Substack CEO Chris Best on democratizing media, content moderation & freedom of speech
"If you're a consistent advocate for freedom of the press, you will unfortunately have occasion to quarrel with every party and every side of the political spectrum," says Substack CEO Chris Best.
As one of the most important platforms for independent writing online, and one of the only ones not reliant on advertising, Substack has sometimes attracted controversy for its content moderation policies. Today on Revolution.Social, Chris and Rabble talk about the "Nazi bar" problem, the democratization of writing, and the future of free speech. They also discuss the competing business models of the creator economy, why platforms like Elon Musk's X suppress external links, and the purpose of media in the age of AI.
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
03:37 The Origin Story of Substack
10:32 Internet Protocols & Spam Filters
13:18 Building a Platform With the Right Incentives
22:47 The Subscription Model vs. Micropayments
26:43 Expanding Beyond Newsletters
32:57 Freedom to Exit
35:33 The Future of Media and AI
40:19 Algorithmic Transparency
42:03 Free Speech and Democratization
46:19 Disinformation & Takedowns
49:39 Who Else Should Be on the Podcast?
52:10 The "Nazi Bar"
54:51 Outro
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This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing.
To learn more about Rabble’s social media bill of rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/
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Why We Need a New Social Media Bill of Rights
Thanks for listening to Revolution.Social! in this bonus episode, recorded live at Web Summit Vancouver in May 2025, Rabble speaks with Penny Daflos, reporter for CTV News Vancouver. They discuss Rabble's work as part of the founding team at Twitter, why we need to reframe and create social media 'rights' for both developers and users, and how to create better places to connect online.
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This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing.
To learn more about Rabble’s social media bill of rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/
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Yoel Roth on Banning Trump, Battling Bots & the Difficult Job of Trust & Safety
"Content moderation decisions are like assholes," says Yoel Roth, the former head of trust & safety for Twitter. "Everybody's got one."
The underrated challenge of working in trust and safety is that every decision could affect millions of users, and the reasons for those decisions are often opaque. Today on Revolution.Social, Yoel and Rabble talk about what goes on behind the scenes when a platform like Twitter wants to do something like ban President Donald Trump; how moderation best practices can work on decentralized protocols; and the fallout of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections.
" The most striking thing to me from a lot of that work was how a lot of the Russian accounts that we identified on Twitter weren't posting lies."
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
03:42 Yoel's Origin Story
06:25 How Content Moderation Starts
08:56 Banning Trump
11:22 The Future of Social Media Protocols
16:12 Trust and Safety on Decentralized Platforms
21:12 Inauthentic Activity and Bots
28:22 The Arms Race Against LLMs
29:47 Community Self-Governance
38:28 No, You Need Moderation
42:09 The Homogeneity of Tech Founders
46:20 Should Twitter Promote Democracy?
48:59 Why Spam Really, Really Matters
51:31 Who Else Should Be on the Podcast?
Follow Rabble:
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This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing.
To learn more about Rabble’s social media bill of rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/
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Kara Swisher on Tech Founders' Flaws & Why Social Apps Are the New Cigarettes
The founders of social media companies like Facebook and Twitter never cared about the lofty ideals they claimed, says longtime tech journalist and podcaster Kara Swisher.
"I never thought they were idealistic. I thought they were there to make money," she says.
Swisher, who co-hosts Pivot and also hosts On With Kara Swisher, likens tech giants to the Borg from Star Trek, constantly absorbing smaller companies to fuel their growth. But she sees potential for better user experiences and moderation tools in some platforms, such as Bluesky and Reddit.
Today on Revolution.Social, she and Rabble also discuss how letting users moderate their own communities can create healthier online spaces; why cell phones should be banned in school; and the silver lining of Elon Musk's Twitter takeover.
This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing.
To learn more about Rabble’s social media bill of rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/
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Jack Dorsey on Selling Twitter, Leaving Bluesky & What He's Building Next
Twitter never should have been a traditional tech company, says Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey. Instead, it should have been designed as a protocol — like email, or podcasting.
“That was the pure expression of it from day one,” Dorsey says. “And it was never really allowed to be that because it was on this fast track to becoming a public company.”
Today on Revolution.Social, Dorsey explains why it’s still possible to build a successful business on top of open protocols and decentralized social platforms like Nostr. He and Rabble also discuss why Jack doesn’t regret encouraging Elon Musk to buy Twitter; why he left Bluesky; the problem with centralized AI firms; and the evolution of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.
This episode was produced and edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm, and executive produced by Alice Chan from Flock Marketing. Special thanks to Sebastién Moret.
To learn more about Rabble’s social media bill of rights, and sign up for our newsletter, visit https://revolution.social/
A podcast about the future of social media and reclaiming our digital communities.
Revolution.Social is hosted by technologist and community advocate Rabble, a.k.a. Evan Henshaw-Plath — who was Twitter’s first employee and hired Jack Dorsey. In weekly interviews, Rabble will interview thought leaders, technologists, academics, and more about the need for a new social media "bill of rights."
Just as the original Bill of Rights protected individual freedoms from government overreach, we need fundamental protections from corporate control and surveillance capitalism. This is the start of a conversation about what developers are building, how they're building it, and what consumers need to be asking for.
Guests will include Jack Dorsey (former CEO & co-founder of Twitter); Kara Swisher (host of On with Kara Swisher, co-host of Pivot); Cory Doctorow (science fiction author & former editor of Boing Boing); and Taylor Lorenz (founder of User Mag, host of Power User).
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