Now Is the Time to Subscribe to The Hinternet!
A Word from Our New Managing Editor, Olivia Ward-Jackson
Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Olivia Ward-Jackson, one of two new Managing Editors at The Hinternet — and unlike my elusive colleague, Hélène Le Goff, there can be no doubt as to my existence. If you don’t believe me, you can ask my mother, or, most days, you can find me wandering the streets of Westminster (often dressed as a milkmaid) — or else searching for mythical black panthers in the English shires.
Which brings me to how I became involved with The Hinternet. I’ve spent the past two years begging its Founding Editor to contribute essays to UnHerd magazine, where I also work as a Commissioning Editor. He has written for me on topics as bizarre and complex as the origins of our belief in extraterrestrials, Surrealist sea-cucumbers, and the poetic depths of Nick Cave. But the odd essay was never enough, given how much I admire JSR’s work, and so I am over the moon to be joining The Hinternet.
As Hélène has already explained, The Hinternet is in the process of metamorphosing, from JSR’s personal and most idiosyncratic writing experiment, into —well— a most idiosyncratic magazine, featuring a stunning slate of contributors of, shall we say, varying degrees of metaphysical robustness, some of whom are both luminary and existent, while others merit only one of these designations. But to pull off this creative feat, we do very much need a proper operating budget. And alas, sigh, we don’t all have investment-banker husbands like Hélène…
So here comes the awkward part: while we love nothing more than good wishes, good vibes, energetic “like”-clicking, and above all, our distinguished readership, we also need paid subscribers to keep this cerebral circus on the road. We currently have around 15,000 readers in total (though individual essays can reach more than 50,000), and if every single one of you subscribed, we could really wreak some havoc on the dreary old Discourse. Our readers include some of the smartest and most influential people in media, academia, and the arts, as well as an inspired bunch of online libertines dreaming of something more than takesmanship and SEO-milking. We remain at present, however, a boutique operation, aspiring to something more than that, and utterly convinced that the balance between quality and quantity is not a zero-sum affair.
Some readers, we understand, might miss the more intimate good old days. But I can assure you, while we now have a proper Masthead, a great group of contributing writers, and in so many other ways may now be said to “contain multitudes”, all these multitudes are but variations on the same shared vision and sensibility. We can thus guarantee that the core purpose of The Hinternet today remains the same as it was at its founding in 2020: to break free of the imperatives of the news cycle; to defy the pressures and expectations of the droning chatter of “the They”; to play chicken at the boundary between fiction and non-fiction, between essay and storytelling; and to exploit all of the resources our new information media provide in free exercise of the imagination.
But all of this takes time, teamwork — and, alas, funding. We were joking the other day when we insinuated that we had received funding from Thiel Capital. In fact, we are entirely subscription-funded. That said, if you happen to be one of the good rich people —we know there are at least a few of you out there reading right now— and you are in the habit of investing in promising new endeavours of potentially great cultural significance, then do get in touch: editor@the-hinternet.com. (I can promise you that sponsoring us will be far more amusing than buying an organic vineyard — or worse, funding a political campaign…)
If you are not blessed with great riches, no matter. You can support our mission by subscribing to The Hinternet for less money per month than you are probably already paying for some other subscription deal you signed up for and then forgot about, but never notice because the amount periodically removed from your bank account is so very small. We can promise you, unlike those other guys, you won’t forget about us. And today, we’re offering 25% off all subscriptions. So, tell your friends, your shrink, your weird survivalist uncle, and that affable ghost in your fireplace to subscribe to The Hinternet — we promise, this is an investment that will pay handsomely.
Olivia Ward-Jackson
Managing Editor, The Hinternet
