Substack has lastly added DMs to its platform, permitting publication subscribers and writers to speak straight with others.

Introduced on Wednesday in a weblog publish, Substack messages now sit inside the new Chat tab on the app and web site. You will see messages from newsletters you are subscribed to alongside these with different customers you are linked with — all different messages will go right into a Requests folder, which you’ll be able to approve or reject like different messaging platforms.

If you wish to message somebody on Substack, you are able to do so from a author’s web page or one other consumer’s profile web page, or straight within the Chat tab. You may as well share posts or Notes (Substack’s reply to tweets) via Chat. Blocked and banned customers will not be capable to message individuals who’ve flagged them, and you may report messages inside the Chat app — a operate solely added to Substack in January.

Past being a approach for customers to construct neighborhood with different customers, Substack sees the function as a very good alternative for writers to construct a profitable subscriber base; for instance, as the corporate urged in its publish, DMs might be a restricted perk for paid subscribers, with a lock icon showing for non-paying readers. Writers may also contact fellow writers to collaborate straight inside Substack.

It is a much-needed drawcard for Substack, which has been floundering via controversy after controversy amid its ongoing content material moderation points and the corporate’s insufficient dealing with of misinformation and hate flourishing on the platform regardless of its Phrases of Use and Content material Pointers. Although Substack stays in style (in 2023, the corporate mentioned it had over 20 million month-to-month lively subscribers and a pair of million paid subscribers), customers have left the platform in droves, a number of instances.