Rachel Hills joined newmatilda.com as associate editor in 2007 after a two-year stint heading up the politics division at Vibewire.net. She now writes on the personal and political for various magazines, newspapers and websites, including her own Musings of an Inappropriate Woman and is working on a book on Gen Y sexuality, social status and identity.
1. Who is your favourite newmatilda.com writer? Ben Eltham. I also really enjoyed working with Shakira Hussein, Mark Bahnisch and Helen Razer.
2. What’s your favourite newmatilda.com article? Ben Pobjie’s "Coming Down From The Summit" sticks out. Perfect mix of nerdy, political humour.
3. What were you doing when you heard the sad news? Were you sitting down? I was sitting at my desk at my current place of employment when the news came through via SMS.
4. Were you surprised? Yes. I jumped on the website immediately to confirm if it was true. And mourned for a few days afterwards.
5. How many people do you reckon work at newmatilda.com office on an average day? Seven.
6. Fill in the blank in this sentence: "I’m sad that newmatilda.com has hit the skids because their articles occasionally stuck it to ___ and those people give me the creeps." The latte belt.
7. Where will you go for commentary when newmatilda.com stops publishing? The blogosphere.
8. What’s the second-best online source of news/analysis and satire that will now — poor sods — have to work twice as hard to fill the gap? Crikey — although more on the news/analysis side of things, than the satire.
9. Do you subscribe to any online content? What? Why, or why not? Yes — Crikey. They deliver me the news I want to know in a format that respects my intelligence. Which is more than I can say for some of the bigger news outlets. I also purchase premium content on a couple of my favourite blogs (mostly non-Australian) to support people I think are doing good work.
10. If you could pick one public figure to deliver live commentary on Election Night, who would it be? Lara Bingle.
11. Do you have any secret political crushes you’d like to share with our readers? Stephen Smith.
12. Name a political writer who deserves a promotion. Ben Eltham.
13. Who deserves a bigger tax break: banks or mining companies? Mining companies. But only if they use the break to stop mining and to develop alternative energy sources.
14. What do you see as the most important issue in the upcoming federal election campaign? Climate change.
15. What annoys you about journalists? When they (er, we) write boring articles that tell us nothing we don’t already know.
16. What politician and journalist combination would you like to see stuck in a lift recording a long interview? Malcolm Turnbull and Marni Cordell.
17. Are you part of the latte belt? Yes.
18. Is the Australian media getting better, worse, or staying the same? It sometimes feels like it’s getting worse, but it might just be that the alternatives we have to choose from are getting better.
19. What question would you like to ask us? What’s next?
20. Have you got any job searching tips? What works for you? Apply for positions you are utterly unqualified for, and win them over in the interview.