The Shit You Should Care About co-founder tells us about being the subject of high school gossip, being followed by Ariana Grande, her first phone and more in this week’s episode of FIRST.

When the Shit You Should Care About Instagram went from 200,000 to a million followers in a month, Lucy Blakiston froze. As the voice of the account, which she started with two Blenheim schoolmates back in 2018, she never anticipated she would be speaking to so many people. “That was panic stations. I was like, I can’t post any more because I can’t gauge how big this audience is,” she says.

Follow The Fold on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast provider.

The account’s following has more than tripled since then, and it’s fair to say the posting is back to normal. Not only that, the trio now have three podcasts on the go as well as the new web series Extremely Online.

To now be so online seems like destiny for someone who once sold her mum’s jam and rode her bike to Harvey Norman so she could buy her first phone, a $69 Sanyo “Pinkalicious” flip-top. “I just would ring Telecom and listen to their plans,” she remembers. ”I didn’t have anyone to contact.” That’s not a problem any more.

Follow FIRST on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast provider.