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Goodbye to the
infinite slop feed.

Staying informed shouldn't feel so bad. Maybe it doesn't have to?

Instagram is not a good place to get the news. Neither is X, or YouTube, or TikTok, or the ninety-seven newsletters you subscribe to that arrive throughout the day and pile up unread.

We all know this, and yet—every time you open one of those apps, thirty minutes vanish and you come away feeling worse than when you started.

You didn't ask for this. But then, what choice do you have? You want to be online—just not that online.

I wanted to get off social media and still stay connected to the conversations and stories that matter to me. So I built The Gist.

Every night, The Gist reads through hundreds of newsletters, social feeds, and news sources. It looks for stories you'll care about, figures out what's actually relevant, and writes you one email.

The Gist has a point of view—it's curated, opinionated, and doesn't try to cover everything. But it's also yours. Reply to any edition and talk to it like a personal editor. It learns what writers, sources, and topics you care about—and it surfaces things you wouldn't have found on your own.

Reply as much or as little as you want. It's great out of the box and gets better as it gets to know you. There's no app, no feed, and no ads. You get an email, you read it, you reply when you want to adjust something.

That's it. That's the whole product.

Try it out and reply any time to let me know what you think.

— Nick

Questions

Is this written by AI or a real person?
Both. I'm a real person and The Gist has a real editorial point of view—it's not a generic summary bot. But it's also assisted by AI, which is how it can read everything overnight and customize each edition for each reader. I curate the voice, the sources, and the editorial sensibility. The AI handles the scale. Think of it less like “AI-generated content” and more like a publication with one editor and a very fast research assistant.
How does it know what I care about?
When you sign up you can tell me what you're into. After that, just reply to any edition—“more culture, less politics,” “keep me up to date with the Epstein files,” “skip crypto forever”—and your Gist adjusts. No app, no logins. You just talk to it like a person.
How is this free?
This is an experiment. I'm building it because I think the way people stay informed is broken, and I want to see if something better is possible. There's no ad model, no VC money, no growth hack. It costs me real money to run, and I reserve the right to shut it down or change the model. But for now it's free, and I just want to see if we can make a news product that actually feels good.
What sources does it read?
Hundreds of newsletters, news sites, and social feeds across every major topic—from politics and tech to culture and business. The source list is curated and always expanding. If there's something you think is missing, just reply to an edition and tell me.
What if I don't like it?
Reply “unsubscribe” to any edition and you're out instantly. No guilt trip, no “are you sure?” screen, no 14-click retention flow. I'd rather have fewer readers who actually want to be here.
Does this compete with newsletters?
Not really. The Gist isn't a replacement for your favorite Substack writer and it's not designed to compete with the people you already love reading. It's more like a personal editor—someone who takes away the tax of sifting through noise every day to find the takes you actually want. If your favorite writer drops a new piece, The Gist makes sure it gets through to you so you don't have to go hunting for it. In that sense it's really more of a competitor with social feeds, which are a high-cost, low-signal way of finding the information and media you actually care about.
What do you do with my email?
Send you The Gist. That's it. No selling, no sharing, no third-party anything. If you unsubscribe, your data gets deleted.
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