💥 Zeteo UK Is HERE!

Read Mehdi’s announcement, explaining why we're launching a UK-focused Zeteo offshoot, who we’re bringing with us, and how we plan to fix a broken British media.

I can’t quite remember the exact moment when I realized we needed a Zeteo specifically for the UK.

Was it after watching the Gorton and Denton by-election in late February, when almost every major media outlet from Sky News to the BBC to the Daily Mail helped spread Reform UK’s lie about British Muslims engaging in illegal ‘family voting’ for the Greens?

Was it after examining the egregious failure of mainstream media in the UK in the first week of March to describe the joint U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran as illegal, a violation of the UN Charter, and a clear act of aggression?

Was it after reading a linguistic analysis by UK media bias comparison app NewsCord in late April, which showed how some of the UK’s leading news organizations “failed to name Israel as the perpetrator in Israeli attacks where civilians were killed in Gaza” in around half of all cases?

Was it after witnessing the British media pile-on against Green Party leader Zack Polanski in early May, over the issue of antisemitism, while most journalists gave Reform UK leader Nigel Farage a pass on that same issue?

Or perhaps… it was all of the above.

The UK media is broken. TV ratings are in decline, newspaper circulations have been collapsing for years, and trust in journalism is disappearing fast. Britain ranks 32nd out of 48 countries for trust in news, placing it in the bottom third of the countries surveyed, and far below the levels seen in other major European democracies. The only professions in the UK that command less public trust than journalists are advertising executives and politicians.

I have to say that I take no pleasure in the crisis engulfing the British media. I spent a decade inside the mainstream media, working for the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, and Sky News. Those were the years that shaped me as a journalist. I worked alongside many remarkable colleagues and came away convinced that a strong and healthy democracy depends on a strong and healthy media.

For far too long, however, mainstream media in the UK has failed the public. It has downplayed the rise of the far right at home while helping manufacture consent for genocide abroad. It has claimed the mantle of fearless truth-telling while too often bending to the wishes of the powerful. It has stressed independence and impartiality while too often bowing to corporate interests – or, in the case of the BBC, to political pressures from the government of the day.

The good news is that there is another way. In the United States, independent journalism has exploded, reaching millions of people who no longer defer to establishment media gatekeepers. Polls show Americans increasingly placing more trust in independent and online journalists than in traditional national news organizations.

There is no reason Britain cannot follow America’s lead (at least in this one positive trend!). No reason we cannot build a media landscape that is more fearless, more accountable, and more willing to speak truth to power.

We, Zeteo, have had huge success in the United States as an independent outlet – breaking big news stories and producing ground-breaking documentaries; winning multiple awards; and acquiring hundreds of thousands of loyal subscribers on Substack and millions on YouTube. All this has been possible thanks to the financial support of all our paid subscribers. Every paid subscription helps us expand and fund real journalism.

Now, we want to replicate that growth and success in the UK. Zeteo UK will produce exclusive UK content by UK reporters for its subscribers. We’ll be bringing together some of the smartest British media voices from across the political spectrum – including Sangita Myska, Owen Jones, Grace Blakeley, Afua Hirsch, and Peter Oborne - while our daily coverage of Westminster politics will be helmed by former ITV News reporter and presenter Shehab Khan, who has interviewed the past six British prime ministers.

Oh, and I’ll be involved too! I plan to join many of Zeteo UK’s live events, both online and in person, as well as co-host shows and write op-eds. (I caught the UK politics bug at a very young age and – despite Donald Trump’s antics now commanding much of my journalistic time and attention – I haven’t lost it yet!)

So why would you not subscribe to it?

To be clear, this is a soft launch. We’ll spend the coming months expanding our reporting, growing our team, and building something worthy of this historic political moment in the UK. We’ll be publishing videos and articles on a semi-regular basis, some of which will be paywalled. Then, in September, we launch officially with daily content, including op-eds, news shows, and video podcasts – and we’re also planning a big live event in London with a very prominent British politician!

But every launch has a beginning.

Tomorrow, with your help and support, a new force for journalism, truth-telling, and disruption arrives in the UK media landscape.

Today, Zeteo UK is born.