Help us build a media outlet you deserve in 2026
A holiday message from Rahim Jessani, founder and editor of Bottom Up
Dear reader,
I hope you are having a great holiday season. Every year, we send a thank-you message to appreciate each one of our subscribers and remind ourselves of the community we have built online and in real life. I am so grateful for the love and support you have given this young founder to keep pursuing his dreams of creating an outlet that truly represents the voice of the next generation and the powerless.
In 2025, we gained nearly 20,000 followers and reached over 8 million people. I went on TikTok live (almost every day), covering the most important issues for you and with you. I personally got your concerns out there to some of the most important people in journalism.
However, our work these past few months has become more challenging and, to some extent, dangerous.
Due to financial constraints, I have had to step away from this newsletter and the quality of reporting on our page to focus on keeping the lights on at Bottom Up Media. This newsletter, as you may know, has gone from a weekly newsletter to bi-weekly, and now monthly.
I tell you this not for sympathy.
Over the course of the last six years, this outlet has seen roller coasters, from shutting down to having a whole team, to being leaders in the field of creator journalism. I am grateful for the progress and change we have made.
But to be frank, I need your help.
The reality is that this work will not be funded by big corporations. It won’t be funded by billionaires. It will be funded by you. The people. It will be brought to life by a simple belief in people and a crazy dream of changing news and media.
Young people need your help. Marginalized communities need your help to sustain our independent reporting.
Here is how you can support our work.
Become a member of our community
For just $6.99 (the price of a cup of coffee), you can support my work, and these contributions can help me purchase video software and tech to produce higher-quality video content. It will also give you the benefits of extra videos on TikTok and unlock our video interviews, which we plan to do more of in 2026.
Purchase a Bottom Up Media T-Shirt
Purchase a Bottom Up Media T-Shirt for $25!
We have pre-order forms available now, and these are running out fast. These are a great way to show off our work to your friends and family and can help us fund some interns as we try to produce more on-the-ground stories in Boston. (I will reach out to you once we are ready to ship them via email)
If you can’t contribute, that’s okay. You are still a key member of our community by being a subscriber to this newsletter, which I promise will be better in 2026 but will remain monthly. If you are already a paid subscriber, or bought a shirt, thank you for your support of our work.
With love,
Your friendly neighborhood journalist,
Rahim