About
Why START exists
START began from a plain observation: the distance between what research shows and what the public believes keeps growing, and almost no one is paid to close it.
The problem
Academic work is written for other academics — as it should be. But that leaves the public dependent on whoever translates it next, and the loudest translators are rarely the most faithful. Findings get flattened into headlines, stretched into claims they never made, or buried behind paywalls. The result is a public that is both drowning in "studies show" and starved of what studies actually show.
The approach
START pays attention to one thing: fidelity. We don't chase engagement, we don't manufacture controversy, and we don't let a brief go out until someone qualified has checked it against the source. The people doing the translating are the same people who do the research. That's the whole model, and we keep it deliberately unglamorous.
Principles
Six commitments we don't bend.
Fidelity over reach
A brief that's accurate and quiet beats one that's viral and wrong.
Sources, always
Every claim links to the research it came from. No exceptions.
Free for the public
Understanding research shouldn't depend on a subscription.
Vetted, not crowdsourced
Contributors are academics with standing in their field, not anonymous volunteers.
Open about uncertainty
When the science is unsettled, we say so plainly.
Funded without strings
We accept no money from advertisers or from industries our briefs cover. Institutions fund the work; reading stays free.
Who's behind this
The founder
START is built by Roan Reinhardt, who edits it today and is recruiting the academics who will write and vet its briefs. It is an independent project, run in the open — no institution behind it, no investors steering it, no advertising to answer to.
I started START because I kept watching the same thing happen: a careful piece of research would come out, and by the time it reached the public it had been flattened, hyped, or paywalled into something its own authors wouldn't recognise. The knowledge existed; the honest translation didn't. I don't think that gap is inevitable — it just isn't anyone's job to close it. START is an attempt to make it someone's job, and to do it in a way a skeptical reader can check line by line.
This is early, and I'd rather say so than pretend otherwise. The briefs you'll find today are editorial pilots, clearly labelled as such, published to show the format while the contributor program comes together. As academics join, their names go on the work — and mine stays where it belongs, on the editing and the building. If you want to help, or just to hold this to its word, get in touch.
— Roan Reinhardt, founder & editor