This is not my message
6am reminder that you ≠ any platform
I looked over my partner to see the alarm clock on his side of the bed. 5.59am. If I’m awake first (unusual tbf), I’ll stay in bed until my son wakes up. I try not to check my phone yet.
But this morning I did check my phone in this order: WhatsApp, it’s a teacher training day at nursery and I didn’t finish planning childcare last night. The weather, entirely unnecessary but it’s another (😎!!) sunny day in London. Gmail.
I had more emails from Substack than normal. One of the first was a DM from my friend Kel. “Woah you might have been hacked”.
The other emails were notifications showing that I had commented all over my own posts inviting commenters to Telegram. What?
I ran downstairs to my laptop and sat at my dining table. I could still log in to my Substack account on my phone and laptop so changed my password in case I had been hacked.
I hadn’t. “Matillda Lucy BG” had impersonated my profile including bio and photo and was spamming readers in the comments.
The Substack AI support was actually pretty good and confirmed by 6.20am that the offending account had been suspended.
So phew, a lucky escape. Not hacked for now and hopefully no more spam from Matillda Lucy BG coming your way.
After the initial wave of relief and downloading my subscriber csv, I felt a rush of this kind of shit is exactly why I don’t want anyone to depend on any one platform to create value or build relationships. All platforms are vulnerable to being flooded with AI spam. Your account could actually be hacked. If it gets too spammy around here, I want to be able to leave and connect with you in other ways.
In 1964 (only just realised how lol this publication date is) Marshall McLuhan wrote The Medium is The Message in which he argues that the way content is shared is more important than the content itself.
I can think of no more likely Marshall McLuhan stans than the social media execs of the 2020s. Turning their mediums into the message is literally their MO! Turning a platform into a verb (Google it) or common noun (I wrote a Substack) is the holy grail.
I don’t want any medium to be my message
Fuck that! I want my thoughts to be the message. My work to be the message. My opinions to be the message. The outcome of our conversation to be the message.
So a reminder for all of us to make sure the medium is not the message.
Your message isn’t:
Your follower count on any one platform
Your content on any one platform
Your message is:
Your work + results
Your opinions
Your weird combo of interests
Your relationships
The way you make people feel
This way your message travels with you wherever you go. Ok rant over. Thanks again if you flagged the weird bot to me!
Chat soon :)
Matilda
Preach. Glad it's all sorted and a very important lesson, too!
Great vent, as vents go