Give The Gift Of Blogs And Gossip

Defector is widely recognized as an authority on hideously expensive holiday wares. Too few know that we're also a purveyor of sensible gifting options ourselves! Consider giving someone the gift of blogs:

Reader and Pal subscriptions can be purchased HERE, and Friend and Friend-of-a-Friend subscriptions to Normal Gossip can be purchased HERE.

If you buy an annual gift subscription to Defector or Normal Gossip before the end of December 2025, we'll comp you a gift subscription to your choice of a participating site on the Lede platform! You can enjoy this second subscription yourself, or you can turn around and re-gift it. Five of our Lede neighbors–Certified Forgotten, The Pickup, PopHeist, Racket, and Sox Machine–have gone in with us on this deal. Click here for full details on this offer.

Gift subscriptions come with the knowledge of where your money is going and our abiding gratitude to you for making Defector possible. Thanks again for your support. If you have any questions, our customer service team (info@defector.com) is happy to help.

FAQs

Can I schedule a delayed send for a gift subscription (e.g., recipient only finds out on Christmas morning)?

Our system does not currently allow for delayed notifications. That means, upon checking out, your Defector gift subscription recipient will immediately receive an email alerting them to the gifted subscription. The best way to achieve a delayed send is to set yourself as the gift recipient, and then forward that email to your recipient on the day you’d like.

To redeem a subscription, your recipient just needs to click the link in that email–it doesn’t actually matter what email is set as the "recipient." Relatedly: DO NOT click on the link yourself, if you're going to wait to forward the link.

How do renewals work for gift subscriptions on Defector?

When a gift subscription is redeemed, the subscription and subsequent renewal decisions are owned by the redeemer, not the original purchaser. Like any other annual subscription, a gift subscription will come up for renewal one year from the date of redemption. The only ways a renewal can happen are: (a) if the redeemer liked the subscription enough to add their own payment method; or (b) if a second gift subscription to the site in question is purchased, redeemed, and tacked onto their existing term. We also send all annual subscribers a renewal reminder 30 days before their subscription is up to avoid any confusion.