Today the founder of beehiiv wrote a pointed Substack takedown post. It was called “Death by a thousand substacks: if you’re not a breadwinner, you’re the yeast”.

My newsletter was explicitly called out as an example of Substack’s “50 shades of dark patterns”.

My two cents: ignore it.

What beehiiv misses is that Substack fosters a community of writers and a community of readers who want to engage with their ideas. So what if “my” audience gets introduced to other fantastic writers on the platform? Or gets invited to download the Substack app?

We won’t thrive by tearing each other down. With a platform like Substack, we all grow together.