and the only account I’m allowed to follow is Elon Musk (because he’s a narcissist). But if you knew the full Twitter problem you would know that the censorship is just as bad as before.
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Please do us a favor by liking, subscribing and restacking this article to keep us favored in the algorithm. Substack’s algorithm is not a fan of us so we would appreciate your support.
My history with Twitter goes back to 2011, but that’s a story for another time. For now, let’s just focus on when I made my current account in June of 2023.
I had just started Substack and on June 1st, I decided to make a new Twitter to promote my old Substack publication. Unfortunately, upon publishing my first article on June 3rd I was immediately suspended and then left with a shadow ban after my appeal was successful. You may ask, “what did I share on Twitter?”
Oh you know, a story about a groomer trying to indoctrinate children into becoming drag queens. This clearly wasn’t a controversial topic because Twitter was filled with Pride Month propaganda and clips exposing groomers, however, the big issue was the fact that I was publishing from Substack.
The bad blood between Substack and Twitter started almost a year ago. It was April 2023 and Elon had previously hand picked Substack journalists to release what would become “The Twitter Files,” a collection of evidence that proved that, before Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, the government had asked Twitter to intervene on their behalf to censor conservatives and dissidents. The Twitter Files first began in December of 2022 and went on until late March of 2023.
For most people this was not a surprise but for some it was quite a shock. I of course have been getting cancelled and banned for over a decade, so as you can imagine, I was well aware.
The cause of the bad blood was actually pretty simple to see; Substack had just released Notes, their social media app. Musk and Twitter were not thrilled with this, as you can imagine; now Substack could grow a community and drive people to their publishers without having to do outside promotion.
This caused Twitter to begin censoring any Substack links which actually caused a huge fight between Matt Taibbi and Elon Musk. Taibbi whose publication, Racket News, which is hosted on Substack was censored upon the news of Notes launch and subsequently brought an end to The Twitter Files.
Musk had intended to bring attention to Substack and use it as a method of increasing cross platform revenue, however, Substack wasn’t getting the same kind of money that Twitter was. Substack doesn’t rely on ad revenue, instead it relies on a subscription service.
According to
in a post announcing Notes:“While Notes may look like familiar social media feeds, the key difference is in what you don’t see,” said the Substack co-founder Hamish McKenzie in a post announcing the feature. “The Substack network runs on paid subscriptions, not ads. This changes everything. Here, people get rewarded for respecting the trust and attention of their audiences. The ultimate goal on this platform is to convert casual readers into paying subscribers. In this system, the vast majority of the financial rewards go to the creators of the content.”
The problem for Substack was the fact that only a select amount of publications got exclusive access to The Twitter Files, and since Substack runs on paid subscriptions, there was far less money being generated on the Substack side. And it should be mentioned that the journalists that were given access to The Twitter Files were promoting their work on Twitter.
So, Elon essentially got to use Substack as an ad revenue service by driving more people from Substack over to Twitter to verify the information. While only a select number of people made money on Substack, all of Twitter was able to generate the company substantial money based on viewership.
There is no doubt that Elon was considering making Substack his next purchase. Substack had been struggling to generate enough income to play with the big boys during the 2022 fiscal year (after losing money in 2021), however, 2023 was a game changer.
Notes didn’t just roll out in April of 2023, it had clearly been in development for at least a year, which is why Substack had been trying to crowdfund in March of 2023. It’s quite clear that the $5 million that Substack was crowdfunding would be used for Notes and any finishing touches that it needed. Since then, Notes has single-handedly reassured the world that the platform is here to stay.
However, before Substack Notes:
Many Substack authors rely on Twitter for both reader acquisition and content to write about, leaving the newsletter platform in a painful position if Musk’s chaotic administration of Twitter since his $44bn (£38bn) takeover last October were to lead to the social network’s collapse.
Notes was specifically made to save the company in case Twitter couldn’t find advertisers or simply drove them off.
Musk decided to have any tweet containing a Substack link censored. Essentially they were to be algorithmically deprioritized, blocked, or hidden in the search feature. Searches for the term “substack” itself were automatically replaced with searches for the word “newsletter”. And many of the people that were able to click on the links were given a warning that the links were “unsafe or malicious.”
According to the Guardian:
Taibbi, one of the most prominent writers on Substack, found himself in the middle of that conflict. Despite working closely with Musk on the Twitter Files – a selective publication of internal Twitter documents authorized by Musk with the apparent goal of demonstrating liberal bias under its former management – he said he would be leaving the platform over the restrictions.
That departure prompted a response from Musk, the company’s first public statement on the matter, days after the first reprisals against Substack had been noticed: Musk falsely accused Taibbi of being a Substack employee (he is not), claimed Substack links “were never blocked” (he later admitted they were temporarily marked as “unsafe”), and accused Substack of “trying to download a massive portion of the Twitter database to bootstrap their Twitter clone”, which Substack’s chief executive has denied in a post on Substack Notes.
So since June of 2023, I have been shadow banned. And every interaction I have gets deprioritized or doesn’t result in any views. Despite what Twitter claims, they are still targeting Substack writers because they are afraid Substack with it’s 35 million users will quickly increase to the point that Twitter has serious competition. And when it comes to the ad revenue vs subscriber reality, subscribers are showing up in droves to support journalism while Elon is still fighting with advertisers.
And the thing that got me flagged and shadow banned this time was direct messaging ten of my subscribers and asking if they would like to join my Substack subscriber list. Apparently that is considered spamming viewers and just in case you don’t believe me about not spamming, just look at my Twitter and then cross check when I mentioned the ban on Notes. Since being shadow banned again, I have to do captcha tests each time I do something on Twitter. Since June my follower list has also steadily declined.
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Even if my work was primarily done through a document maker like Microsoft Word, Twitter’s CEO, Linda Yaccarino, is all about censoring people. I’m not the only one that has noticed that Twitter is actively censoring people. Jeremy Hambly or The Quartering has been one of the most vocal members of the anti-censorship team. Recently he cancelled his $1,000/month gold verified check mark. If you click on the picture below, it will take you to his tweet.
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I have been saying this the whole time, do not trust Elon Musk and the people who suckle at his tit. Instead turn to God and reject the censorship that is prevalent in our society. Liberty Magazine will continue to fight against censorship on every platform and thankfully Substack has sided with us.
My understanding is all Substack accounts are shadow-banned on Twitter. I share all of my Substack post on Twitter because of the ease to do so. Just click and it’s on Twitter. It’s only today I have a had any traction since September. And just one guy commented and subscribed to my Substack.
in my view it is absolutely despicable after all we have been through with Covid. And he is just marketing himself as some kind of free speech guy. But we are so far behind getting anywhere near free speech, because of this vendetta he has against Substack. It's like, hey Elon, do you really care about free speech? Because you would think it wouldn't be a competition thing, it would be more of a celebration of free speech. He should be all for Substack. But on Twitter they all pat him on the back all the time. "Thanks Elon, for bringing free speech back" WHAT!!?!??!