From war to Styles The media pioneer finding new ways to deliver the news to gen Z's phones

Lucy Blakiston, the 27-year-old founder of a thriving global media company, loves being underestimated. And swearing.

- Eva Corlett

"I wear on purpose the girliest, pinkest, most colourful outfit to an event of tech bros," she told the Guardian from her home in New Zealand's capital, Wellington.

"I like them thinking, 'who the f*** is that and why is she here?' and then slowly start to release when I open my mouth and talk, 'oh, she knows what she's talking about."

Blakiston is the founder of the online media platform Shit You Should Care About, a company that says it "cuts through the bullshit" to make global issues and news accessible for broader and younger audiences.

She trawls news websites to pull together easy-to-read stories on everything from celebrity culture to news on conflicts, which she then boils down to digestible snippets to share on Instagram, X and TikTok. Fans can also subscribe to a free newsletter and tune into podcasts, while paying subscribers fund the business.

What began as a blog with her friends Ruby Edwards and Olivia Mercer in 2018, Shit You Should Care About has since amassed nearly four million followers on social media, including Bella Hadid, Madonna and, to Blakiston's surprise, the US podcaster Joe Rogan. It has more than 80,000 newsletter subscribers, and has spawned a podcast series and book titled Make It Make Sense.

Nearly half of the platform's followers are based in the US, with roughly 30% in the UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.