Hello! My name is Isaac Saul, and I'm the founder of Tangle. I'm a politics reporter who grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, one of the most politically divided counties in America.
I've been a journalist for 13 years and I created Tangle because I recognize that the media is broken. Most news outlets have biases that are obvious to every American, we are all living in self-curated "news bubbles" where we are spoon-fed beliefs we already have, and if we log onto social media the people we disagree with are caricatured into the worst people possible. Put simply: Our information ecosystem is broken, and I'm trying to fix it.
Here's me hanging out in my home-away-from-home, with my family in West Texas:
Of course, everyone shares some blame.
Political reporting can be sensationalized and misleading. Politicians and pundits on both sides work hard to elevate the worst arguments of their opponents and say they’re representative of the other side's perspective. Influencers and talking heads are part of the problem, too. And even consumers (that's you) play a role by clicking on the headlines that are meant to evoke emotion.
Here's the truth: If you read any single news article about any one story, you are seldom getting the full story.
I created Tangle to fix some of these problems. My goal is to get people out of their bubbles, help us understand the political debates happening in a more nuanced way, and build a media organization trusted by people on the left, right and center. So far, we've done that:
- Media bias watchdogs rate Tangle as "center" bias and highly accurate
- Our audience is 40% liberal, 30% conservative, and 30% independent or "other" — so we are bringing a diverse audience under one roof
- More than 95% of all our readers, regardless of their political affiliation, say they trust Tangle to deliver balanced news
In order to do this work right, though, I had to make a tough decision: I was going to be 100% independent.
That means no investors and no outside influence. Every now and then, Tangle will partner with an advertiser whose work we believe in (ads only appear in the free newsletter), but over 80% of our revenue comes solely from subscribers and donations.
So, while keeping most of Tangle free, I ask my readers to support this project with a low-cost, monthly ($6) or yearly ($59) subscription to our newsletter.
To be clear: Anyone can read Tangle for free. But becoming a member gets you unique, members-only content and it means you're supporting independent media trying to do things the right way.
Here's what you get with your subscription:
- Subscribers-only Friday editions
- Optional Sunday editions with comics, games, and round-ups
- 100% ad-free newsletters
- Access to the comments section
- Transcribed interviews, deep dives, access to our partners' content, and full access to our archives, with over 1,500 posts on controversial topics
If you listen to podcasts, we have one of those too. And you can also bundle your newsletter subscription with a podcast membership and get 20% off those together.
So far, over 70,000 of our 500,000 readers have become paying subscribers, and 99% of all Tangle members stay subscribers every month.
Since you just signed up, I wanted to encourage you to take the leap and join those 70,000+ subscribers in supporting this new kind of independent journalism. Again: You can read our Monday-Thursday newsletter for free, but as part of this offer, if you subscribe in the next 72 hours, you can get 20% off our yearly newsletter subscription here, or 20% off a newsletter and podcast bundle here.
Thank you for trying Tangle, and I hope you enjoy the content.
Best,
Isaac Saul & the Tangle team