Jessica Testa and Benjamin Mullin at The New York Times:
In April 2023, the newsletter platform Substack received an unexpected proposal from Elon Musk, who had recently purchased Twitter.
Mr. Musk put it plainly: He wanted to buy Substack. At the time, he was trying to supercharge paid subscriptions on the social network, now called X, which had long fashioned itself as a “global town square” for political news and debate. Paid subscriptions are the core of Substack’s business.
He floated the acquisition on a call with Chris Best, chief executive of Substack, suggesting that Mr. Best could serve as chief executive of the combined company, according to three people familiar with the conversation.
Mr. Best declined to entertain the proposal, and the short-lived discussion ended, the people said.
One on hand, this would have been disastrous for the writers who have built businesses on Substack. On the other hand… yeah, it kinda tracks.