Substack becomes more social with the launch of DMs

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Substack introduces direct messaging, allowing users to have private one-on-one conversations, the company announcement Today. DMs can be accessed in the Chat tab of the Substack app and website. By default, users will only receive DMs from people they are connected with. Other messages will be sent to a Requests folder where you can choose to accept or reject them.

After launching an X (formerly Twitter) clone from last year called Notes, Substack is now copying yet another feature of the social network. A few months after Notes launched, the company began allowing users to to succeed. Although Substack is best known as a newsletter platform, the company has slowly been shifting its platform to become more of a social network over the past year, and the new DM feature takes that transition a step further.

Substack claims that DMs were a highly requested feature among users, and many users shared their excitement in the announcement post. But not everyone may be interested in this addition, as one user commented asking if DMs can be disabled, noting that they didn’t want people to contact them directly. Substack responded and said that users can disable DMs by going to their settings and setting “Allow message requests from” to “Nobody.”

The company tested DMs with a small group of writers and found that they can be used to retain followers, connect with other writers, and cultivate a community of readers. Substack hopes that DMs will strengthen the connections that writers make on the platform.

Image credits: Substack

If editors want to encourage their readers to message them directly, they can add a “Send Message” button to new posts. Substack says it can help writers do things like solicit news tips or collect questions.

The launch of DMs comes a few days after Substack has updated its peer-to-peer recommendation system, allowing writers to organize and share a list of publications for their readers to subscribe to. The idea behind this change is to allow writers to help other writers expand their reach and potentially get more subscribers and followers.

Substack had a controversial start to 2024 after saying it would not ban Nazi newsletters. Hamish McKenzie, CEO of Substack said although Substack bans posts containing “incitement to violence,” the company will stick to a “decentralized approach to content moderation.” In response, notable writers like Casey Newton And Ryan Broderick decided to leave Substack.

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