Good morning,
I’ve been writing this newsletter for a while (and don’t plan to stop!), but I’ve finally arrived at the end of an era, I think.
6 years ago, in December 2019, I started writing letters because I felt completely taken by two relationships: me + the news, and me + care work. I needed a space to think about why media consumption felt so heavy and maddening, and why my ability to value care work, both for myself and others, felt so impossible.
I ended up with a lot of notes.
They feel book-shaped to me, but at the moment, I am not convinced I have a tidy argument to present. I also have questions about what a book should be in 2026.
So: I’m opening up a print subscription to my… notes. Packets of working material pulled directly from the reporting, reading, and research process.
Why print?
The mediums available to me right now for longform nonfiction don’t feel right for the moment I’m (we’re?) in:
Journalism asks for far too tidy a synthesis for the world we’re currently experiencing. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve felt unable to pitch something to a traditional publication because I can’t tell you the headline…or I can, but I don’t think it serves the research.
Doing knowledge work with AI asks for a form of metabolism I don’t have. I’m learning and accessing so much, but very little of it is really making it into the deeper parts of my life. Synthesis needs to happen offline.
Traditionally published nonfiction is often too slow to publish. By the time a project is live, the energy electrifying it is gone and the questions may have changed.
Also, I find the reporting and research process much more interesting than the tidy output. And yet it’s often the loneliest, reader-less space. I want to write to people who want to sit with something book-shaped while it's still being made.
If you’re interested in low-fidelity, from-my-own-printer notes, essays + some hand-written artifacts on some of the big questions I’m currently sitting with, I would love your company!
It will be an intentionally small run and priced in a way to allow me to work on this for a year (6 editions sent over 1 year at $180).
(Scroll to the end to learn more about the project & subscribe by mail.)
If you’re craving time offline + want to be part of this:
I’m setting aside six correspondent slots for readers who’d like to be in exchange with me on this—you would receive the packets for free and contribute something to the project over the year (e.g.: a reference, a conversation, a synthesis session, your own notes).
If that role interests you, reply to this email with a question (or few!) that you’re currently sitting with about time, care, media, work or tech.
So what’s happening to the newsletter?
Last year, I started a new series here called Companion Machines—field notes and reflections on living with intelligent tools, from the perspective of knowledge worker and parent. If you’ve been reading along, you’ve already seen some of it.
They’ve lead to the questions I feel taken by today:
how to understand our humanity in the age of AI
how to reckon with our value as workers and caregivers
how to create culture as traditional systems of production dissolve
We’ll still examine care, time and media but with an emphasis on navigating emerging technology.
To follow along, you don’t have to do anything different, just note that the newsletter is under my name now. Both Companion Machines and Time Spent (the full archive) are sections of it.
TL;DR — Subscribe by May 31
To receive mailing #1, please subscribe by May 31. Late joiners will receive earlier editions alongside the current one, but I do think pacing matters.
See some of you at the post office!
Jihii
P.S. I write these essays for free, but some of you have been Sustaining Readers along the way — I can’t thank you enough! If you’d prefer to support the newsletter without subscribing to the print edition, you can become a Sustaining Reader here ($7/month).