Substack Is Totally Borked on Twitter

Kyle Barr
·4 min read
3
Mobile phone with webpage of US subscription company Substack Inc. on screen in front of business logo next to Tweet with error message
Mobile phone with webpage of US subscription company Substack Inc. on screen in front of business logo next to Tweet with error message
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Users are unable to embed tweets on Substack or retweet the platform’s links on Twitter.

Like a voodoo doll that’s been poked and prodded by an overly-enthusiastic amateur magician, Elon Musk’s Twitter has started to come apart at the seams. Now it’s an open question if Musk’s well-known vindictiveness has broken another aspect of the site as Substack writers say their attempts to promote their work on Twitter and are being hamstrung.

Users have widely reported that they are unable to comment on or retweet any post that contains a Substack link. Similarly, on Thursday, Substack confirmed that Twitter embeds were no longer working on Substack, adding that it was trying to resolve the issue.

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Early Friday morning, users could post a Substack link, but every time you try to comment or retweet those links a message pops up reading: “Some actions on this Tweet have been disabled by Twitter.” Developer Jane Manchun Wong confirmed some attempts to engage with a Substack link also resulted in an “Authorization: Engagements are limited on tweet” error.

In Gizmodo’s own tests, we found that some older Substack links posted on Thursday or earlier are still fine. There’s also no issue we could find with Substack links that do not contain the word “Substack” in the name. However, trying to retweet or comment on a post containing a link with Substack in the URL from Friday morning onward results in an error message. What’s even stranger is that users can freely quote-tweet those posts without issue.

These issues come just a few days after Substack introduced new features meant to court Twitter users. On Wednesday, the newsletter company announced a new Notes feature. It works as a kind of Twitter-lite, where users can post short-form content and “share ideas with each other and their readers.” The interface itself bears a striking resemblance to Twitter, including a “What’s on your mind?” prompt at the top of the page next to a user’s profile image.

In an email to Gizmodo, Substack founders Chris Best, Hamish McKenzie, and Jairaj Sethi said:

“We’re disappointed that Twitter has chosen to restrict writers’ ability to share their work. Writers deserve the freedom to share links to Substack or anywhere else. This abrupt change is a reminder of why writers deserve a model that puts them in charge, that rewards great work with money, and that protects the free press and free speech. Their livelihoods should not be tied to platforms where they don’t own their relationship with their audience, and where the rules can change on a whim.”

If we tried to reach out to Twitter, the site would just send us a “poop” emoji, on Musk’s orders. Musk, the defacto PR apparatus for the bird app, has not yet responded to users’ queries about the issue.

Shortly after Musk took over the platform last October, Substack started actively trying to recruit Twitter refugees looking for a way off Musk’s sinking ship. Last year, the company unveiled Substack Chat for writers to talk directly to readers, but these latest features seem to deal directly with Twitter itself. Twitter recently announced changes to the platform’s API, including offering paid tiers to access the company’s developer tools. Some developers like those working on the Discord-to-Twitter bot TweetShift announced earlier this week they were suspended from the API.

If this were truly retaliation against Substack, the implementation is incredibly wonky and ill-considered. If it weren’t for the timing of Substack Notes, it would be easier to chalk this up to just another glitch on a platform that’s experienced multiple outages in recent months. Musk has been culling the global Twitter staff, and the site’s engineering teams meant to keep the platform stable have been significantly reduced. When your platform’s breaking down in front of everyone’s eyes, there’s a lot of room for plausible deniability against accusations of anti-competitive practices.

Users could of course post screenshots of tweets to Substack blogs, but that doesn’t offer anywhere near the same functionality. If Twitter is trying to make itself more of a self-contained walled garden, then limiting other apps on the platform is just the start.

Update 04/07/23 at 11:30 a.m.: This post was updated to include a statement from Substack.

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