To me that seems like the difference I guess, the mob will always be there but it is individual writers rather than the chaotic mess of people and algo-amplifie

To me that seems like the difference I guess, the mob will always be there but it is individual writers rather than the chaotic mess of people and algo-amplified-words you are bombarded with on other platforms. For example if you follow infosec twitter it's quite common to end up with a large amount of American political content whether you want it or not. Things like that don't really seem like a problem for substack where most have a single focus. Not to say that a writer can't go rouge, turning from pacifist to war-monger overnight and angering a bunch of readers, but the fallout from that seems quite limited, it's far less the platform in such a case. I've watched a few of my favourite journalists jump ship from big news companies with varying success, it's certainly not easy going full independent with your own site, even if you have a few decades of loyal readers behind you. Substack always comes across as a nice middle ground of independence with discoverability for professional writers along with less friction for readers.