---
published: true
layout: post
title: 'Commune Has An API And Substack Does Not'
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/apievangelist/api-evangelist-images/commune-has-an-api-and-substack-does-not.png
date: 2026-10-15
author: Kin Lane
tags:
  - Newsletters
  - Commune
  - Substack
  - Data Portability
  - Switching Costs
  - APIs
---
My first rule for any software I use to run API Evangelist is that it must have an API. Not just because I like APIs, but so that my business can get its data in and out. An API reduces my switching costs and leaves me with more control over my own operations. If I can't automate it, and I can't take my data with me when I leave, it is not a tool I am using, it is a tool that is using me.

That is why our newsletters are [moving onto Commune](https://apievangelist.com/2026/10/06/commune-shipped-an-api-and-our-newsletters-are-moving-onto-it/). [Commune](https://usecommune.dev/) shipped an API, and with it I can manage subscribers, publish issues and pull my data back out the same way I work with everything else in my stack. Substack does not offer a public API. I can read my posts through a feed and export a spreadsheet of subscribers by hand, but I cannot build anything on top of the platform where my audience lives.

I understand why Substack is the default right now. The network effects are real. The readers are there, the recommendations are there, and the conversation is there. Commune is not at that scale yet, and the network effects between the two are not parallel. I am not going to pretend otherwise.

But network effects follow control. Writers and businesses are going to move to where they have more control over their data and the ability to automate their work, and the audience follows the people it reads. Once enough of us are somewhere we can own our subscriber lists, wire our publishing into the rest of our operations, and leave whenever we want, the network effects will catch up. A platform that locks your audience in is betting you will never need to get it out. A platform with an API is betting you will stay because it is useful.

This is the same thing I ask of every API provider I profile on [APIs.io](https://apis.io/): publish the interface, so the people who depend on you are not left guessing or stuck. I hold the software I buy to the same standard. Commune has an API. Substack does not. That is the whole decision for me.