What is The Signal?
We’re a new current-affairs brand—a guide to democratic life, the trend lines shaping it, and the challenges confronting it.
Democratic life is an unusual expression, but we think it’s essential—plain language for something once called the Free World that we otherwise don’t really have current language for:
- The connected affairs of democratic societies—their politics, economics, technology, and culture—and of those working to create democratic societies.
And what’s shaping and confronting democratic life is shaping and confronting yours.
What do you do?
In practice, this mission means a few—unusual—things:
- An organizing commitment to civic values, in American society and beyond, that transcend partisan identity;
- A question-based approach that puts issues of common intrigue and urgency ahead of ideological narratives; and
- A decentralized network of knowledgeable contributors—from across the country and around the world—in place of a concentrated set of professional opinion journalists.
We publish our email update twice weekly—it’s free:
We also publish observations and thoughts from the field on our site regularly.
We’ve published our first print extra, The Long Game:
And we run a regular slate of deep-dive articles, with an extensive archive, for our members:
Who are your contributors?
They’re from all over, representing all different kinds of knowledge and know-how. They’re not all-purpose “news experts”; everyone brings specific experience, general humility, and distinctive insight to the questions we bring them.
Here are a few:
- Daron Acemoglu, a professor of economics at MIT and a co-author of Power and Progress: Our 1,000-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity
- Alice Han, the China director at the New York–based consulting firm Greenmantle, where she leads research on the country’s economy, technology, and politics
- Martin Raymond, the cofounder of The Future Laboratory and the editor in chief of LS:N Global
- Sarah Myers West, the managing director of the AI Now Institute
- Marc Weitzmann, a French journalist and the author of Hate: The Rising Tide of Anti-Semitism in France
- Atika Rehman, the London correspondent and former managing editor for Dawn, the largest English-language newspaper in Pakistan
- Essam Daod, a psychiatrist and psychoanalytic therapist who co-founded Humanity Crew, an international-aid organization providing first-response mental-health support for refugees around the world
And your community?
They’re from all over, too—more than 100,000 people. In the U.S., they live in every state, not just in major media markets or urban centers; globally, they’re in hundreds of countries. What they all—we all—share in common: We’re independent-minded, committed to human flourishing, and busy.
What topics do you cover?
Democracy, autocracy, economy, technology, diplomacy, war, science, health, climate, law, crime, education, media, culture …
Why a new current-affairs brand?
In today’s media ecosystem, the dominant business model depends on addicting us to crisis, reshaping us into angry partisans, or both. It depends on keeping us in a digital environment designed to colonize our time and our lives.
Meanwhile, there’s a growing fear across news media that it’s losing its traditional authority and power. And the more it does, the more committed to this model it gets.
The Signal isn’t just an alternative; it’s a new kind of alternative—a brand designed to help us navigate democratic life; feel more grounded, resilient, and effective; and grow. It’s a companion, and a network of companions, for those who can’t afford to get caught up in media narratives or partisan propaganda but need to think for themselves.
You’re nonpartisan?
Yes.
So, you’re neutral?
No. We stand for the thing we explore—a moral idea and a vulnerable but resilient reality that connects people across deep differences here in America, where we’re based, and everywhere on Earth: democratic life.