Why Is Substack Performing Fundraising?...

... and calls it investment?

Substack is calling for people’s support

Two days ago, Substack sent out e-mails to authors, informing them that they can invest in Substack through crowdfunding with as little as $100, and they enjoy priority over readers:

Own a piece of Substack

All readers here know how unique and wonderful Substack has been. It started small, but managed to grow, while attracting authors by investing in them well before it received its 20% share back from paid subscriptions. It represents one of the final bastions of Free Speech. Yet how much longer can it do that?

Apparently, Substack performed fundraising in March, 2021, but the sources of the funds received are not specified in the article, although the authors do state that this is the first “community round.” The authors emphasize that Substack is still a startup and returns are far from guaranteed, although buying these “shares” does mean some sort of ownership. The authors explain the objective of maintaining a forum for Free Speech that remains financially independent from large investors, which is something I fully support what the article states about this:

To realize this mission, we have to do much more than build good software. We have to build a new kind of network: one that unlocks the scale and democratizing power of the internet but is based on principles that give control to writers and readers. In such a network, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Each new person who joins Substack makes the network more valuable for everyone else.

Obviously, “joining Substack” here means financial investment.

So, what is NOT in the article?

First, the investment is not of the traditional kind. Without being able to look into Substack’s accounting books from the very beginning (I would need to see a list of all its previous investors and its expenses), I can only conjecture, and there are some good and some bad possibilities (obviously, there are more, but I am writing an article, not a book):

The best:

1. Substack is looking for further expanding (which is stated in the article) and restructuring in order to preserve its original profile and become less vulnerable technologically and, perhaps, legally. I hope this is the truth and the fundraising will produce sustainable results.

The good:

1. Due the high inflation rates, previous calculations are not working now to keep the enterprise afloat, so those, who want it to survive, might as well help out.

The bad:

1. Substack has been approached by unfriendly parties that want to take it over or threaten/harm/sue it into oblivion, unless the owners sell it to them. The owners are perhaps raising some money before they leave (this is a nasty thought, but such things happened before in business plenty of times).

2. Substack owners rewarded themselves too generously and now the figures do not add up, because prices of everything have risen too much unexpectedly. New capital can keep the site afloat a little longer.

3. Substack is under legal attack and it needs to lawyer up to an unprecedented extent.

The worst:

1. Substack owners have already transferred ownership without announcing it, and the new owners are doing a bit of fundraising only in order to keep up appearances.

2. As in the case of the Canadian truckers, “authorities” are collecting the details of those who are willing to contribute in order to prioritize “the enemies of the state.” Charges will be raised, bank accounts frozen (well, the CBDCs will take care of the latter, anyway), and lists generated of those scheduled for deportation to “re-education” camps.

3. As it happened to the Canadian truckers, they never received a penny from the first round of crowdfunding (they had to switch to another company).

I truly hope, it is the best option that will prevail, but to me, it looks like all the rest are also in play, although it’s unclear how far they have gone by now.

Building a strong network

The most important and barely visible way to foil the globalist plan is to keep and expand your relationships. Do not become isolated:

https://rayhorvaththesource.substack.com/p/the-most-important-thing-anyone-can

The following statements are essential in the Substack owners’ article, and in my experience as an author here, they are true:

Substack is a subscription network. We think subscription networks will play a major role in the internet’s next chapter. They represent a step forward from social networks.

While social networks are associated with advertising and attention, subscription networks are about direct payments and trust. While social networks facilitate shallow connections, subscription networks foster deep relationships. While social networks are about lock-in and platform ownership, subscription networks are about freedom to move and creator ownership.

While there are authors with barely three times the number of my subscribers (but I often have the same number of visitors on my site) publishing shallow and misleading articles have “hundreds of paid subscribers” (that’s when I suspect fake paid subscriptions taken out of the black budget on the taxpayer’s expense), I am at 13 (about one in a 100 readers are able/willing/daring enough to help out), which doesn’t enable me to support Substack with more than what is taken out of my readers’ gifts, anyway, but I would definitely contribute, if I could, because sufficient funds would at least give Substack a chance. Maybe, by the time the second “round” comes up, I will have enough supporters.

Apparently, there are people with a little money who subscribe to my logic:

At the moment, the crowdfunding is nearly over at

https://wefunder.com/substack

and “$6,574,482 has been reserved by 5,706 investors.”

Each person invested $1,152.2, which suggests that big bad investors either aren’t playing or they have been using thousands of agents to make their presence invisible. Big investors might also stay away, because they are aware of the imminent financial collapse that will reduce the buying power of the dollar to ashes. After that, there will be no room for a company like Substack, because people’s CBDC will be centrally controlled and divergent opinions are not going to be tolerated.

The situation reminds me of a line from an old poem,

“Bask in the last rays of sunshine, but don’t expect it to save the summer.”