The Monday Media Diet with Sophia Smith Galer

On Private Eye, The Sims 3, and Reverso Context.

I first saw Sophia’s fun investigations of the Arabic language in the flurry of pandemic scrolling. She put together a great edition this week. -Colin (CJN)

Tell us about yourself

I’m a 29-year-old Britalian living in London, England, where I’ve been all my life except for stints in Spain, Lebanon and - wait for it - up North (Durham and Salford). I am a freelance journalist, author and content creator; people online know me either for being a viral TikTok creator, the author of a book debunking sex myths and pseudoscience called Losing It, or for being a recovering VICE News and BBC reporter. I also write In Other Words on Substack.

Describe your media diet

For my sins, I still get a lot of my news from Twitter, desperately looking for crumbs in its collapsing information structure. My content diet otherwise almost exclusively comes from Instagram and TikTok. At this point I’ve curated my social feeds well enough to the point that if there is news floating around relating to my personal interests, it finds me. I get to watch great health and feminism content doing this, and it never comes from a news brand. It always comes from a creator, often with expertise in the area, like a doctor. 

When content doesn’t come to me via an algorithm, it’s because I’ve sought it out on Google or the BBC News website, or because I’ve had time that weekend to buy the weekend papers (The Guardian/Observer on a Saturday, The Times on a Sunday). I like lethargic Sunday paper reading and I am also obsessed with recipe segments, which I rip out and hoard ahead of dinner party plotting. This is also why I am obsessed with the weekend paper Waitrose publishes, which is going to be the most middle class thing I ever say, but it is honestly a brilliant weekly review of interesting things I didn’t know about across food and agriculture. 

When there’s a major news story unfolding that I feel like I don’t understand, I like to listen to podcasts about it. I’ve been enjoying the News Agents when I’ve needed that. But I find it hard tuning into a podcast weekly if it’s about news; it’s too boring for me. I am, by nature, a news avoider, not a news junkie like many of my journalism colleagues are. I would much rather binge listen to My Dad Wrote a Porno or You’re Dead To Me. 

Aged 29 I should have also probably got my own Private Eye subscription by now as I read that too, but that would mean telling my dad to stop buying it for me, which has become a family ritual I’d hate to deprive us of. He always reads it first, and sometimes circles bits he thinks I’ll find interesting, and then he gives it to me the next time he sees me. Last year he opened it once and found my name. I had always thought my first mention in Private Eye would be a roast, but instead it was praising my an investigation I did. It was very cool. 

What’s the last great book you read?

My response to this is unoriginal given it seems to have been one of the most successful books of the past few years, but it’s Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. I brought it on holiday with me as I wanted to force myself to only read fiction for a week. I grew up addicted to fiction, then I became a journalist and now seem to have a chronic non-fiction-only problem. Anyway, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow fixed me. I love playing video games and was thrilled by how much a book transported me into that world - I didn’t think it was possible. 

What are you reading now?

Viorica Marian's The Power of Language. Most of the content I make is about language, and my biggest goal this year is improving my Italian. I'm enjoying reading this book written in praise of multilingualism.

Who should everyone be reading that they’re not?

Megha Mohan's journalism. I mean literally millions of people read her work on the BBC website, but not nearly enough people talk about it in writing spaces. It's solid gender reporting that battles through news agendas and content feeds, reigning victorious. I am biased because I also know her personally, but I remember when she was a stranger. I was a teeny weeny nobody at the BBC and she gave me the time of day when plenty of others didn't. That generosity is visible in her writing, too. 

What is the best non-famous app you love on your phone? 

Reverso Context. Indispensable if you speak more than one language.

Plane or train?

Both are far too noisy and I can't get decent internet on either of them. I'll take walking every time. I once walked the camino ingles in Spain - about 116km.

What’s your reading strategy when you pick up a print copy of your favourite publication?

When I read Private Eye I read the first page, then skip straight to the Streets of Shame to read about the media industry. It has often been the case that I’ve found out information about whoever my current employer was for the first time from a Private Eye article - which should tell you a lot about how transparent media organisations are with their employees. 

Tell us the story of a rabbit hole you fell deep into.

Going into rabbit holes is literally my job. I get to do it for pleasure sometimes - there isn’t much I don’t know about The Sims 3. One of the worst though has to be online virginity communities. I investigated lots of them for Losing It because there’s a chapter in there on how virginity still holds importance for many people today, whether that value is a positive one or a negative, stigmatised one. Only about a quarter of my rabbit hole dive went into the book. If you want to learn anything about virginity auctions or exchanges - yes they do exist - I’m, unfortunately, your girl. (SSG)

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Thanks for reading,

Noah (NRB) & Colin (CJN) & Sophia (SSG)

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