Happy Wednesday from NYC, where today, I come with an announcement.

I had a journalism professor at Boston University who once told me to "be brilliant at the basics." He was right. He's still right. The basics are what matter. The fancy things are all fine and good, but if you don't get the basics right, or worse, if you replace the basics with things people never asked for, that's where you run into trouble.

After I posted last week about the death of HARO at the hands of Cision, I received well over 2,000 replies asking me if I'd consider building a new version. Not connected to the old one, but rather, one that went back to basics. A simple email sent out every day, using my connections, that could help both journalists and sources connect around the world.

In other words, could I be brilliant at the basics once again?

Originally, I didn't want to. But you'd be amazed what 2,000 emails all asking the same thing can do, so, in classic ADHD fashion, I thought... "Why not?"

Introducing Help Every Reporter Out - HERO. It's exactly what it sounds like. You sign up, you get (for now) an email each day with queries from journalists around the world. If you can help the journalist, do it. As it was originally, it's free. I'm not going to charge for it. I never did.

The one thing I do ask of you? Tell friends. Send the link around. Tell your journalist friends. (The reporter query page is here.) As before, the more people who use it, the better it will be for everyone.

One cool new thing - There are tons of things I can do with HERO that I wasn't able to do before - Better tracking, AI integration... Depending on what works and what doesn't, we'll see what happens.

But for now, let's go back to the basics. What do you say? Want to join me?

Go on. Be a HERO.

Much love,

-Peter

PS: Forever thanks to Gabriella for suggesting the new name. How did I never see it before?