The Awl was a website about "news, ideas and obscure Internet minutiae of the day"[1] based in New York City.

Founded in April 2009 by David Cho and former Gawker editors Choire Sicha and Alex Balk out of Sicha's East Village, Manhattan apartment, after they were laid off by the pop culture magazine Radar,[2][3] the trio decided to launch their own blog, completely "out of pocket with a bare-bones site."

The site's name was coined by contributor Tom Scocca, after the small pointed tool used for piercing holes.

[4] The first posts on the site were an infographic by Emily Gould of Gawker's office seating chart, "a video of a Miss USA contestant responding to a gay marriage question from Perez Hilton, and an item linking to a Reuters article about physicist Stephen Hawking being taken to the hospital.

[14] Brian Lam's tech review site The Wirecutter also originated with The Awl before merging with The Sweethome and being acquired by The New York Times.