When Elon Musk accused journalist Matt Taibbi of being an employee of Substack, a publishing platform, and that same platform of stealing data from Twitter, my first reaction was that Elon would not have said any of this without evidence even though Taibbi and Substack’s CEO were both denying this. This led me to examine what happened more carefully.

I also think it’s critical for us to pause a moment and seek the truth. With this in mind, I asked Elon for context for the sake of this article. As you well know, I write articles that support the mission of Twitter 2.0 (X.corp.)  

My publication, “WhatsUpTwitter” was founded November 2022.  My goal is to “create a publication that strives to communicate accurate information about Twitter and leave the reader feeling hopeful and optimistic about the future.” 

This article is about an insidious attempt to destroy Twitter and sheds light on what really happened

As the first week of April rolled along, I watched what I think is one of the most insidious attacks so far on Twitter 2.0 since Elon Musk bought it. Even more so is the intensity of the sense of betrayal. A journalist who Elon Musk trusted not only stabbed him in the back, (in my opinion), but his actions showed that he wanted Twitter to fail. Again, this is my personal opinion.   

Substack’s copycat social media app looks almost identical to Twitter,  accompanies their blogging site, and is called “Substack Notes.”  This is alarming considering Elon Musk’s explanation that the platform was trying to download a large portion of the Twitter database.

“Substack was trying to download a massive portion of the Twitter database to bootstrap their Twitter clone, so their IP address is obviously untrusted.” – Elon Musk

Bootstrapping is a technique of loading a program into a computer by means of a few initial instructions which enable the introduction of the rest of the program from an input device, and this is what Substack was doing to create “Substack Notes,” so that is why it looks like a rip-off of Twitter because it is!

To further add salt to the open wound, a prominent writer of the Twitter Files announced that he was leaving Twitter for Substack Notes. It later came to light that he, by his own wording, is an employee of Substack. 

Matt Taibbi Declines Activating Twitter Subscriptions

It is well-known that Matt Taibbi released many Twitter Files threads. I wrote about that in many previous articles. 

With a large following and his notoriety on Twitter for releasing the Twitter Files (a generous gesture from Elon Musk), it seems it would make sense to take advantage of the Twitter subscription feature. I know that I would if it were me. I wrote in February about how writers with subscriptions activated will be able to publish directly on Twitter and get paid for it by adding essays as attachments to tweets.

An important context for this is that Taibbi declined Twitter subscriptions on the pretense that people would say he was an employee of Twitter. Why? And why would Substack choose this time to release their counterfeit version of Twitter?  Perhaps because of the gained fame of some of its leading writers with paid subs (on Substack) to raise free awareness through the use of Twitter.  And how did they gain in popularity?  Certainly, the release of the Twitter Files was a big factor.  

In my opinion, it feels like Substack wants to directly compete with and possibly ruin Twitter. And that prominent writer, Matt Taibbi, announced that he planned to leave Twitter and give up the opportunity to dual post his writing on both Twitter and Substack. 

Taibbi also declined to activate paid subscriptions on his Twitter account, which currently has 1.8 million followers. He could have many Twitter Subscribers and make a wonderful income as many people are already doing on Twitter. 

In a private email, Elon Musk shared some important context with me which made clear that Taibbi declined Twitter subscriptions on the pretense that people would say he was an employee of Twitter. Taibbi said that Twitter didn’t work for him professionally, questioned how he could market his work, and that if he were to post his articles to Twitter and enable subscription service, “people would say I’m essentially an employee of Twitter and both of us would never hear the end of it.”

Elon pointed out that Twitter isn’t giving Taibbi extra reach or any free advertising and rhetorically asked if the people using YouTube to post videos and earn money creating content were considered employees. He has an excellent point there. YouTube, TikTok, and other social media platforms pay users for content creation although they are not actual employees. 

In response to this, Taibbi said “The optics of that would be really bad journalistic ethics-wise.”

In my opinion, Taibbi is choosing to support Substack which wants to ruin Twitter. And the excuse of “journalistic ethics” is weak. Taibbi was, in his own words, a Substack employee. Keep reading for proof. 

Taibbi’s Work With Substack

In the above message thread, Taibbi himself admits that he was/is employed by Substack. 

What wasn’t apparent to most people was that Taibbi was, all along, part of the paid Substack Pro, or Substack Professionals program. Taibbi wrote about this in a newsletter that came to my inbox. Taibbi left out the details of just what his historical association was with Substack, and how much money he had gained and is currently receiving from Substack.

Substack was founded in 2017.  In 2018, founders Chris Best, Hamish McKenzie and Matt Taibbi, posted on Hacker News, 

“We’re Chris Best and Hamish McKenzie, the founders of Substack (YC W18), and Matt Taibbi, a journalist and author who has written four best-sellers and is a contributing editor to the Rolling Stone. Substack is a tool that makes it simple for a writer to start a paid newsletter – but we’re also experimenting with other models for online publishing. For instance, Matt is using Substack to serialize a novel called The Business Secrets of Drug Dealing: Adventures of the Unidentified Black Male, which you can see here.

Matt has so far published six chapters in the book. The serial is an experiment for him, too, but even when it’s done he intends to keep publishing his independent work through Substack. We thought it might be interesting to bring Matt into a Hacker News discussion about this model, other things that might be tried, and the state of online publishing generally.”

My firm belief is that Matt Taibbi was getting paid for and was working for Substack. I believe Elon Musk is correct when he asserted that Matt is employed by Substack.

Conclusion

The truth always has a way of coming to light. We will never truly know the motives of those journalists who took advantage of Elon’s generosity when releasing the Twitter Files. Yes, they performed a valuable service. However, Taibbi’s actions show that he was never on Twitter’s or Elon’s side. Running to the competitor, who he said was his employer, when given the opportunity to monetize his own Twitter account, is, in my opinion, proof of this. 

Those who want Elon Musk to fail, in my mind, are fine with humanity being doomed. Perhaps this seems an exaggeration but I fully believe that Elon’s heart is focused on helping all of humanity itself and this is why he bought Twitter. 

He purchased it with the solid intention of providing a digital town square for humanity.  Tesla and SpaceX are philanthropy and so is Twitter.  

Prior to Elon Musk, Twitter was raking in advertising profits based on the amount of likes advertising posts would get, but many of those likes turned out to be bots.  Twitter’s ad placement also had a net negative effect on companies as they were placed next to viral posts, and it is now widely known that some of those “viral posts” contained CSAM (child sexual abuse material). 

As Twitter, now officially X.corp, moves forward with the mission, it is clear that Substack Notes won’t be able to compete and their sad attempt to kill Twitter will one day be remembered only as a small glitch.  

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – April 11, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 (X.corp) and Elon Musk in both making lives better on Earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization. I write these articles, I will not use AI of any form to write them, they are time-consuming and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.