It all started in 2000. The founding members were Thorley Russell, Andy Goodall and Andy Coney. They were from a variety of backgrounds, including education, publishing, administration, finance and marketing. At the time, they were teachers who were tired of the same old material: boring course books, out-of-date texts and over-used classroom activities. So, they came up with the idea of producing a fun, monthly magazine for learning English – something completely different from anything on the market, with an emphasis on the type of language that students don’t usually get to see in ordinary course books: slang, taboo words and spoken English expressions. Hot English was born.