Why subscribe?

The UK’s capital city is poorly served by the media. Too much of the journalism about London, from both Left and Right, is negative and simplistic.

I try to provide an antidote to that, both as an individual and as publisher and editor of the multi-contributor, no ads, no paywall website OnLondon.co.uk, whose operation and freelance writers my earnings from this Substack help support.

I publish here only stuff by me. About half of it is free to all subscribers, and nearly all of the free posts are articles that have already appeared at On London.

The other half of my output here is my paid-for newsletter On London Extra, which comes out every Tuesday and every Friday (except when, very occasionally, it doesn’t).

On London Extra is comprised of original writing, which won’t be published anywhere else, analysis, opinion, gossip, links to recent On London output by other writers and things to bring you pleasure and joy.

Another benefit of becoming a paying subscriber is that, from time to time, I will be able to offer you free or discounted tickets to interesting London events I am involved with.

Before founding OnLondon in February, 2017, I was, from 2008, the Guardian’s award-winning, self-publishing London commentator working as a freelance from home. I’ve been a London-based freelance writer since 1981, having moved to the city as a young man in 1979.

I am the author of Olympic Park: When Britain Built Something Big, which tells the story of how London came to host the 2012 Olympics and the huge regeneration programme in the east of the city, near where I live, that it entailed. That book led to my researching and writing an award-winning BBC Radio 4 documentary, presented by Gabby Logan and produced by Andrew McGibbon.

I am also a trustee of The London Society, in partnership with which I make two kinds of podcast: scripted, radio documentary-style shows with Andrew called London Explained, and conversational ones with significant Londoners called Talk About London, which I co-host with London Society chair Leanne Tritton.

I also make my own, very rudimentary podcasts under the heading True London. My YouTube channel is here and audio versions of the True London podcasts are here.

Alongside all the above, I write London sketches, reflections and fiction under the pen name John Vane, who has his own Substack and also appears at On London. As John, I have also written a novel - a political satire called Frightgeist, inspired by the pandemic, the rise of populism and today’s social climate of volatility and anxiety.

Thanks for reading. Please subscribe!