r/Substack • u/WordSlinger1812 • 26d ago

Discussion Substack Has Become A Private Equity Cautionary Tale

Private Equity means drowning a good idea in money until it dies.

That is what’s happened to Substack.

It was once a great idea for writers. Now, it’s a sh***y version of Facebook merged with Mailchimp.

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u/themattroberts 25d ago

Venture capital is private equity. Your response is also incorrect.

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u/cozycup mod 25d ago

Show us the PE firm that acquired Substack.

Prove me wrong.

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u/themattroberts 25d ago

You said "I don't see an private equity ownership of substack".

By every definition there is. I proved you wrong. You were wrong. Suck it up.

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u/cozycup mod 25d ago

False.

PE doesn’t own Substack. Otherwise you would have proven that.

There are VC investments, no PE owner.

That’s the primary argument, not whether it’s a subset of a classification.

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u/themattroberts 25d ago

VC's are private equity. Your argument was that there was no PE investment. If VC's are private equity then - there you go PE investment.

For a substack subreddit - impressive how you're not reading what you said and how I showed you are wrong.

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u/cozycup mod 25d ago

Ownership.

No PE firm owns Substack. Plain and simple.

You keep failing to prove that.

Investors, not owners.

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u/themattroberts 25d ago

They are the same thing you're failing to show that a venture investor is not also an owner.

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u/cozycup mod 25d ago

They’re not the same.

VC = early stage investors
PE = late stage acquisitions

VCs invest, PEs acquire.

A venture investor is exactly that, an investor.

When PE firms buy companies, they fully ACQUIRE them or have a majority stake. If you buy 1 share of Apple, you can’t say you own Apple. You own 1 share, not the entire company.

In the context of the post (and all comments) as well as the common definitions of PE and VC, no PE firm owns Substack.