What's Next for the Brackets?

I'll tell you if you keep reading.

In April 2020, I made a snap decision that has, over time, aged in strange ways. I could not have known it was going to lead to this moment. Sometimes, you just follow an innate impulse and let the chips fall where they may.

I, of course, mean my decision to tweet this.

Josh Spiegel @mousterpiece

Look at this asshole.

That tweet (you’ll have to click through to see the screenshotted remarks I was inspired to tweet about) ended up getting a ton more traction than I expected for an early-morning jibe at someone who is — in fact — very rich and — in my opinion — very dumb.

At the time, I thought of this gentlemen as inordinately powerful, but not in a way that affected me directly (as a person who does not own a Tesla, nor plans to). Ah, privilege. It’s fun until it’s gone!

April 2020 is when I also made a snap decision to do a March Madness-style bracket to decide the best Disney Animation title among 64 options.

Starting with that initial bracket, I’ve done 32 over 2 1/2 years, all on Twitter and all a lot of fun. Many of them provide a welcome outlet that allows me to tune out the real world for a few minutes a day, and I hope they provide a similar outlet for you.

But as much as I like the brackets, I am not particularly enamored with sticking around on a site owned by — to quote my tweet above — this asshole, considering that I, and you, do not have to.

Anyway, this is a very long-winded way of building up to the news: I am moving the brackets to Substack.

Questions?

What does this mean for me?

Starting with the next bracket, you will have to vote in the polls on Substack instead of Twitter. That’s really the long and short of it.

Do I have to pay?

Nope — this newsletter is free. (And to be clear: my choice to move the brackets is mine alone, and not a partnership with Substack.) Maybe one day enough of you will be willing to pay for the newsletter, but today (and likely for always), it’s free.

Are you leaving Twitter for good?

No. I have reviews, essays, etc. I’ll post there, and I’ll nudge people to the Substack to make sure they know where to vote. But I’ll be there less often.

What about the Disney Legends bracket?

It started on Twitter, and it will end there. I’ll do the daily tweet-thread for the Disney Legends bracket like usual, through November 13.

When does the next bracket start?

Monday, November 28.

That’s a longer gap than usual.

It is! But a) I like to take a couple days off between brackets usually, and b) with the Thanksgiving week, it would be weird to start and pause a bracket a few days in.

So what is the next bracket?

An answer for another day.

But you do know the answer already, right?

I do. And it is possible the photo above this set of questions is a hint.

So how will voting work on Substack?

As noted above, it’ll be the experience of voting, just on a different site. And instead of voting in a tweet-thread, you’ll vote on the polls in a single post, once a day.

What if I am a lurker to your Substack and don’t subscribe?

You’ll have to be a lurking subscriber. I gather from Substack’s support site that if you a) are not currently a subscriber and b) try to vote in a poll, the site will ask you to sign up.

And it costs me how much again?

Nothing! Subscribing to this newsletter is free. Just as Twitter is free (…for now), I wanted to make sure that if I shifted the brackets, they’d move to a similarly free site.

Do you think you’ll ever go back to Twitter for the brackets?

Anything is possible. I mean, one day, it might cost $240 a year to stay verified on Twitter and the next, it might just be $96 a year!!!

Uh-huh. Are you still going to do your breakdowns of what you think should win?

I’ll do those in the same posts with the polls themselves.

Can you undo the PizzeRizzo win?

No one can undo Twitter history. Not even that asshole.