Republicans Ramp Up Investigation Into Democratic Plan to Pack Alaska’s Ballot

The Justice Department issued subpoenas, a House oversight committee sought interviews and the state opened its own inquiry into a Democratic plan to recruit a spoiler into a Senate race.

Crypto worth billions frozen after suspected Binance hack

The firm has not said how much was potentially stolen but some crypto experts have put the figure at over $5bn.

Democrats have an identity crisis - it won't be an easy fix

Whatever the result of the midterm elections, the party is facing tough questions over what they stand for and who should represent them.

A Sailor Jumped From the U.S.S. Lincoln. The Navy Punished Him.

The case offers a rare look at the military’s handling of mental health issues during extended deployments.

When Your Parents Are Dying: Some of the Simplest, Most Difficult and Redemptive Life-Advice You’ll Ever Receive

“Death makes human beings seem like very small containers that are packed so densely we can only be aware of a fraction of what’s inside us from moment to moment.”

“Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself,” Kahlil Gibran wrote in his poignant verse on parenting. And yet we are, each of us, someone’s child — physiologically or psychologically or both — and they sing themselves through us as we sing ourselves into our longing for life, whether we like the melody or not.

Like a Zen koan, this fact becomes utterly discomposing when you begin…

Australian mushroom murderer loses appeal to overturn convictions

Erin Patterson argued her trial was unfair due to seven grounds but three appeal judges dismissed them all.

How Common Is Ballot Stacking? What to Know as Conflict Roils Alaska Senate Race.

As a conflict over candidates roils the Alaskan Senate race, here’s a look back at the political practice over the years.

Patrick Stewart Brought Elegance To ‘Star Trek’ as Jean-Luc Picard

Led by the Shakespearean veteran in his role as Jean-Luc Picard, “Star Trek: The Next Generation” gracefully went where the franchise had never gone before.

Bombshell confession in The Traitors as faithfuls finally turn the screw

Could the faithfuls finally come good in Thursday's penultimate episode?

The director of Obsession put a new horror short on YouTube

Curry Barker, the director behind the hit horror film Obsession, just published a new horror short on YouTube. The short, titled "Mama Bear," is nearly five minutes long. The video is pretty unnerving, and fair warning that it gets a little graphic, but it's a fun one to watch if you're looking for something scary ahead of Halloween on Saturday.

Barker wrote, directed, and edited "Mama Bear," according to the description for the video, which was published on his that's a bad idea YouTube channel. The description also has a note thanking Windows for "sponsoring this short film," and Barker was…

Trump Administration Pressures California With Expanded Voter Fraud Investigation

The department has issued grand jury subpoenas to local election officials as part of a widening effort to prove unsubstantiated claims about large numbers of illegal voters in the state.

What Is Your Refugium?

For courage, says Bulgarian folk wisdom instructs, keep a horse chestnut in your pocket.

Even as a child, I was mistrustful of superstition. But every autumn, I would pick up dozens of them from the sidewalks of Sofia and fill my pockets — not as a spell against fear but as an ode to joy. Conkers, as the English call them, spun me up in delight — shiny as mahogany, smooth as river stones, tiny planets from some other universe, the wonder-smitten eyes of some prehistoric creature.

I didn’t know then that they are emblems of life’s irrepressible insistence on itself — miniature monuments to the…

What Israeli Election Results Reveal About the Electorate

Some groups stood by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party, but support fell off among others. Turnout was also a striking factor in the election.

Intel says it’s selling every affordable laptop chip it can make

During Intel's latest earnings call, CEO Lip-Bu Tan said that demand for its budget-focused Wildcat Lake chips "is outstripping supply." According to CFO David Zinsner, the chips are now sold out. Zinsner said Intel has "seen significant growth in Wildcat Lake. It's coming exactly at the right time because it's cost-optimized and we're seeing a lot of focus in that regard."

As shortages of RAM and other components have driven up PC prices over recent months, Intel's Wildcat Lake chips have been appearing in new lower-cost Windows laptops on par with the MacBook Neo, like the new Dell XPS 13 or…

Polymarket Is Investigating Suspicious Bets on Israeli Election

The company said it was looking into hundreds of new accounts that had placed wagers in two markets related to the election on Tuesday.

Newly Freed American Describes His Years in Russian Prison

Stephen James Hubbard, the retired teacher arrested soon after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, said he sometimes lost hope.

Rest In Peace, Patrick Stewart (1940-2026)

Sir Patrick Stewart, best known for his role as Captain Jean-Luc Picard on Star Trek: The Next Generation, has died at the age of 86. He passed at home in Los Angeles from Alzheimer’s disease and Lewy body dementia.

He was largely considered an unknown when the “Star Trek” offer came along. At the invitation of a friend, a university professor, Mr. Stewart had been in Los Angeles conducting master classes on Shakespeare when, one evening, he gave a lecture and performed some bits of the plays in a program that was open to the public.

A TV producer who was involved in developing a new “Star…

Fiat's Tiny $15,000 EV Can Finally Hit American Streets

Get ready for your taste of la dolce vita, because the Fiat Topolino is street legal now.

No Clear Winner in Israel Election, Final Results Show

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party and its allies won 53 seats in Parliament, falling short of the outright majority needed to form a government. The main opposition bloc, led by Gadi Eisenkot, won 48.

Hyrox athlete who soiled herself in race says she put others at risk

In her first interview since the incident, Joanna Wietrzyk told the BBC she takes responsibility for it but did not deserve such a severe backlash.

Trump Erupted After Learning of Alina Habba’s $50 Million Deal

Angry about the scale of a contract signed by one of his former lawyers with the family of a wealthy pardon seeker, the president told allies he wanted some of the money to go to his future presidential library.

626: Droid Does

MacBook Pros can be touched, iPad mini chips can be binned, and John Ternus can change the world.

This episode of Connected is sponsored by:

Fitbod: Get stronger, faster with a fitness plan that fits you. Get 25% off your membership.

Hegseth Fires Top Army General He Accused of Leaking Information to Media

Lt. Gen. Brett Sylvia was fired as part of a broad and highly unusual campaign to find and punish senior military officers who speak to reporters.

Patrick Stewart’s Many Roles, From ‘Star Trek’ to ‘Avengers: Doomsday’

The actor’s long and varied career included Shakespearean roles, “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” comedy and a stint in the Marvel Universe.

Patrick Stewart, ‘Star Trek’ Captain and Professor X on ‘X-Men,’ Dies at 86

The British actor was 86. He achieved pop-culture stardom as Capt. Jean-Luc Picard on “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”

Reddit’s CEO says Google’s AI Mode ‘does not drive traffic’

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman said in an earnings call today that Google's AI-powered search modes do not help with traffic to the platform, echoing problems facing other websites and publishers. As part of its Q3 2026 earnings, Reddit revealed that search traffic in October has "dropped by more than 1 million referrals on average per week," and he attributes part of the company's struggles with Google traffic to how AI Mode and AI Overviews change the search experience.

"The reality is, AI Mode does not drive traffic," Huffman says. "Not for us, and not to anybody, as far as I know. That's just a…

Google value plunges by $500bn as AI fears rattle Wall Street

Google spooked investors so badly that its stock hit a six-month low, after it revealed its AI search summaries were affecting ad revenue.

Americans Keep Spending

Also, Patrick Stewart dies at 86. Here’s the latest at the end of Thursday.

Thursday discussion post

Have you heard? There’s an Election Day around the corner.

Reddit is moving to “a logged-in-only experience,” CEO says

In the future, you won’t be able to use Reddit without logging in.

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman confirmed the impending change in a letter (PDF) to shareholders today about Q3 performance. He said that Reddit is shifting “to a logged-in-only experience," adding:

Moving to primarily logged-in will ensure our users have the best Reddit experience possible, and can find the content and communities most relevant to them. It is better for our business because we will have more signals for ads targeting, and being logged-in leads to higher engagement generally. It also allows us to protect access to…

I Can Hear Everything

The world can be tough to navigate with one working ear. Even now with two, I still face challenges.

An Italian farmer planted some decades-old seeds he found...

An Italian farmer planted some decades-old seeds he found in his attic. Wheat with seven ears per stalk came up and the farmer found a reference to this type of nutritious, drought-resistant wheat in the Bible’s book of Genesis.

Ford CEO Says Its New EV Tech Is 30% More Efficient Than BYD's

CEO Jim Farley says that its new motors, inverters, and EV gearboxes will maximize efficiency and keep costs down.

Apple Drops App Store Commission by a Whopping 4 Percentage Points in Taiwan

Apple is making changes to the Taiwan storefront of the App Store, following discussions with the Taiwan Fair Trade Commission.

As of October 31, 2026, the commission rate for standard Apple In-App Purchase and paid app transactions will be 26% on the Taiwan storefront of the App Store on iOS and iPadOS. Currently, that rate is 30%.

Well there we go. The App Store in Taiwan — just like in Japan — is fixed.

'Continue your journey': Key moments of leaked Spain train crash audio

Recordings between a control centre and the train drivers appear to show one train was given clearance to move even though another train had stalled on the track.

Rivian's R2 Is Already Its Best-Seller. Now It's Raising Its Sales Forecast Again

Rivian's Tesla Model Y rival is a hit among buyers, with Rivian increasing its annual delivery guidance again.

Microsoft fixes a Windows 11 annoyance as PC revenue declines

Microsoft is beginning the rollout of a Windows 11 preview update that finally addresses a persistent power user complaint with the operating system: the right-click menu that obliterated years of muscle memory on command locations and hid others behind an additional click. The timing is notable, as the announcement comes alongside Microsoft's quarterly financial report, which showed a continued decline in the business of selling Windows licenses for new PCs.

The preview update, KB5127936, is cumulative for Windows 11 versions 26H2 and 25H2. The update will be a gradual rollout before…

Exclusive: Peter Thiel-Backed Nuclear Fuel Startup Hits a Key Regulatory Milestone

General Matter, the secretive nuclear enrichment startup led by one of the first employees at Elon Musk’s SpaceX, emerged last month by publicly unveiling its plans to convert a Superfund site in Paducah, Kentucky, into the nation’s newest plant transforming raw uranium into fuel for reactors. Backed by both tech billionaire Peter Thiel and former White House climate czar John Kerry, the Los Angeles-based company chose the location, which until 2013 served for over six decades as an enrichment facility for the United States government, as a symbol of American reindustrialization. The startup…

Patrick Stewart has died at age 86

Patrick Stewart, best known for his roles in Star Trek and X-Men, has died at age 86. A message posted to Stewart's Instagram account says the actor died in his Los Angeles home on Wednesday "following a brief and poignant journey with Alzheimer's Disease and Lewy Body Dementia."

Born in 1940 in Mirfield, Yorkshire, England, Stewart began his acting career in theater. He eventually landed the role of Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation, which ran from 1987 to 1994. Stewart returned as the Star Trek captain in subsequent films, including Star Trek: Generations (1994), Star…

Pentagon IG refuses to investigate Starlink/Starshield slowdown in Ukraine

The Pentagon inspector general's office declined a request from US senators to investigate restrictions recently imposed on the Ukraine military's use of SpaceX's satellite network.

Ukraine, which uses SpaceX's Starlink service and the military version known as Starshield, said earlier this month that military drones lost satellite connectivity when traveling above 161 kilometers per hour (100 miles per hour). The limit was removed after about 10 days.

Five Democratic and four Republican senators sent an October 15 letter to Department of Defense Inspector General Platte Moring, asking for a…

Reddit will force everyone to log in

Reddit is announcing a huge shift: It's going to start requiring users to log in.

Right now, you can browse Reddit without having an account, and the site is generally a great resource for crowdsourced information on a whole range of topics. I know I'm not the only person who appends "reddit" to a lot of Google searches to find answers to things written by actual humans instead of robots. But that openness has made it a target for scraping and automated traffic, leading Reddit to file lawsuits over alleged unauthorized access of its data and make product changes like limiting access to "Old…

Star Wars: The Radio Drama

Somehow I’d never heard of this before: NPR produced and aired1 radio dramatizations of the films in the original Star Wars trilogy. The first program was particularly popular, garnering NPR hundreds of thousands of new listeners. The original versions are available in full on The Internet Archive:

Star Wars: A New Hope (1981)

Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1983)

Rivian’s R2 is officially its best-selling vehicle

Rivian reported its third quarter earnings of 2026, providing us a closer look at the company's financial health as it ramps up production of its all-important R2 electric vehicle - which is now, for the first time, outselling all of Rivian's other EVs.

Rivian said it brought in $2.155 billion in revenue, a 38 percent increase compared to the $1.558 billion in Q3 2025. Of that amount, $1.55 billion came from automotive revenue, which is up 36 percent year over year. Comparatively, the company reported $605 million from software and subscription services, a 45 percent increase year over year.…

A Health Update From Craig Hockenberry

If you noticed that the Iconfactory sites were kinda broken last week, now you know why. It’s because I was kinda broken last week.

Now I’m finishing this post from a comfy chair on our deck. Typing into the latest version of WordPress and PHP. And I couldn’t be happier.

No, you teared up a little reading this.

TL;DR: Where to watch all our Massachusetts ballot question video explainers

Fear not, we've made short videos for each question so you can just watch instead. Each video is under two minutes and highlights what you need to know to make an informed decision on Nov. 3, aka Election Day.

Celtics donate $200M to Boston Children's Hospital

The donation comes from the owners of the Boston Celtics. It will help fund research for pediatric diseases and mental health care for children.

Rolfe Winkler at The WSJ: ‘The Beleaguered Chip Sellers Getting Their Revenge on Apple’

Rolfe Winkler, in a crackerjack story for The Wall Street Journal (gift link):

Blevins, who left Apple in 2022, sometimes set up back-to-back meetings with suppliers so that rival sales teams might run into each other, stoking competitive tension. Sales representatives learned to pack nutrition bars to sustain them through negotiating sessions that Apple executives sometimes pushed past midnight without a dinner break. Blevins’s bad-cop reputation gave his staff leverage: They threatened to call him in if contract terms weren’t to their liking.

One significant contract term allowed Apple to…

GM to pay $220 million to resolve claims it sold driving habits data

General Motors has agreed to pay $220 million to settle claims that it illegally sold driver and location information to data brokers, as reported earlier by Reuters. The agreement, which resolves a complaint from a coalition of 36 US attorneys general, requires GM to limit the driving data it collects and obtain "express consent" from drivers before collecting their information.

The allegations surround GM's now-discontinued Smart Driver program, which collected data about driving habits, including acceleration, braking, and trip length. GM allegedly passed this information to data brokers,…

Dumpster Archeology. “Lew Blink’s passion for dumpster...

Dumpster Archeology. “Lew Blink’s passion for dumpster diving, his tenacity in connecting the dots, and his magnetic charisma as he unearths the secrets of others were a captivating lens through which to explore themes of privacy, waste…”

Ford Fathom Pricing Will Stretch Into the 'High $30,000 Range'

The Ford Fathom starts at under $29,000. Here's how much a nicely equipped one will cost you.

Archive of Our Own goes offline for 2-4 weeks for emergency maintenance

how stressful, hopefully there’s no permanent data loss

Trump declares robot imports a national security threat

President Donald Trump has declared the imports of foreign-made factory robots to be a national security threat—ordering new US negotiations with trading partners while holding out the possibility of imposing new tariffs on such robot imports in the future.

Issued on October 28, Trump’s presidential proclamation represents heightened government scrutiny of foreign-made industrial robots that could complicate the manufacturing operations of major US corporations that rely on such robots. Those companies include Detroit automakers General Motors and Ford, electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla, and…

Massive Fanfic Site Archive of Our Own Says It’s Going Down for 'Up to 4 Weeks'

Archive of Our Own (AO3), a massive repository for fanfiction and creative writing, might be down for as long as a month after going down for "maintenance" on Thursday.

The Organization for Transformative Works (OTW), the non-profit organization that runs AO3, posted on its status page early Thursday morning that the site was down for maintenance. A few hours later, it updated the status to say that it was expected to take at least 12 hours. By Thursday afternoon, it said the site restoration will take around two weeks, but could take up to a month.

“We are hopeful that we will be able to bring…

Sick of AI ads, a roofer hand-drew his own and was accused of being AI

the post went viral, spawning dozens of copycats made with AI image models

You can generate and edit Google Docs files directly in Gemini chats now

Now you can generate, preview, and edit PDFs, Google Docs, Google Sheets, slide decks, Markdown files, TXT files, and code directly within Google Gemini. The new file editing capabilities are available starting today for all Gemini users, and while PDF previews/editing works on both the web and mobile, all other file formats are only in the web version for now.

Google added support for generating and downloading files in Gemini earlier this year, but now you can tweak those files without leaving the Gemini app. Google says you can expand documents to edit them in full-screen mode and highlight…

Trump ignored intel on China’s Nvidia spy to protect company’s stock, report says

Donald Trump apparently is so aligned with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang—who has become the president’s key advisor on AI—that he ignored intelligence indicating that Huang was the target of a “Chinese spy plot,” and did so partly to protect Nvidia’s stock.

The New York Times spoke with people briefed on US intelligence agencies’ surveillance and granted them anonymity to discuss findings drawn from “classified intelligence.” According to sources, about a year ago, Trump was briefed that “Beijing was getting reports from someone with direct access” to Huang. That “someone” was Alice Huang, or Huang…

Volkswagen's EVs Are Selling Like Crazy. That's Actually Hurting Its Profits

You'd think selling more EVs would help, but low profit margins mean that it actually can hurt.

Ikea’s colorful donut-shaped smart lamp is $20 off

With its playful design, versatility, and relatively affordable price, the Ikea Varmblixt quickly became one of my colleague Jennifer Pattison Tuohy’s new favorite smart light products when she tested it in April. Now, the donut-shaped lamp is on sale for $79.99 ($20 off) through November 11th at Ikea.

$99.99 $79.99 at Ikea

window.HYPE_DESK_CONFIG = { productImageUrl: "https://platform.theverge.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/10/iphone_17e.png", productImageAlt: "iPhone 17e • Unlocked", productTitle: "iPhone 17e • Unlocked", shortDescription: "Save on an unlocked refurbished iPhone 17e",…

What’s the largest tweetable number? You’ve got 280...

What’s the largest tweetable number? You’ve got 280 characters. So: “9999…” or “one centillion” or “googol!!!!!!…” or an image of a number? Turns out it’s complicated!

Turning a solar power system into its own backup

Rather than directly converting photons into electricity, concentrated solar energy uses mirrors to turn sunlight into heat, which can then be used to drive traditional generating turbines. Up to about a decade ago, there was a case to be made that concentrated solar energy had a bright future, as improvements in heat storage had turned it into a way to generate power around the clock.

It wasn't to be. While concentrated solar costs fell enough to compete with nuclear power, the price of photovoltaics plunged, making solar panels the cheapest source of power in most locations. Currently, if…

Can Artificial Intelligence Forecast Treatment Effects in Economics?

I use LLMs to forecast treatment effects of research studies pre-registered on the AEA RCT Registry and the Open Science Framework. I focus on studies whose results were first publicly released in 2026 and elicit forecasts from models whose training or knowledge cut-off dates were before the relevant set of papers was released. First, LLM models extract forecasting questions from the pre-registrations or pre-analysis plans. These questions elicit forecasted treatment effects; not all resolve in the subsequent papers, but those that do can be used to consider forecast accuracy. Forecasts were…

What are the government's options for reducing welfare spending?

BBC Verify examines how much the welfare system costs and the options the government could use to reduce it.

Search More Than 500 Cases of U.S. Citizens Detained by Immigration Agents

Experts have long warned that immigration dragnets will inevitably result not only in the erosion of rights for immigrants but also for citizens. Since the start of this Trump administration, we’ve watched those warnings come true.

So we have once again done what the government won’t: We have tallied and cataloged every case we can find of an immigration agent reportedly detaining a citizen during the current administration — more than 500 cases from Inauguration Day through Oct. 21, 2026.

Read our earlier reporting on U.S. citizens being detained.

Apple’s new laptop supports one of the coolest features for color pros

The new MacBook Pro brings with it a bunch of firsts for Apple laptops, the two flashiest being an OLED display and touchscreen functionality. But as an image-accuracy enthusiast, trained calibrator, and resident display expert, what excites me most about the MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display is the technology it uses to display an accurate picture. It's the first laptop, and only the second product overall, to support Apple CMF 2026 color modes. It could be the future for displays.

CMFs, or color-matching functions, mathematically represent how we perceive color, and there are a few…

Podcast: Flock CEO Says the Backlash Isn’t Real

We start this week with Jason and Joseph’s article about leaked audio from a private police conference. In that audio, Flock’s CEO made all sorts of wild claims about the backlash to his company not being real, and his wife’s advice to never apologize. After the break, Sam tells us why former Yahoo CEO Marrisa Mayer can’t keep pretending ‘gender doesn’t matter.’ In the subscribers-only section, Joseph tells us about a woman who is facing years in prison because someone else opened a CashApp account in her name.

Listen to the weekly podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Become a paid…

Rolling Stone: The 200 Greatest Rock Songs of the 21st...

Rolling Stone: The 200 Greatest Rock Songs of the 21st Century So Far. I cannot argue with the top pick: Maps by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. There’s a Spotify playlist with all 200 songs…a great way to spend 15 hours and 25 minutes.

California’s long road to make EV charging more reliable

This is California Wire, a weekly newsletter from Jeff St. John on the state’s clean energy transition. Subscribe to get it every Thursday via Substack. Welcome back to California Wire! Today’s topic is public EV chargers and California’s long and winding road to make them reliable. In 2023, I wrote a …

#2572 - Colum Tyrrell

Colum Tyrrell is a comedian, streamer, and co-host of the "Cockfight" podcast with Lev Fer and Tristan Bowling. His new hour-long comedy special premieres October 28 on YouTube. He is currently on tour.

Try Perplexity Computer now: https://pplx.ai/joerogan

50% off your first box at https://www.thefarmersdog.com/rogan!

Talking Headways Podcast: Architecture Won’t Save a Bad Street

This week on the Talking Headways podcast, we’re joined by Naama Blonder to talk about the book she wrote (with Misha Bereznyak), “Building Charm: A Hyper Practical Guide to Developing Outstanding New Neighborhoods.” We chat about the book’s focus on human scale and how it radically rethinks street design.

This is not for the faint of heart.

Now, you know the Talking Headways drill:

Thursday assorted links

1. “A whopping 79 NBA players are listed on today’s 2:30 PM injury report for tonight’s games. That’s roughly 15% of the entire league” This is just week one people! And some commentary.

2. Video making the case that AI has been fine for jobs.

3. John Repetti reviews The Rouse at Jacobin.

The Remarkable Serbian Election

I’ve been reading a bit about the recent election in Serbia and some of the details are fascinating. A student-led coalition toppled the 12-year corrupt reign of “the increasingly authoritarian leader” Aleksandar Vučić in recent elections. But in order to ensure voters and allies that this wasn’t a grab for power on the part of the students, the students ruled themselves out.

Supporters had the votes, but they needed the losing side to stay. The strict rules were a promise: to those who had opposed running, that it would not turn the movement into a party; to voters, that the list was no party…

H.264 Is Magic (2016)

A high level walkthrough of the basics of video compression techniques used in MPEG, AVC/H.264, codecs.

A New Kind of Chemistry

Thanks to Kyle Schiller at Marathon Fusion for conversations and information that informed this essay. All errors are my own.

Much of modern civilization is built on top of chemical reactions, either to produce new materials (as in the blast furnace, which converts iron oxide into metallic iron), or to generate energy. Chemical reactions, as we’ve previously noted, work by rearranging how atoms hold their outermost electrons. Combine an atom of sodium and an atom of chlorine, for instance, and sodium’s outermost electron will end up in chlorine’s outer electron shell in an ionic bond, creating…

The Space Shuttle Discovery’s Starboard Side ‘s’ Is Upside Down

How Jason Snell beat me to linking to this, I don’t know. But like I said back in February, when it comes to signage, “Mind your P’s and Q’s” ought to be “Mind your H’s and S’s”.

The NY Times recently asked readers “what they can no...

The NY Times recently asked readers “what they can no longer afford, or have given up on having”. Among the answers: medication, car repairs, new clothes, having more kids, eating out, and contact lenses.

Basajan - Full Performance (Live on KEXP)

http://KEXP.ORG and AXEAN present Live on KEXP in Bali with Basajan performing at Locca Sea House. Recorded August 28, 2026

Budak Leutik Bisa Ngapung 04:22

Live on KEXP in Bali is a partnership with AXEAN. Recorded at Locca Sea House, in Bali, Indonesia

Manifestos, Fear, and ‘Loser Thinking’: Inside Proton’s AI Reckoning

Andy Yen, the CEO of Proton, had a message for an employee in the company’s security Slack channel who urged the company to at least take a few days to pentest newly written code before pushing it live. “That’s bullshit and loser thinking. Of course it’s possible to be fast and secure,” Yen wrote in the channel at the end of August. “Stop thinking always of how to be slower, and focus more on how to be faster.”

In a follow-up message, Yen reiterated his point: “only losers think like that.” His ultimate message for the team was to “stop lovingly handcrafting all our code and use AI more.”

That…

We're releasing the weights of Mistral Large 4

The weights of Mistral Large 4 (Le Chonk) are now open. A 1T parameter multimodal model, and best open-weight model for coding, trained in Europe.

Old Newspaper Headlines About the Name Doppelgängers of Current Celebrities

This is great: Annie Rauwerda (of Depths of Wikipedia fame) sifted through the archive at newspapers.com to find the goings on of long-ago celebrity name doppelgängers (follow-up post). A few of my favorites:

Tags: Annie Rauwerda · celebrity · language

Driving The Cheapest Lucid Air For 40,000 Miles Came With A Few Surprises

The most affordable Lucid doesn’t feel cheap, and it delivers all of the basics that the more expensive trims are known for.

From mummies to frankenweenies, where to watch Halloween films this weekend

From the Coolidge's all-night Halloween Horror Marathon to a screening of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," WBUR film critic Sean Burns rounds up frightful film screenings around Greater Boston.

I made a small tweak to Prometheus (gift link discovery...

I made a small tweak to Prometheus (gift link discovery site) that kinda kicks ass: NYT Cooking is now a separate source (which you can filter by). The Rigatoni With White Bolognese recipe is a favorite of mine. 🤌

DoorDash to acquire Instacart

Together, DoorDash and Instacart would help stores of every size reach more customers with the kinds of innovative technology that the biggest online retailers and grocers build for themselves.

GE Vernova Bets $9 Billion on Transmission Lines

Current conditions: A Pineapple Express — the powerful atmospheric river that hits the West Coast, not the marijuana strain — could pummel the Southwest with heavy rain on Halloween • The remnants of Typhoon Champi are driving a severe storm in the Bering Sea, with four-foot waves lapping on Alaska’s shore • Despite India’s evacuation of nearly 200,000 people, Cyclone Arnab killed at least nine and destroyed tens of thousands of acres of crops in Andhra Pradesh.

1. The Fed holds rates steady

The Federal Reserve voted Wednesday to keep benchmark interest rates steady despite last month’s spike…

Boston Mayor Wu says city is prepared for Election Day, talks housing policy

Plus, she addresses controversial comments from her planning chief, Kairos Shen, about the city's inclusionary development policy.

If IPv4 were land

An interactive world map where every country is resized by how many IPv4 addresses it holds instead of its land area. Flip between real land and IPv4 land, zoom in, and compare countries.

NetBSD adds a new text editor called atto

To ease the transition for new users, #NetBSD -current now includes an alternative editor to vi(1) and xedit(1) in its base system, atto(1). https://man.netbsd.org/atto.1

It is a modeless screen-based editor similar to nano, pico, xedit, or emacs. It is only 48 kilobytes, making it suitable for inclusion in the rescue system.

(This is real, but I'm honestly missing an opportunity by not posting it on 1 April. Let the editor wars commence!)

How Tyler Cowen and Alex Tabarrok Have Changed Their Views on AI and Where They Disagree

From the Archives-written by ChatGPT.

Both became dramatically more confident in AI’s capabilities while remaining optimistic about its economic potential. Their differences concern how benefits arrive, how seriously to weight emerging dangers, and whether AI might possess consciousness. Cowen emphasizes institutions, bottlenecks, and geopolitical competition. Tabarrok emphasizes inexpensive intelligence, scientific discovery, and—especially in his later writing—concrete safety failures.

The dated passages below trace those changes across the public archive. Quotations are the authors’ own…

Mass. sheriffs ask Gov. Healey to tweak new limits on ICE arrests

Twelve of the 14 sheriffs in Massachusetts signed a letter asking Gov. Maura Healey to consider a change to the new law limiting communication with ICE when it comes to certain pretrial detainees.

Lawsuit seeks to block ICE from hiding locations of detainees with final removal orders

The policy, adopted suddenly last month to expedite deportations, interferes with immigration lawyers’ rights by making it difficult, and sometimes impossible, to locate their clients, according to the lawsuit filed in federal court in Boston. Federal immigration agencies have denied that they are disappearing detainees.

Chained PHP2Shell exploit roots 25 servers, including US Government servers

Custom PHP2Shell Exploit Chained with Kernel LPE to Root Versions of Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS Firewalls in the Wild

“The Argument” podcast, ad free: The human condition in the age of A.I.

As A.I. companies race to rid the world of gainful employment, we now face the question of what it would even mean to be human if labor itself becomes obsolete. For their latest book club episode of the podcast, Matt and Jerusalem read Hannah Arendt’s “The Human Condition,” which considered this very question in 1958. Arendt, who spent years as a statel…

How I would fix all of America’s major problems

When you’ve finished reading today’s post, I hope you’ll check out the latest episode of “The Argument” podcast, where Jerusalem and I explore Hannah Arendt’s “The Human Condition” and what artificial intelligence could mean for everything from the future of work to the purpose of human life. Paid subscribers can watch or listen ad free and read the transcript and show notes here. If you’re a free subscriber, you can catch the episode on YouTube here or listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | Overcast | Pocket Casts

Arguing about electoral politics…

Hills and mountains

A girl’s story of forced marriage reveals how the Soviet invasion of 1979 transformed life in Afghanistan

- by Aeon Video

Detroit Could Block Billionaire-Owned Concrete Plant From Further Neighborhood Expansion

After years of community opposition, Detroit city officials have taken steps to stop a concrete mixing facility from further expanding into a residential neighborhood.

City Council members, acting on a recommendation last week from planning officials, will soon consider a rezoning measure that would restrict industrial activity at the site of the Kronos concrete plant and surrounding area. The concrete facility at its current size could stay and continue to operate as normal.

The planning recommendation comes after a BridgeDetroit and ProPublica investigation this year revealed how city…

Senators Demand Meta Answer for 'Pervert Glasses' Following 404 Media Investigation

Oregon Senator Ron Wyden and Massachusetts Senator Edward Markey sent a letter to Meta on Wednesday demanding the company answer for the privacy concerns its smart glasses pose to the public.

The letter cites 404 Media’s October 2025 investigation into how people use Meta’s smart glasses to harass massage parlor workers. That investigation found Instagram accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers and millions of views uploaded videos filmed with Meta’s Ray-Ban glasses, where men entered massage parlors across the country and solicited the workers for sex work. The full letter is here.

“Me…

The physics of getting fired

Physics offered me a sense of order and purpose. But when life got messy I realised it had a much deeper insight to give

- by Zahaan Bharmal

The new landscape for gas turbines

Data center developers are facing unprecedented roadblocks to power new facilities. In addition to being hampered by an enormous interconnection queue backlog, the major gas turbine suppliers — GE Vernova, Mitsubishi, and Siemens — are completely sold out past 2030. As a result, developers are scrambling to find alternate behind-the-meter power solutions.

In this episode, Shayle invites Tony Brough, president of Dora Partners & Company, back on the show to examine this squeeze on gas-fired power generation. They break down the OEM backlog, examine rising equipment pricing, and take a deep dive…

Midterm Spending Blitz, GDP & Inflations Reports, Israel Election Deadlock & Iran War

Ad spending in Kansas’ Senate race has jumped tenfold in weeks as Democrats pour money into Republican-heavy districts in the final days before the midterms.

The economy appears to be growing at a solid pace, but inflation is still running ahead of wages and leaving many Americans feeling worse off financially.

Israel still has no governing majority after its election, leaving Benjamin Netanyahu in office during coalition talks as questions remain about whether the country could launch another strike on Iran.

A golden age of science is coming

It’s almost hard to remember, but just a few years ago, a lot of very smart people thought that science was in terminal decline. Respected researchers were writing papers with titles like “Are Ideas Getting Harder to Find?”, “Papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time”, and “Slowed canonical progress in large fields of science”. In 1996, science writer John Horgan even published a book called The End Of Science: Facing The Limits Of Knowledge In The Twilight Of The Scientific Age.

The fundamental idea was that the Universe only has so many insights to discover, and that we’ve…

A Plan for Two Dans: How Democrats Manipulated Alaska’s Ballot

An investigation from The New York Times has uncovered how two candidates named Dan Sullivan ended up on the ballot for U.S. Senate in Alaska and the secret role that Democrats played in making it happen.

Kellen Browning, a political reporter for The Times, takes us inside the political scheme and explains what it means for a race that could determine which party controls the Senate.

Guest: Kellen Browning, a political reporter for The New York Times in San Francisco.

Tesla FSD Is Hitting Europe. It's Not Perfect

Steep hills and tight gaps showed what FSD can do. Missed signs and driver takeovers showed how much supervision it still needs.

Top U.S. Health Official Backed a Medication Policy Shift That Benefited a Company She Has Stock In

Last November, the Department of Health and Human Services announced the elimination of “black box” warnings on hormone replacement therapies, aiming to reverse nearly two decades of stigma surrounding a key treatment for menopause symptoms.

Among the officials at a press conference about the decision was Alicia Jackson, director of a federal health agency that invests taxpayer money in medical technology and research. As Jackson stood behind a lectern adorned with the HHS logo, she praised the new policy, calling it a victory for women and science.

“Today we have the opportunity to add up to a…

Transcript: How the Permitting Reform Bill’s Best Stuff Works

This transcript has been automatically generated.

Subscribe to “Shift Key” and find this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can also add the show’s RSS feed to your podcast app to follow us directly.

Why Permitting Reform Is a Historic Victory Over Utilities

Climate and environmental advocates are sharply divided over the Senate’s bipartisan permitting reform proposal. But what most people agree is that the bill’s changes to electricity and transmission law are really, really good — and in some sense are much better than expected.

Because of how the media works, that means nobody has talked about these proposals very much. So on this show, we wanted to focus on the part of the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act that has gotten rave reviews.

On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by David Pomerantz, the executive director of the…

“Peak Greenwashing”: Two Bills in Congress Endorse Misleading Recycling Claims

The plastics industry spent decades convincing consumers that throwing used products stamped with the “chasing arrows” symbol into a curbside bin meant they would be recycled.

Now, amid growing awareness that many of those items never get reprocessed, the industry is championing a pair of proposals in Congress that would give misleading recycling claims the support of federal law.

On the surface, the two bipartisan House bills promise transparency for consumers by establishing national standards for recycling and recycled content labels.

How the Permitting Reform Bill’s Best Stuff Works

Climate and environmental advocates are sharply divided over the Senate’s bipartisan permitting reform proposal. But what most people agree is that the bill’s changes to electricity and transmission law are really, really good — and in some sense are much better than expected.

Because of how the media works, that means nobody has talked about these proposals very much. So on this show, we wanted to focus on the part of the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act that has gotten rave reviews.

On this episode of Shift Key, Rob is joined by David Pomerantz, the executive director of the…

Why Are We Having Less Sex? Ask a Pornographer.

Pornography gets the blame for a lot of societal problems, including the so-called “sex recession.” Can porn ever really be ethical? Erika Lust thinks so. The adult filmmaker sees porn as an art form. She’s a self-described feminist who centers women’s desires and fantasies in her work. But how different is the product she’s making?

Lust sits down with Julia Yost, senior editor at “First Things,” to make the case for porn. Together, they discuss the adult film industry, stigmas around sex and translating fantasy into reality.

Note: As we work on relaunching “Interesting Times,” the show will…

What we know so far about Spain train crash

More than 500 passengers were on board the trains when the crash occurred in the province of Toledo, south of Madrid.

The 2027 Kia EV9 Gets Some Standard Features That Used To Be Optional

The base price goes up by $90, with the biggest changes coming on the mid-spec Land trim.

In eastern Montana, a new oil pipeline comes with perils and a potential payday

Jerry Arnold stands in a patch of cleared land, his combine idling behind him. To the west, acres of freshly cut grain reveal rolling hills, and to the east, 3-foot stalks of wheat pulse in the wind. Arnold’s sweat-stained baseball cap is coated with fine golden dust after a day of harvesting at his farm near Opheim, Montana, a town with a population of 72 near the Canada border.

Last year’s warm, dry winter hit Arnold’s unirrigated farm hard. Record-low snowpack left moisture in short supply, stunting crops’ growth. But he could soon see some financial relief. Arnold is one of nearly 300…

The new Cold War comes to Kodiak

Last August, Christine Burton got an unexpected call from her sister, an employee at the Pacific Spaceport Complex in Kodiak, Alaska. The state-owned facility was about to conduct an unannounced test launch of what was likely a hypersonic missile and would be closing the only road that runs from the center of town to the site. Burton knew the drill. She and her husband, Buck, owned and operated a 140-acre bison ranch that abuts the Spaceport and, for the last couple of years, had had to deal with the many disruptions that came with it: road closures, accidents — at least five rockets have…

What Wall Street Really Thinks About the AI Trade Now

It has been a big week for the AI trade — we've seen wobbles in the market, many of them in response to headlines like the Anthropic S-1 and earnings from the hyperscalers (Oracle, Microsoft, etc.). So what does Wall Street make of all the news, and how are they processing an increasing sense that the laws of the economy barely apply to AI? Today, we speak with Alexander 'Alty' Altmann, global head of equities tactical strategies at Barclays, and he helps us make sense of how Wall Street really feels about the AI trade right now. We also talk about the KOSPI-fication of the S&P 500, if there…

From zoos to craft brews, Michigan looks to spur decarbonization

Re-creating polar habitats in Michigan is no small feat. Just ask the Detroit Zoo, where the polar bear and penguin centers require producing industrial levels of cooling from energy-intensive equipment. For the zoo, figuring out how to keep animals comfortable using less, and cleaner, energy is key to meeting its…

PJM desperately needs grid batteries. Here’s a way it could get some.

PJM Interconnection is finally taking steps that could let a lot of new battery capacity connect to its grid without eons of delay. PJM is the biggest grid operator in the U.S., serving customers across 13 mid-Atlantic, Midwestern, and Southern states. Its grid is notoriously bogged down and congested, especially…

Toyota’s New Hybrids And Plug-In Hybrids Will Be 15% More Efficient

An all-new engine was developed specifically for electrified powertrains, promising higher efficiency than its predecessors.

AI dominates human peer reviews

We show that AI-generated article reviews are now better, by every measure we could construct, than reviews written by well-compensated human experts and judged to be of unusually high quality by journal editors and authors. We then discuss how this result may inform journal policy choices, with concerning downsides as well as potential paths to increase publication speed and quality; reduce adversarial interactions; improve the experience of editors, reviewers, authors, and readers; and advance science.

By Gary King and Steven Worthington, not even using what are now the very best models,…

Fake film deals and emails from top agents: who is behind the explosion in literary scams?

Illustration: Anaïs Mims/Guardian Design

My design Conversation with Roman Mars

Here is the audio, video, and transcript. Here is part of the episode summary:

Roman Mars has built one of podcasting’s great empires out of noticing things everyone else walks past. His show, 99% Invisible, has racked up over 500 million downloads telling stories about the unnoticed design choices that quietly shape how cities and objects work…

Tyler and Roman discuss street signs, why classic cars were so much more distinctive than today’s SUVs, Waymos, New Jersey jughandles, yellow streetlights, lane-stripe colors, why Houston keeps growing despite its lack of charm, whether any post-war…

Episode 599: Architecture Won't Save a Bad Street

This week on the Talking Headways podcast we're joined by Naama Blonder to talk about her book she wrote with her partner Misha Bereznyak entitled Building Charm: A Hyper Practical Guide to Developing Outstanding New Neighborhoods. We chat about the book's focus on human scale and how it radically rethinks street design. +++

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Find out about our newsletter and archive on YouTube!

Steven Levy on the New MacBook Pro, With, Yes, a Touchscreen

Steven Levy, writing at Wired with the scoop on the new MacBook Pros (News+ link):

This turnaround is a big deal to Apple fans. Ternus shrugs off the drama. “The Mac is first and foremost an indirect input device, built around the trackpad and keyboard. But I think there’s times when it’s comfortable and handy to have touch.”

Ternus and Apple want to make sure that the Mac faithful don’t panic that the 42-year-old franchise is losing its identity to Apple’s gangbusters mobile products. “We needed to get to a point where adding touch didn’t make the product lesser in any way. It didn’t make it…

The Olivia Tremor Control: The Same Place

Following the deaths of two founding members, the long-in-the-works final album from the Elephant 6 group is a dark, psychedelic epic that unfolds with eerie clairvoyance and intensity.

brakence: marroW

The Ohio artist’s first album in four years is paranoid, indulgent, and theatrical, unfolding like a dark romantasy novel.

Thursday’s Headlines Live in an Endless Summer

President Trump announced that the EPA is “terminating” the Biden administration’s limits on methane produced by oil and gas drilling — the largest source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. (Associated Press)

From makeup and appliances to highways and subdivisions, the fossil fuel industry in the mid-20th century used advertising and PR campaigns to create demand for its products. It’s an outdated vision of the American Dream that the Trump administration still shares today. (Grist)

Noah Kaufmann says that economists are being shortsighted by recommending policies that cut greenhouse gas…

Could Congress’s Anti-Flock Surveillance Bill Ban Automated Traffic Enforcement, Too?

A proposed federal surveillance ban may threaten speed and red light camera programs across the country, which some advocates say would force cities to pick between privacy and street safety.

Following months of rumors, The Flock-Off Act was officially introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) in September, with promises to withdraw all federal funds from any municipality that contracts with a surveillance camera operator. And that’s not just limited to the notorious technology company for which the bill is named, which has deployed an estimated 116,000 motion-triggered cameras in neighborhoods…

Anderson.Paak / Cordae: Heavy Is the Crown

Anderson.Paak and Cordae kick back over a suite of boom-bap and trap-adjacent slappers on their lopsided but entertaining collaborative album.

Water Damage: Repair

The Austin ensemble makes minimalism feel enveloping and unruly on its latest record, where new melodic details are always emerging from a swarming mass of sound.

Errol Morris shot ads for Theranos and recently revealed...

Errol Morris shot ads for Theranos and recently revealed he has a two-hour interview with Elizabeth Holmes that he’s considering releasing. “Did I have any reason to believe that she was a fraud? I did not. Did that change as time went on? It did.”

Remember the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game? Turns out:...

Remember the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game? Turns out: “Kevin Bacon is not the center of Hollywood. In fact, he never has been, and almost certainly never will be.”

Why Electricity Law Would Make It Very Hard to Unplug a Rogue AI

This is Heatmap Daily, a weekday digest written by our executive editor. Subscribe here.

It’s one of the most popular what-ifs about rogue artificial intelligence: Suppose an AI agent really were to get out of control and start threatening hospitals, flights, critical infrastructure, or even humanity as a whole. Why wouldn’t we just pull the plug on it?

A new report argues: We might not be able to. And the reason has to do with the energy system.

8: What South Carolina and the Early Vote Tell Us About the Midterms

With Election Day less than a week away, Galen, Clare, and Nate answer your burning questions and unpack what the latest New York Times/Siena poll reveals about South Carolina’s Senate race, whether pollsters are herding, and how to interpret the numbers in the final stretch. They also dig into what early voting data can—and can’t—tell us about voter turnout and the broader electorate.

You can request a transcript by emailing transcripts@crooked.com. Include the podcast name, episode title, and air date. Please allow 48 hours for delivery.

The Most Important Thing to Remember About Your Mother

“It is not easy to give closeness and freedom, safety plus danger.”

One of the hardest realizations in life, and one of the most liberating, is that our mothers are neither saints nor saviors — they are just people who, however messy or painful our childhood may have been, and however complicated the adult relationship, have loved us the best way they knew how, with the cards they were dealt and the tools they had.

It is a whole life’s work to accept this elemental fact, and a life’s triumph to accept it not with bitterness but with love.

Annie Rauwerda collects old newspaper headlines about people with the same names of future celebs

even more in the second thread, including gems like “Peter Thiel Ends Life With Acid”

Bright Lights, Big City Ticket: Intra-NYC Commuter Rail Trips Are Surging

New York City residents are riding commuter trains at record rates thanks to cheaper tickets that let people pay less to ride between stations inside city limits, MTA officials said on Wednesday.

Ridership on the Long Island Rail Road and the Metro-North Railroad has nearly rebounded to pre-pandemic numbers — largely thanks to disproportionate ridership growth in New York City, whose residents have taken advantage of $5 off-peak and $7 peak “City Tickets” for intracity travel that the MTA expanded from a weekend-only deal in 2022.

Ridership at city stations has grown a flabbergasting 180…

This New Bio-Inspired Membrane Could Make Lithium Extraction Much Cleaner

The tech still needs more testing, but it could revolutionize how lithium is sourced for batteries.

A pastor, a Tejano singer, and a slew of salmon and Sullivans walk into a midterm

With less than one week until Election Day, Democrats are looking good by nearly every national measure. The Senate math is…

‘Unburdensome’: The Slate Truck Is Easier Than A Tesla To Live With, James May Says

The former Top Gear host said the affordable electric truck was “good natured” and “vaguely practical” in his latest review.

The West Invented the Electrolyzer. China Is Building the Industry.

The electrolyzer has come a long way in the nearly 250 years since a pair of Dutch scientists first used electricity to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. Over the decades, European and American scientists refined and commercialized this technology, yet it is China that now accounts for nearly 70% of global electrolyzer manufacturing capacity, churning out the machines that make clean hydrogen from water at a fraction of Western costs. Its factories are building far more equipment than its domestic hydrogen market can absorb, and exports are climbing. On paper, China looks poised to…

The EU Just Hit A Historic Milestone: EVs Outsold Gas And Diesel Cars Combined

EV sales are up in nearly every EU country. They could surpass hybrids very soon.

Trump Hasn’t Been Advancing New Wind Farms During Permitting Talks

In September, the Trump administration told a reporter that the president directed the Pentagon to finally process wind projects through routine airspace approvals as required under a court order. By doing this, it created the appearance of real headway and good faith in talks with Democrats in Congress on energy permitting legislation before the November midterm elections.

But the White House’s assurances are not what they seem.

All of the projects the administration has reportedly advanced over the past week are repowerings, meaning they’re only upgrades of existing projects, and two of the…

P S Y C H O! (a mixtape)

This mix began as a Halloween party mix (complete with “Monster Mash”) and then morphed into something weirder and scarier, I think: a mix of songs (mostly) about being crazy — maybe even psychotically! — in love. (The more you listen to love songs the more you realize, “Man, this person is not well!”)

These mixes usually begin with what I call “seed songs” — a song that you kind of want to build a whole mix around. In this case it was the Sonics’ “Psycho” and Girls’ “Lust for Life,” which I couldn’t get out of my head for weeks. I also found that picture of Frankenstein’s monster with the…

This Small City's LRT is so Good it Made me Angry

Made by humans for humans. No AI voices or generative AI were used in the making of this video.

Check out my new public transit travel show, Day Pass, now available on Nebula!

Watch this video ad-free and sponsor-free on Nebula:

The DOE announces $5B loan to Constellation for nuclear uprates

The pro-nuclear Trump administration continues to put its money where its mouth is. On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Energy announced a conditional loan commitment of up to $5 billion to boost the output of 15 reactors at eight nuclear power plants in Illinois, Maryland, and Pennsylvania by a combined 1.1…

#2571 - Jimmy Carr

Jimmy Carr is a comedian, television personality, and writer. His new book, "On Jokes: The Hidden Mechanics of Funny," co-authored with Amanda Baker and Abi Grant, is available now. He is currently on tour.

Perplexity: Download the app or ask Perplexity anything at https://pplx.ai/rogan.

Don’t miss out on all the action this week at DraftKings! Download the DraftKings app today! Sign-up using https://dkng.co/rogan or through my promo code ROGAN.

It’s A Wonderful Night of the Living Dead

remix geniuses Bell Brothers mashed up two of the most famous post-1930 public domain movies

A bunch of items from Stanley Kubrick’s personal archive...

A bunch of items from Stanley Kubrick’s personal archive will be auctioned off early next year, including Jack Torrance’s axe & the sisters’ blue dresses from The Shining, Kubrick’s director’s chair, and a chess set owned by the director.

Errors in the research of Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman

AI issues its judgment:

147 serious enough to change a headline number

69% of papers have at least one

Samuel East writes about getting laid off from Plex, only 60 days in

they apparently laid off the entire player team; so much for the “Lifetime” Plex Pass

Neuron Persona Library

tracking the bizarre personas that appear when pushing neurons in open-weight AI models

PC Magazine’s screencam archive

amazing DISCMASTER collection of narrated website reviews from 1997

South Korean Police Are Cracking Down On Tesla Owners Jailbreaking FSD

Only U.S.-built Teslas get FSD, so Korean owners of Chinese-built Teslas are illegally unlocking it.

The Moving Image Archive

The Moving Image Archive is a collection of over 120,000 clips from almost 2300 archival films drawn from public domain collections.

The internet is full of forgotten films, and this archive is a growing library of that collection. When synthetic footage can now fabricate the past, preserving verifiable history matters more than ever before.

A few things I found while poking around:

Love Spells - Maybe I Still Love You | A COLORS SHOW

Some feelings don’t fade. They just get quieter.

Houston’s Love Spells (@LoveSpellsLovesYou) finds clarity in lingering feelings on ‘Maybe I Still Love You’, a soft-focus love song from his new album ‘LOVE IS THE LAW’.

▶ Stream Love Spells' COLORS SHOW: https://colors.lnk.to/lovespells

It’s Hard To Be A Rich Radical. “It was disappointing how...

It’s Hard To Be A Rich Radical. “It was disappointing how easily money turned a lot of them into sudden conservatives, full of right-wing doctrine about bootstraps and the fantasy of a black capitalist utopia…”

Can You Ever Un-Sprawl a City Like Las Vegas?

When other US cities were building neighborhoods around electric streetcars — neighborhoods that largely haven't been improved upon — Las Vegas had a population of around...25. How do you begin to fix a city that didn't even get started until the highway age?

Thanks so much to Clark County Commission candidate Minja Yan for having me down! Learn more about her campaign here:

The Arts District has lots of fantastic murals. The one I've featured on the thumbnail is by Vegas local Eric Vozzola, who you can find at:

Wonderful Weather: Floods and Foreboding in 17th-Century Britain

When the Bristol Channel flooded in 1607, it was not just one of the worst natural disasters in British history, it was also a sign, for many, that they had strayed from the path of God. Erik Crnkovich examines the overlap of miraculous weather and the early modern printing industry, which cultivated a thirst for all things occult, exotic, and odd.

Meet ProPublica’s 2026 Class of Emerging Reporters

ProPublica’s Emerging Reporters Program provides support and mentorships to college students who are pursuing careers in investigative journalism and need additional training and financial support to help advance their goals.

Participants receive a $9,000 stipend, a trip to the annual NICAR investigative journalism conference, occasional training and presentations by speakers. They’ll also be paired one-on-one with ProPublica journalists who can help counsel them on stories, build their connections in the industry and expose them to the varied paths that careers in investigative journalism can…

Do Those Funky Tesla Wheel Covers Actually Boost Range?

Haloblk wheel covers are supposed to boost range while giving disc wheel vibes, but they only do one of those.

Yellow Fang - Full Performance (Live on KEXP)

http://KEXP.ORG and AXEAN present Live on KEXP in Bali with Yellow Fang performing at Locca Sea House.Recorded August 28, 2026

I Don't Know 04:25

Day To Dark 19:22

Guessing the Name: MacBook Studio?

A teaser video shared by Apple CEO John Ternus today hints at a potential name for the rumored MacBook models with touch-enabled OLED displays: MacBook Studio. [...]

Apple is expected to show off the new MacBooks to selected tech reporters and content creators at an experience in Los Angeles at 10 a.m. Pacific Time today, and that is the home of Hollywood movie studios after all.

I went to bed last night thinking “MacBook Studio” was the best guess. I woke up this morning feeling like it was a name worth betting on. It just fits. There’s a Mac Studio desktop, Studio Display monitor, and Apple’s…

Objection, your honor

You've probably heard, at this point, about the big changes coming to Meta's AI scraping terms for business accounts. Nieman Lab had that scoop, and since then, small businesses, journalists, and artists using Meta products like Instagram have been raising the alarm. But if you're in the EU or UK, you might be in luck and can object to that use of your data, as some users have pointed out.

If You're In the UK or EU, Here's How to Object to Meta's AI Training

Earlier this month, Meta updated its commercial terms of use for business accounts to allow it to “use any content from such domains, web…

If You're In the UK or EU, Here's How to Object to Meta's AI Training

Earlier this month, Meta updated its commercial terms of use for business accounts to allow it to “use any content from such domains, web pages, or URLs to provide, develop, improve, research, train, and maintain the integrity of” Meta’s products.

Many artists and small business owners that rely on Instagram and Facebook are livid at Meta granting itself permission to use their content, including from websites simply connected to their Meta accounts, to train AI. But for users in the United Kingdom and European Union, for now, there’s a way to object.

Meta buried this change in its Commercial…

The October inflection point for vibe game development

I've written before about how November 2025 was an inflection point for coding agents - the point where Opus 4.5 and GPT-5.1 crossed a tipping point that meant their respective coding agents became reliable daily drivers for software engineers. I think we've reached a new inflection point in October 2026, and this time it's for vibe coding computer games.

Pumpkin Farmer, aka Quarter Sun Cove

Four times as insulting

Politicians are afraid to fix taxes. So 100 citizens tried.

Connecticut’s property tax system has been broken for decades and the politicians have failed to fix the problem. So now, they’re trying something new: a citizens assembly. (Citizens assemblies are also old. They go back to Ancient Greece, when lawmakers were chosen not through elections, but through random lotteries.)

Today on the show, Connecticut’s citizens assembly. It's like jury duty, but for taxes. About hundred random people from all around Connecticut come together to try to solve the state’s property tax problem. They wrestle with whether they should raise taxes, cut spending, find…

What Israel’s Election Means for Energy

Current conditions: For the first time, Miami’s king tide — a periodic exceptionally high tide brought by on astronomical alignment — crossed the threshold for “major” flooding without a hurricane, notching the highest level in 11 years • America’s Northern Mariana Islands are hunkering down as Typhoon In-Fa is set to brush past its northern reaches • India has evacuated tens of thousands from its eastern coast as Tropical Cyclone Arnab makes landfall.

1. Israel’s nail-biter election could bring a former long-duration storage startup exec to power

Which way? Nir Keidar/Anadolu via Getty Images

This 400 kW EV Charger Uses Old EV Batteries To Avoid Costly Grid Upgrades

Allye’s new DC fast charger can use a simple 16A grid connection, energizing depots and temporary sites in hours instead of months.

MALIMAN | Brussels, Belgium | Keep Hush Live x BREAXX

Keep Hush is an independent dance music platform that collaborates with crews worldwide to showcase local talent. Back the Underground. Since 2012.

We teamed up with BREAXX to bring dubstep legend Coki to La Fabriek, with some of the city's most exciting upcoming artists. Cutting edge sounds through a funktion one soundsystem, this one is for the bass heads.

TRACKLIST (we need your help!):

Coki | Brussels, Belgium | Keep Hush Live x BREAXX

Keep Hush is an independent dance music platform that collaborates with crews worldwide to showcase local talent. Back the Underground. Since 2012.

We teamed up with BREAXX to bring dubstep legend Coki to La Fabriek, with some of the city's most exciting upcoming artists. Cutting edge sounds through a funktion one soundsystem, this one is for the bass heads.

TRACKLIST (we need your help!):

Pala10 | Brussels, Belgium | Keep Hush Live x BREAXX

Keep Hush is an independent dance music platform that collaborates with crews worldwide to showcase local talent. Back the Underground. Since 2012.

We teamed up with BREAXX to bring dubstep legend Coki to La Fabriek, with some of the city's most exciting upcoming artists. Cutting edge sounds through a funktion one soundsystem, this one is for the bass heads.

TRACKLIST (we need your help!):

Queen Paramount | Brussels, Belgium | Keep Hush Live x BREAXX

Keep Hush is an independent dance music platform that collaborates with crews worldwide to showcase local talent. Back the Underground. Since 2012.

We teamed up with BREAXX to bring dubstep legend Coki to La Fabriek, with some of the city's most exciting upcoming artists. Cutting edge sounds through a funktion one soundsystem, this one is for the bass heads.

TRACKLIST (we need your help!):

WondaGurl | Boiler Room LA: heds

This week we're broadcasting heds' stage takeover from last month's LA showcase featuring sets from WondaGurl, The Glitch Mob & DJ Sliink.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

► Shop Boiler Room clothing: https://blrrm.tv/shop

The Glitch Mob | Boiler Room LA: heds

This week we're broadcasting heds' stage takeover from last month's LA showcase featuring sets from WondaGurl, The Glitch Mob & DJ Sliink.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

► Shop Boiler Room clothing: https://blrrm.tv/shop

DJ Sliink | Boiler Room LA: heds

This week we're broadcasting heds' stage takeover from last month's LA showcase featuring sets from WondaGurl, The Glitch Mob & DJ Sliink.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

► Shop Boiler Room clothing: https://blrrm.tv/shop

The PAC taking out clean energy opponents

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Clean energy is the cheapest, fastest-growing source of power in the country, yet politically it barely registers. Republicans gutted its tax credits last year without fearing any consequences. The Invest in Tomorrow Coalition, a super PAC backed by clean energy investors, is trying to change that the old-fashioned way: by punishing the industry’s enemies. It went six for six in this year’s primaries; it’s now spending at least $15 million against seven…

Those who work and those who post

Last week in The Atlantic, Jonathan Chait hailed New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani as a pragmatic moderate in his approach to governance.

I’ve toyed with this theme and basically agree with Chait’s points. But for the sake of offering a different perspective, I don’t think Mamdani’s pragmatic and moderate approach to doing the job of mayor means he’s not really a leftist.

The clearest precedent I can think of for the way he’s governing is Bernie Sanders as mayor of Burlington. Sanders won narrowly in a three-way race, thanks in part to support from the police union, and by all accounts gained…

The Amarna letters

Petty disputes, pleas for help and requests for gold – explore letters sent to Egyptian pharaohs more than 3,000 years ago

- by Aeon Video

$1,000 a Year to Welcome a Data Center?

Would you welcome a massive data center to your town if the developer promised your household $1,000 every year? That's the offer facing residents of De Soto, Kansas, in Isabella Ledonne's article, “De Soto Data Center Plans to Offer $1,000 to Households, but Neighbors Say They're Not So Sure.” Norm Van Eeden Petersman examines the deal with Greg Miller of the Center for Land Economics and Strong Towns Chief Technical Advisor Edward Erfurt. The project could bring enormous new property value, but much of the resulting tax revenue may be tied up financing infrastructure for the development…

Trump Rallies For Republicans, Israel Election Results, Fed Interest Rates Meeting

President Trump rallied for Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton in Texas, but his personal grievances kept competing with his party’s closing message ahead of the midterms.

Israel’s election remains too close to call, with Benjamin Netanyahu and Gadi Eisenkot both short of a governing majority and Arab-led parties potentially holding the balance of power.

Investors expect the Federal Reserve to hold interest rates steady today, even as prices rise faster than wages and squeeze household budgets.

Is Running From Trump Enough to Save Republicans on Tuesday?

A look at candidates from President Trump’s party who are running on a platform of criticizing him.

In next week’s midterm elections, a specific kind of Republican candidate is appealing to disillusioned voters of both parties: moderates willing to criticize President Trump.

Jess Bidgood explains how some Republicans are trying to bring back an older version of their party.

How Cleta Mitchell Turned Trump’s “Big Lie” Into a Movement

In July, not long before President Donald Trump delivered a primetime address questioning the legitimacy of American elections, the pioneering conservative election lawyer Cleta Mitchell and about two dozen of her associates logged onto a private video briefing with the White House.

Mitchell, who holds no formal position in the Trump administration, had been pivotal to Trump’s bid to challenge his loss in 2020, spearheading efforts to prove his claims of fraud and reverse his defeat in court.

After Joe Biden took office, when others abandoned the fight or scoffed as Trump clung to conspiracy…

How much are Trump’s pro-coal policies costing us?

The Trump administration loves coal plants. The rest of us are paying the price in higher electricity bills, poorer health, and worsening climate change. That’s the takeaway of an analysis out today from the Environmental Defense Fund. It finds the Trump administration is directly or indirectly propping up nearly…

Extreme weather is creating a perfect storm of misinformation. Here’s what’s at stake.

Extreme weather is creating a perfect storm of misinformation

a perfect storm of misinformation

Rumors and conspiracies are spreading too fast for emergency managers to keep up. This information chaos is slowing disaster relief and putting lives at risk.

Would you trust an emergency alert written by AI?

Earlier this month, after Hurricane Isaias made landfall on the Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane, the emergency management expert Laura Myers got a call from a meteorologist in Alabama. Myers is director of the University of Alabama’s Center for Advanced Public Safety, and she talks to state and local emergency managers around her region all the time. The meteorologist told Myers that a local emergency manager had published a graphic showing where Isaias might threaten the Alabama coast with a “sting jet” of high winds.

The problem? The emergency manager had generated the graphic using an…

How to fact-check during and after a disaster

Misinformation about extreme weather and disasters often starts small: Someone reposts a rumor on social media about government corruption or an AI photo of a shark swimming in floodwaters. It’s shared dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of times before huge swaths of people believe it as truth.

Trying to fact-check during a crisis is stressful, and extreme weather makes you feel like there’s a lot to figure out and learn in a short period of time. That’s why it’s important to know ahead of time who you can trust, how to vet information, and how to talk to your friends and family about it.

Ext…

Hurricane Helene haunts the midterms in North Carolina

Lunch hour was busy at the Haywood County Public Library in Canton, North Carolina, where the midterm election wasn’t the only thing on people’s minds as they cast early ballots on October 19. The region has seen a lot of natural disasters in the past few years, and many residents are still rebuilding after Hurricane Helene. Repeated flooding has unsettled Sandra Moody, a straight-ticket Republican voter.

“Well, we’re not weather people,” Moody said with a hoarse laugh, “but these floods that keep coming — they’re supposed to be 500-year floods. You’re like, ‘What is going on?’”

Two years after…

More heat pumps would actually be good for the grid, researchers find

Heat pumps, superefficient sources of electric heating and cooling, are winners for the climate, air quality, and typically a household’s energy bills. But a common claim cautioning against their widespread adoption in the U.S. is that the electrical grid is too strained to handle all the extra demand they would…

For Indigenous peoples in Brazil, the election results offer a reprieve — not a resolution

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s reelection as president of Brazil gave Indigenous communities a measure of relief after a campaign in which his opponent, Flávio Bolsonaro, promised to halt recognition of new Indigenous territories and push for more mining and development.

“For Indigenous peoples, the reelection of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is more than a victory, and it is bigger than Brazil,” said Edson Krenak, who is Indigenous Krenak. “It is not about victory; it is about the possibility to dream and to fight without fear of death.”

But Sunday’s runoff election strengthened Bolsonaro’s movement…

Can Universities Survive? The Great Expansion Part 2

Today’s episode is part two of David’s conversation with political theorist Alan Finlayson about the up-and-down history of British universities since 1945, taking the story from the Blair years to the present. What changed when the ambition became to send half of all young people to university? Which old barriers came down and which new barriers came up? Where did universities fit into the new knowledge economy? And how did so many of them stumble into the crisis they face today?

You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus our free online…

From the archive: The disabled villain: why sensitivity reading can’t kill off this ugly trope – podcast

This week, from 2023: For centuries, fictional narratives have used outer difference to telegraph inner monstrosity. As someone who uses a wheelchair, I’ve learned you can’t just edit out a few slurs or bad words to fix this – it’s often baked deep into the storyWritten and read by Jan Grue

Seattle Aims to Turn Vision Zero Dreams Into ‘Durable Law’

Seattle just passed a pair of bills aimed at giving the city’s theoretical commitment to Vision Zero real teeth— and the pressure is on to pass the third part of the package, which proponents say could really take the Emerald City’s street safety aspirations to the next level.

On Monday, the Seattle City Council unanimously approved two out of three of the policies collectively known as the SAFER Streets package — short for “Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Equitable and Responsive” — which sponsor and transportation committee Chair Rob Saka said could help “move Vision Zero from an aspirational…

Yung Miami: Watch Dis!

The former City Girl’s solo LP is entertaining enough to overlook the weaker features and superfluous “Spend Dat” remixes. The song dedicated to Diddy, not so much.

Sour Widows: Sigil

The California band channels uneasy dreams and looming threats into tense, slowcore-infused indie rock on a new album produced with Jay Som’s Melina Duterte.

Wednesday’s Headlines Are On the Ballot

More than 20 communities in 11 states have transportation referendums on the ballot this November (Smart Cities Dive).

One is a 0.5 percent sales tax in Seattle to support bus service (Seattle Times; paywall).

Another is in the Bay Area, where Max Mautner notes that residents pay more in taxes to subsidize highways than they do for transit.

Mackeeper: Believe You Me

On their full-length debut, the buzzy NYC siblings pay tribute to the fuckboy charm of the aughts with their precocious, mischievous, and rapidly evolving pop music.

Susanne Sundfør: Revelations of Divine Love

On her eighth album, the Norwegian singer, backed by pipe organ, draws on a 14th-century Christian text for a record wholly devoted to the divine.

Trump’s EPA is letting America’s leakiest oil and gas companies off the hook

At a campaign rally on Tuesday, President Donald Trump said his administration is going to dismantle restrictions on methane, one of the most common and potent planet-warming greenhouse gases.

The new rule, proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency in response to complaints from the oil and gas industry, revises a Biden-era rule targeting methane leaks and would relax methane monitoring and emission-control requirements.

The agency has planned to repeal these rules for months, saying that they posed a “monumental threat” to the economy and an “undue burden” on the oil and gas industry.…

What It Takes to Be Free

We spend our lives trying to find our power and our freedom. It is not easy: We live in a culture that has distorted the meaning and measure of power, confusing visibility with value, status with substance, attention with love; we live in a universe where free will may be an illusion, where chance deals the vast majority of the cards — the family and epoch we are born into, the body and biochemistry we live in, the people we cross paths with, the accidents of chemistry and happenstance we call love. The great double-edged question is how to keep power from becoming a prison and how much…

Siri AI Expands to More Languages in OS 27.2

With the 27.2 software updates released today, Siri AI — an entirely new version of Siri that is profoundly more capable, conversational, and personal — is expanding to more people around the world, with availability now in the French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish languages. [...]

Siri AI is currently unavailable in the EU in iOS, iPadOS, and watchOS. Apple is working constructively with the EU in an attempt to find a path forward.

Don’t hold your breath. (Or if you prefer, N’y comptez pas trop.)

Who Will be Left Behind if the Bus Stops Running?

Growing up in San Francisco, the 48 Quintara was my lifeline. It got me across the city to school in the Sunset, to hang out with friends in West Portal, and then back to the Mission for soccer practice.

Whether I sat up front with the seniors and their grocery carts or was crammed in the back, wishing someone would crack the window, 35 cents got me wherever I wanted to go, surrounded by a microcosm of San Francisco’s wonderful people and cultures.

My son is two years old now, and the 29 Sunset is his lifeline. We take it to daycare, the playground, to the pediatrician, and to see his…

Tuesday discussion post

The Cheesecake Factory and an election in Israel

Environment for Sale: Trump Administration Threatens California’s Coastal Protections

The Trump administration is threatening to strip California of its authority to protect its coastline unless state regulators agree to demands that could benefit offshore oil companies and other powerful interests. The move could make it easier to restart dormant oil operations and expand offshore development, while limiting California’s ability to challenge projects that threaten its coast.

While the state has not publicly discussed legal options should the administration move forward with its threats, there is no legal precedent for the federal government to act in this manner with the…

Apple Creator Studio Updated With a Slew of AI Features, Along With a New Open JSON File Format for Keynote

Apple Newsroom, with software news for Apple’s “Pro and Tell” week:

Apple today introduced transformative updates to Apple Creator Studio, the powerful collection of creative apps designed to put studio-grade tools into the hands of modern creators across Mac, iPad, and iPhone. Final Cut Pro for Mac now includes built-in MotionVFX — an expansive collection of visual effects, plug-ins, transitions, templates, and motion graphics tools — as well as seamless editing in Pixelmator Pro. Apple’s curated Content Hub now includes video assets and is available in Final Cut Pro. Music creators using…

★ Prestructured WYSIWYG

One of the many small pleasures of my job is when someone else writes a good take on a subject that I have been meaning to write myself. Occasionally this stings, because it was something I really wanted to write myself. But usually it’s just awesome, because it’s an article I wanted to exist, didn’t really want to do the work of writing myself, and now it exists and I can just link to it, perhaps with commentary. It’s like finding money on the ground or in the pocket of a jacket you haven’t worn in months.

That’s what happened yesterday with Glenn Fleishman’s “Why Notes Will Never Let Us Edit…

Ep. 898 - You Can See Everything

David, Devindra, and Jeff try not to stare with Clayface, head back overseas for season four of The Diplomat, and assess the woven romance of Wicker. Then they take an unblinking look at Elizabeth Holmes in You Can See Everything.

We're making video versions of our reviews! Be sure to follow us on the following platforms:

David - Decoding Everything: Caroline Siede’s Clayface review

What’s Left for ‘Pro and Tell’ Week: Touch-Enabled OLED MacBooks

Apple on Wednesday will announce 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models featuring touch-enabled OLED displays with thinner bezels, a Dynamic Island instead of a notch, M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, and a lighter and slightly thinner design, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports. Apple is hosting a private “Pro and tell” experience in Los Angeles starting at 10 a.m. Pacific Time tomorrow.

I’m here in LA for the press shindig tomorrow. One thing I’ve been thinking about regarding these reported touch-enabled OLED MacBooks is that Gurman has reported for months that these new MacBooks will sport M5 Pro and…

Sylvia Plath on Living with the Darkness and Making Art from the Barely Bearable Lightness of Being

“One has to shut off that nagging part of the mind and go on without it with bravo and philosophy.”

When the twenty-two-year-old Sylvia Plath (October 27, 1932–February 11, 1963) wrote to her mother one bleak January day, both women were wading through a darkness of the soul. Science was only just beginning to hone the tools with which to begin dissecting the elemental mystery of what makes us who we are: how much of our psychology and what we experience as our personhood — whether we call it self or soul or spirit — is a product of our physical constitution, of the particular biochemical…

Episode #253... The Philosophy of Alan Watts - What Am I?

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Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Apple Also Announces iMac With M6

Just a speed bump, but speed bumps are good.

M6 with 2 Thunderbolt ports: Base price: $1500

RAM: 16 GB +0 24 GB +200

[Sponsor] WorkOS: Let Agents Sign Up for Your App Without a Browser

An agent can’t click through a signup page built for humans, so give it something it can read instead. Publish an auth.md file and agents register themselves without ever touching a browser login, and the user never gets pulled out of what they were doing.

With WorkOS auth.md, enroll in the dashboard and AuthKit publishes the file. Agents read it, register, and get scoped, short-lived credentials you control.

Make your app agent-ready →

Apple Introduces New Base MacBook Pro With M6, 14-Inch-Only

Apple Newsroom’s “Pro and Tell” announcement week continues:

Apple today announced the new 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6, delivering even more performance, powerful on-device AI capabilities, and faster connectivity for college students, business users, creators, and more. M6 features an advanced 12-core CPU with the world’s fastest CPU core, so everything from productivity tasks to more demanding pro workflows feels incredibly fast and responsive. The 12-core GPU delivers up to 30 percent faster graphics and up to 25 percent faster AI workloads when compared to M5, making the 14-inch MacBook…

It's not the bots, Flock

Flock CEO Garrett Langley says some interesting things to cops behind closed doors. He recently lied about his surveillance technology’s role in tracking a woman who had self-administered an abortion and 404 Media’s coverage of that incident, calling it “entirely false.” Now, in leaked audio obtained by 404 Media, Langley is saying the protests that have broken out around the country against his company, many of which have resulted in communities canceling their contracts with Flock and bagging up the cameras, are not real. Seems pretty real to me!

In Leaked Audio, Flock CEO Tells Cops…

Albrecht Dürer’s Monument to the Vanquished Peasants (1525)

The design for a difficult-to-interpret monument that was never intended to be built.

Marissa Mayer Can’t Keep Pretending 'Gender Doesn't Matter'

In Sunday’s edition of the New York Times, Marissa Mayer, former president and CEO of Yahoo, told her interviewer something so absurd it’s since gone viral.

Struggling with the “impossible task” of naming three things that she loves about her own 10 year old daughter, the New York Times reports, Mayer asked the AI assistant she just launched to do that thinking for her. It delivered the perfect answer, Mayer said: “It came back and was like, your daughter is empathetic, creative and an animal lover.” Everyone is piling onto that absurd anecdote right now, rightfully so. What she has to say…

Ford’s new EV pickup will come with more affordable home-power backup

Electric vehicles can serve as home backup batteries. But so far, most EVs have needed expensive bidirectional chargers to do that — a tough sell for customers. Ford aims to remove this cost obstacle with its forthcoming Ford Fathom electric pickup truck. On Tuesday, the U.S. automaker revealed that the Fathom,…

Marcus Aurelius on the Good Luck of Your Bad Luck

“What happened could have happened to anyone, but not everyone could have carried on.”

Most people live with a great deal more suffering than is visible to even the most proximate and sensitive onlooker. Many have survived things both unimaginable and invisible to the outside world. This has been the case since the dawn of our species, for human nature has hardly changed beneath the continually repainted façade of our social sanctions — human beings have always been capable of inflicting tremendous pain on each other and capable of triumphal healing.

There is, however, a peculiar modern…

Why I don’t write about A.I. all the time

Every so often I mention that I agree with many of the founders and technical employees at the major artificial-intelligence companies that their work stands a non-trivial chance of killing everyone.

When I do, I’m typically asked why, then, most of my posts are about other stuff — things like the upcoming midterm elections or the permitting reform bill that’s hopefully going to pass during the lame-duck session of Congress.

My answer is that while I completely respect people who feel like making a wild career pivot, most of us are going to keep working in our same basic professions. And I…

Democrats Lead In NPR Poll, Preparations For Election Challenge, Israel Voting Begins

A new NPR/PBS News/Marist poll gives Democrats an eight-point lead on the congressional ballot, but lagging enthusiasm among young voters and independents could complicate their push to win Congress.

Democrats are preparing legal and political responses to possible election challenges from President Trump as he offers million-dollar rewards for tips leading to voter fraud convictions.

Israelis vote in a closely fought election that could determine Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political future, with tens of thousands of Israelis living abroad returning home to cast their ballots.

PREVIEW: Falling with Style in Elon Musk's "Flying Car"

***This is a preview of a Patreon-exclusive bonus episode. For complete access to this and all of our bonus content, plus ad-free versions of regular episodes, merch discounts, presale tickets to live shows, and more, become a Patreon supporter of The War on Cars.***

Last week, Tesla debuted its second-generation Roadster, staging an elaborate demonstration in which the car drove upside down before righting itself and then "flying" to a safe landing, thanks to some fancy SpaceX technology. After the demo—which also featured the car doing barrel rolls, leapfrogging over a line of other Tesla…

Love with nowhere to go

Grief is not only for the dead. When we are unable to honour other profound losses, we become strangers to ourselves

- by Derek van Zoonen

The Halloween Movie Draft

Live from the Toni Rembe theater in San Francisco, it’s the Halloween Movie Draft! Sean and Amanda are joined by friends of the pod Chris Ryan and Alex Ross Perry to select their favorite spooky genre movies of all time.

(0:00) What makes a Halloween movie?

(21:12) The draft categories and order

The battery boom behind the AI buildout [partner content]

The AI buildout is the most capital-intensive project in history. The hunger for power has pushed companies to unconventional options, sparking demand for jet engines, mobile trailer-mounted generators, and hybrid microgrids.

And now batteries are having a moment. The urgency to connect to the grid and manage volatile AI workloads is making storage a must-have piece of the energy stack for data centers.

The demand is being felt by companies like battery integrator FlexGen, which has seen its order book suddenly filled with data center customers.

They Protested ICE. Now They’ve Been Convicted of Terrorism.

On July 4, 2025, a group of 10 antifa protesters was arrested, accused of what the federal government called a planned attack on the Prairieland detention facility in Texas. They were prosecuted as terrorists.

Janet Reitman, who has been covering the story, discusses the legal case and the questions it raises about who now qualifies as a terrorist in America.

Guest: Janet Reitman, who writes for The New York Times Magazine.

What Is 'You Can See Everything' Really About?

1. It’s a strange new genre of rom-com

Here’s one summary: Nathan, a fastidious neurotic, is a performance artist who is obsessed with understanding the truth about other people1, despite his anxiety that they can never be truly understood. He meets Elizabeth, a world-famous liar, whose bug-eyed appeals to innocence disguise the fact that she can’t stop making things up. He relies on artifice to understand other people’s honesty; she performs honesty to disguise her artifice. That this sounds like a log line for a trippy but possibly ingenious rom-com is appropriate. You Can See Everything is…

CMAT: Tiny Desk Concert

From top to (cheeky) bottom, CMAT’s Tiny Desk has it all: captivating stage presence, sharp songwriting, vocal range, a great band and comedic timing.

Across this set, the Irish singer-songwriter offers a refreshing perspective for country music. On the pop hit “Take a Sexy Picture of Me,” she uses humor as a response to cruel comments she’s received about her appearance. On “When a Good Man Cries,” CMAT deals with the guilt of hurting an ex who was good to her; as the song builds, she raises her hands above her head as her powerhouse vocals harmonize with the band and repeats, “Kyrie…

This Oil Company Is Linked to 1,000 Pollution Incidents and Other Violations. Oklahoma Never Punished It.

In June 2023, staff at an Oklahoma regulatory agency were fed up. The state isn’t known for cracking down on oil and gas companies for polluting the environment, but for over a year, the staff had been building a case to punish Citation Oil & Gas, one of the nation’s largest privately owned oil companies.

About 30 miles north of the Texas border, toxic wastewater was gushing from the ground outside the small city of Ardmore. In the mile-wide oil field known as the Bayou, an oily sheen glistened on creeks and long streaks of salt scarred the land. The so-called purges, bubbling up among stands…

Nate Silver Predicts a ‘Momentous’ Midterm

“If the election goes roughly as the polls say it will go, then in some ways it would mark the end of the Trump era,” Nate Silver told me.

The midterms are a week away, and it looks entirely possible that Democrats will win not just the House, but also the Senate. Democrats are polling competitively deep into red territory – Texas, Ohio, Alaska, Iowa, Kansas – states that Trump won in 2024 by double digits.

But Democrats have been burned by big polling misses before. So can we really trust what the polls are telling us? And what stories have emerged in the data that we might see play out on…

High power bills, blackouts land Michigan utilities on the ballot

When 83-year-old Sam Getsinger thinks about the future, she pictures her five grandchildren and the world she wants to leave them. An important part of that world, Getsinger said, is a healthy democracy. So when she first heard about an initiative to limit Michigan utilities’ influence in political campaigns, she immediately volunteered to support it.

“I don’t want our politics to continue so that the person with the most money wins everything,” Getsinger said. “I don’t think that’s a very sound democracy.”

Getsinger spent months knocking on doors throughout northern Michigan. She said nearly…

As extreme heat worsens, renters are gaining a ‘right to cooling’

Subjecting the incarcerated residents of Texas to extreme heat constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, and prisons statewide must install air-conditioning by the end of 2029.

Although the ruling Judge Robert Pitman issued last month is unique in its invocation of the Constitution’s Eighth Amendment, it is an explicit recognition of an idea increasingly reflected in laws and policies nationwide: As extreme heat becomes more dangerous, even deadly, access to cooling is increasingly seen as a necessity rather than a luxury. This shift has been especially active in housing, where renters often…

Price hikes aren’t all that’s at stake in FirstEnergy Ohio’s rate case

Before a utility can raise electricity rates, it must get approval from regulators. In Ohio, some groups are looking to step into that process to make sure FirstEnergy, whose utilities supply power to over 2 million customers in the state, uses some of the money it will receive from ratepayers to equitably enable the…

Roundup #90: In which Noah joins a Japanese VC firm

I have a fun announcement today, which is that I have a new side gig. I’ll be joining the Japanese VC firm Coral Capital as a Venture Partner! That’s less prestigious than it sounds — basically I’ll just be doing a few blog posts and helping to introduce them to folks in the U.S. But it’s still cool, and the Coral team is really great. The reason I’m doing this, of course, is to encourage more American investment into Japan, in order to revitalize that country’s economy. That was the subject of my book, The Weeb Economy (alternate title: Weebs Will Save Japan), which Coral helped to promote.…

Let Them Eat Cheesecake

Campaigning in Michigan, Barack Obama says Donald Trump's White House renovations look like "Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory" — touching off many rounds of fake conservative outrage. Jon, Tommy, and Lovett discuss Trump's reaction to the comparison and other news from the campaign trail, including Trump's public praise for Nicki Minaj's ass, Obama's response the anti-Muslim rhetoric targeting Abdul El-Sayed, and Mike Rogers's evasive performance on Meet the Press. Then the guys turn to the Department of Justice's preemptive attempt to invalidate the results of the Alaska Senate…

Would you pay to have the ‘best baby’? Liberal eugenics and the troubling quest for human perfection

Illustration: Ryan Evans/The Guardian

Study: The Missing Ingredient in the Fight To End Car Crash Deaths is… Fewer Cars

Communities that drive less and have more mobility options also have fewer deadly crashes, a new study confirms — so why is reducing car dependency so rarely discussed as a life-saving strategy in its own right?

In a fascinating recent study, researchers found that states whose residents drove more miles on average also reported more crashes on average — at least when states recorded those stats on a per capita basis, rather than the misleading per-mile basis on which many US transportation officials rely.

Wyoming, for instance, recorded both the highest average fatality rate across modes and…

Loidis: From the Toolkit of Lovers

The artist better known as Huerco S. nudges the minimal-house revival toward new extremes—of detail, duration, sensuousness—on a sprawling triple LP of hypnotic, late-night grooves.

Op-Ed: Toronto’s Bike Lane Fight Should Be a Wake Up Call for the US, Too

Donate to the fund to support the Toronto bike lane removal protestors here.

On Tuesday October 13, 2026, at around 8pm, myself and several hundred other people on bikes stood in front of multiple construction vehicles that had been sent to remove lanes in Toronto. After about 45 minutes of Toronto Police officers unsuccessfully trying to cajole cyclists out of the way of the trucks, workers without any animosity advised protestors that if we would allow them to pass, they would go home and not start removing bike lanes that night.

It was a big win in the first on-street battle for safe streets…

Tony Iommi: From the Dark

Teaming with Norwegian vocalist Jørn Lande, the 78-year-old Black Sabbath guitarist gets back to heavy-metal basics on a proudly uncompromising new solo album.

Hysterical Love Project: February’s Album

The Melbourne duo taps into trip-hop’s essential strangeness on its latest album, trading the genre’s boilerplate languor for dejected moods, menacing auras, and slippery, all-consuming bass.

Skino: Blood & Oil

The Washington, D.C. rapper’s new album epitomizes the best and worst of free car music: palatial experimental beats full of atmospheric drama and dull, interchangeable delivery.

Why Don’t We Live in an Art Nouveau World?

How many Sagrada Famílias is too many?

643: The iPhone Duo Review

Subtitle: October Experience Draft

Jason and Myke have spent the last few days using the iPhone Duo, and they're ready to report back. And, oh yeah, there's also a new iPad mini and a draft of Apple's forthcoming announcements this week!

This episode of Upgrade is sponsored by:

On nemeses

I used this poem at the top of my letter, “Everything you can see.”

See also: “Do you have a nemesis?”

Typewriter interview with Lisa Hanawalt

The latest typewriter interview is with artist Lisa Hanawalt.

On baseball

I love to (mostly) ignore baseball all year and then follow the playoffs religiously. A few weeks ago I wrote a whole newsletter about the game called “Baseball on the brain.” It begins:

“It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.” That’s the opening of “The Green Fields of the Mind,” collected in the slim, wonderful volume A Great and Glorious Game: Baseball…

Anil Dash’s guide to installing apps on your Commodore 64

I could’ve really used that Automatic Proofreader utility in 1986

ChatGPT keeps telling people 404 Media can solve their tech support problems

tech journalists are regularly getting spammed by meat proxies

Anderson.Paak & Cordae | A COLORS SHOW

UP NEXT I Anderson.Paak (@AndersonPaak) and Cordae (@CordaeOfficial) make a little chaos sound like a team effort.

▶ Stream Anderson.Paak & Cordae’s COLORS SHOW: https://colors.lnk.to/andersonpaakcordae

▶ Stream everywhere: https://colors.lnk.to/allshowscxs

Russia is Building a Nuclear Power Plant Inside NATO

Is Turkey’s first ever nuclear plant a $25BN gamble?

They can't harm you, if they can't find you! Use code theb1m at the link and get 60% off an annual plan 👉 https://incogni.com/theb1m

Grab a copy of Fred's book MEGA BUILDS 👉 https://bit.ly/3Y63G6X

nomi. - r u? | A COLORS SHOW

Do you hold on, or just let go?

North Carolina-raised artist nomi. sits with the tension between letting go and holding on in ‘r u?’, a soulful, introspective track from her new album ‘this wolf may cry’.

▶ Stream nomi.'s COLORS SHOW: https://colors.lnk.to/nomi

Young prudes

The end of casual sex.

Great art explained: Tamara in the green Bugatti

A very modern conception of womanhood: in the Jazz Age paintings of Tamara de Lempicka, women were bold, free and stylish

- by Aeon Video

How to build real peace

From Colombia to Syria, I’ve seen that capitalist logic can’t help to rebuild postwar countries but cooperatives can

- by Azize Aslan

Inside the secret race to build artificial intelligence

What is happening behind the scenes of America’s largest AI companies? How could the squabbles, ideologies, and goals of their CEOs and engineers shape our future?

In today’s episode, guest host Christine Emba sits down with technology journalist Kevin Roose to discuss his new book, The AGI Chronicles: The Inside Story of the Race to Create an Artificial Superintelligence. The book offers a behind-the-scenes look at the engineers and tech leaders competing to build artificial superintelligence. The race has sparked a massive data center boom and made a handful of people some of the most…

AI Agents Are Already Changing the Price of Goods

It's obvious that things are getting more expensive, and there are plenty of reasons behind the surge in prices — whether it's wars or inflation or companies padding their profit margins. But with the release of AI agents like Meta's Muse, tech companies are promising consumers that agents will start saving them tons of money by finding the best deals. According to today's guest, Lindsay Owens, the history of price gouging does not bode well for claims that things might get cheaper because of new technology, and research conducted by her think tank Groundwork Collaborative shows that a number…

Fixer, financier, spymaster: how the UAE’s Sheikh Tahnoon is setting his sights on AI dominance – podcast

Composite: Guardian Design/AP/Getty Images/Photoshot/PA/AFP/EPA/Alamy

heavensouls: cantu of the sower EP

An album-length EP by the 20-year-old producer is a dizzying and boundless collage of collages, using free-jazz logic and digital overload to chart new emotional terrain.

How much development aid is spent on climate change?

Around one-fifth of development aid is spent on climate-related projects. But what does climate-related mean, and does it crowd out other aid projects?

The Satanic Backmasking Conspiracy

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Tricks, Treats and Trends

Americans are expected to spend a record $13.5 billion on Halloween this year, according to the National Retail Federation. That includes costumes, decorations and lots of candy.

In this episode of “The Sunday Daily,” our host Rachel Abrams talks about these three tent poles of the Halloween season with reporters from across the Times newsroom.

Kim Severson, who covers food, tells us about the sour, peelable and texture-confused candy edging out longtime chocolate favorites. Louis Lucero II, an editor for style coverage, predicts the most popular costumes of the year. And Callie Holtermann, a…

Stopping the Steal with Eric Holder

Former Attorney General Eric Holder joins Alex Wagner to game out the ways Trump might try to steal the midterms, from weaponizing the Department of Justice, to sending Homeland Security after suspected noncitizen voters, to straight-up misinformation and intimidation. They talk about how Democrats are preparing to fight back, what Holder has learned running election war games with Hillary Clinton, and why listeners need to lock in their voting plan. Then, Holder, chairman of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, explains why GOP gerrymandering efforts ahead of the midterms…

The internet breaks

“No man could bind him, no, not with chains…neither could any man tame him” — Mark 5:3—4

When I was 14 or 15 — I don’t quite remember — I first got access to the World Wide Web. I remember clicking on the little blue square of the Netscape Navigator icon — that little ship wheel with a starry sky behind it — and feeling like an entire new magical world had opened up. My life changed that day, and the world changed. In a way, the internet is like another realm layered on top of ours — a higher plane, where we exist as spirit creatures, unmoored from our physical bodies.

Fantasy stories like that…

Can Universities Survive? The Great Expansion

In today’s episode for our series about the plight facing universities David talks to political theorist Alan Finlayson about what’s happened to higher education in the UK since 1945. It is a story of massive expansion in the number of universities and numbers of students. What was the original rationale for this rapid growth? How did it change the social and class structure of Britain? Who were the winners and who were the losers? And what happened when this new university system collided with Thatcherism?

You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we…

Why The Elizabeth Holmes Doc is so Wild

Get a whole month of great cinema FREE on MUBI at http://mubi.com/thomasflight

Stream Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma (almost) globally now exclusively on MUBI

A camera is capable of seeing everything, but how do we know if a documentary actually reveals the truth?

Reading List 10/24/26

Welcome to the reading list, a weekly roundup of news and links related to buildings, infrastructure and industrial technology. This week we look at minimum lot sizes, Boeing’s next 737 MAX, Fervo short sellers, Figure AI’s training data, and more. Roughly 2/3rds of the reading list is paywalled, so for full access become a paid subscriber.

No essay this week, but I’m working on a piece about manufacturing isotopes that should be out next week.

Almost two thirds of US homebuilders said immigration enforcement is affecting their labor force, up from 23% in March and 13% a year ago. [WSJ]

Dare We Dream of a Blue Wave?

We’re less than two weeks out from Election Day. In their last conversation before Americans head to the midterm polls, the national politics writer Michelle Cottle joins the columnists Jamelle Bouie and David French to take stock. While Jamelle makes the case for cautious optimism about a possible blue wave, David worries about what could happen if Trump doesn’t like the results.

Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.

Want to catch “The Opinions” live? Join us at the Brooklyn Public Library on Nov. 5 at 7 p.m. The Opinion columnists Jamelle Bouie and David French and the Opinion writer…

What This Democrat’s Surge in Texas Says About the Midterms

Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic nominee for governor, on her appeal to MAGA voters and her refusal to engage in the “culture wars.”

Thoughts? Email us at theinterview@nytimes.com

Watch our show on YouTube: youtube.com/@TheInterviewPodcast

How a Chicago Restaurant Has Stayed Open For Nearly Three Decades

Richard Mott's first foray into hospitality was in the 1980s at the University of Chicago, where he started running a coffee shop in the basement of the business school when he was a grad student. By the time he graduated, he helped grow that single coffee shop into four locations across campus. He's a longtime Chicago-based restaurateur and his farm-to-table restaurant North Pond has been around since the late 1990s. Lately, he's expanded his business to include Spark Shared Kitchen, a catering facility and incubator for food entrepreneurs. He knows a lot about the practical economics of…

The 10 Best Horror Movies of 2026 and ‘Clayface.’ Plus, ‘Street Fighter’ With Shea Serrano!

On today’s show, Sean is joined by Chris Ryan for all things horror. First, they react to the casting rumors for the much-anticipated role of James Bond and hypothesize why there is a new trend of limiting theatrical exhibition for movies with poor tracking data. Then, they cover DC Studios' new body horror film ‘Clayface,’ a type of movie that they have collectively been begging for from the superhero genre but is ultimately a pretty mixed bag. Then, they evaluate what the current state of the horror genre looks like, and share their favorite horror movies of 2026. Finally, Sean is joined by…

How surveillance crept up on us

For years, police have spent billions of tax dollars on watching us, tracking us, and recording us. In the largest police department in the country, these surveillance systems were paid for and adopted without the kind of public oversight cities usually require.

In the wake of 9/11, the New York Police Department built one of the most sophisticated and omnipresent surveillance systems in the country.

And while decisions were being made about what tech to adopt and how much to pay for it, few outside the NYPD were consulted. Not the City Council nor the public. For over a decade, the only paper…

625: Swipegate

Subtitle: A Price to Pay for Weirdness

It's iPhone Duo day!!!!

This episode of Connected is sponsored by:

Sematary | Boiler Room: LA

Saddle up. This week we drop the first bunch of sets from our most recent LA showcase.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

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Apple Music’s iPod easter egg

it’s on their 404 page and really well done

Local Wikipedia

“Wikipedia, but only for things a half hour walk from you”

via Web Curios #

BNYX | Boiler Room: LA

Saddle up. This week we drop the first bunch of sets from our most recent LA showcase.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

► Shop Boiler Room clothing: https://blrrm.tv/shop

ESPRIT 空想 | Boiler Room: LA

Saddle up. This week we drop the first bunch of sets from our most recent LA showcase.

► Listen to Boiler Room’s archive on Apple Music: https://apple.co/BoilerRoom

► Shop Boiler Room clothing: https://blrrm.tv/shop

Interview: Travis Knight, Director of Wildwood

In this bonus interview, Devindra Hardawar chats with Travis Knight, the director of 'Wildwood.'

Octomom

First aired back in 2020, this episode follows the story of an octopus living one mile under the ocean as she performs a heroic act of heart and determination.

In 2007, Bruce Robison’s robot submarine stumbled across an octopus settling in to brood her eggs. It seemed like a small moment, but as he went back to visit her month after month, what began as a simple act of motherhood became a heroic feat that has never been equaled by any known species on Earth.

This episode was reported and produced by Annie McEwen.

What’s the Deal With Billy Evans? A Spoiler-Filled Guide to ‘You Can See Everything’

This week, we focus on Billy Evans, the breakout character of the documentary “You Can See Everything,” and his Theranos-esque new blood-testing start-up. Rob Copeland, a New York Times finance reporter, and Erin Griffith, a tech reporter, join Max Read to discuss what Evans is like when the cameras are off, whether his start-up is a real company and how Silicon Valley is reacting to the film. Then, we break down CoreWeave’s debt, a possible SpaceX-Tesla merger and Joel Kaplan’s Meta exit. Finally, a returning guest: John Carreyrou joins us to answer listener questions about Elizabeth Holmes.

E…

The AI Story Wall Street Doesn’t Want to Hear

If you had to pick one number to measure the health of the AI buildout—or, conversely, the probability of an AI bubble—what number would you choose?

For AI boosters, the trendy pick might be “GPU rental prices.” Despite all the investment in new AI chips, it costs a quarter more to rent older GPUs than it did a year ago. This tells us that demand for AI computing power is growing faster than supply.

For now, the AI buildout is completely different from previous bubbles, which were marked by clear signs of supply outracing demand. In 2001, after the dot-com boom, less than 3 percent of the…

Against supplements

My methods and my madness.

Building our piece of the electric stack

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.volts.wtf/subscribe

Collectively, the electric stack (batteries, motors, chips, power electronics) has gotten about 99% cheaper since 1990. It is quietly remaking every machine that turns electricity into motion, heat, or work. Problem is, China makes most of it. Sam D’Amico, co-author of “The Electric Slide” and founder of Impulse Labs, is betting the US can still claim a piece of that stack. He’s starting with a battery-powered induction cooktop. We talk about why…

Traction!

Tribologists study friction: what happens when things rub together. It’s indispensable, from the wheel to the paths of stars

- by Jennifer R Vail

Fake Polls, Real Wave?

Polling's gold standard, the New York Times/Siena poll, releases new data showing Democrats surging far ahead of Republicans with an 11-point lead on the generic ballot, while another popular pollster is exposed for falsifying its data. Jon and Dan react to the polls, both good and fake, and then turn to Donald Trump's campaign stop in South Carolina, where the president expanded on his love of men. They discuss Vivek Ramaswamy's disgusting ad in the Ohio gubernatorial race, JD Vance getting a cold welcome from his hometown NFL franchise, this week's Senate debates in Michigan and Kansas, and…

Brìghde Chaimbeul: Tiny Desk Concert

A folk revival only goes so far as an artist's understanding — and adaptation — of tradition. What themes and melodies spoke to the past can easily echo into the present, but come alive through the personality of its interpreter. Brìghde Chaimbeul expands the language of the Scottish smallpipes behind the Desk with a quiet, yet demonstrative presence.

Chaimbeul grew up on the Isle of Skye, Scotland, speaking Gaelic and learning the Highland pipes before falling in love with the bellows-blown bagpipe she plays today. Drones are forever with this instrument, but Chaimbeul amplifies, manipulates…

What Hundreds of Focus Groups With Trump Voters Revealed

Sarah Longwell has probably conducted more focus groups with Trump voters than anyone else in America — hundreds of them, starting in Trump’s first term. So she has a treasure trove of qualitative evidence of how voters have evolved in the Trump era and why many of the president’s voters are souring on him now.

Trump’s approval rating has plummeted since the start of his second term, especially among the groups that swung toward him in the last election — young, Black and Hispanic voters. But I wanted to have Longwell on the show to hear what these people are really saying. What exactly has…

Is This Economy Trump’s Fault?

One of the biggest issue driving the midterm elections? The economy. On “The Opinions,” the economist Natasha Sarin and the Bulwark editor Catherine Rampell examine the strange disconnect between how the economy is doing and how Americans feel about it. How much of the blame belongs to President Trump? And how much goes deeper?

Thoughts? Email us at theopinions@nytimes.com.

Want to catch “The Opinions” live?Join us at the Brooklyn Public Library on Nov. 5 at 7 p.m. The Opinion columnists Jamelle Bouie and David French and the Opinion writer Michelle Cottle will unpack the midterm election…

Billy Corgan Is Tired of Your ‘Mocking, Bullying, Laughing’

Billy Corgan, the frontman and creative engine of the 90s alt-rockers the Smashing Pumpkins, sat down with Joe and Jon for a frisky conversation about his personal and professional rebirth — including his passion for the emotional intensity of guitar rock; the passion with which his critics dismiss him; and his passion for rubbing his recent re-ascendance in their faces.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more…

What makes a life good enough?

What does it mean to have a good life when so much feels wrong?

In this episode of The Gray Area, guest host Jonquilyn Hill speaks with Vox journalist Rachel Wilkerson Miller about her forthcoming book, The Nice Life. Rachel argues that even when we feel anxious or unsettled, we can build a satisfying life through curiosity, friendship, creativity, and generosity. Jonquilyn and Rachel explore how to find joy in difficult times, take pleasure in ordinary things, and share that pleasure with others.

Guest Host: Jonquilyn Hill, host of Explain It To Me

The Forgotten Godmother of Economic Literature

In 1776, the field of economics was born with the publication of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations. And among the book's earliest readers, and most ardent advocates, was a Regency-era novelist named Maria Edgeworth. In her time, Edgeworth was one of the most famous literary figures in England, and she smuggled into her stories economic concepts and debates around rent seeking, the idea of productive labor, and so on. These works were enormously influential and they helped expose a generation to practical applications of Smith's new theories. Yet when you read about the history of economics,…

Fine: Jazz dreams

The Danish artist achieves a beguiling flow state on her second solo album: a set of future standards full of empty space.

Why am I obsessed with China’s ancient golden age? I took my daughter on a trip to find out – podcast

Photograph: ZUMA Press, Inc./Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy Live News.

Why Finishing the Sagrada Família Is So Difficult

How Barcelona is finishing the Sagrada Família.

Check out the Samsung Galaxy Tab S12 Ultra here 👉 https://bit.ly/3VLRpqh

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Jay Morrg: “Grab Her Nuh (Zess)”

Time for some East Coast zess as soca and dancehall meet NYC litefeet and Jersey club.

“Earth Not a Globe”: Parallax’s Zetetic Astronomy (1865)

A book more or less responsible for the revival of Flat Earth theories in the modern period.

BTM data centers’ looming methane surge

It’s no secret that hyperscalers’ behind-the-meter gas bonanza could generate enormous CO2 emissions. But the BTM boom could become responsible for another, less-publicized emissions issue: upstream and onsite methane leaks that could derail decarbonization efforts.

In this episode, Shayle Kann speaks with Olya Irzak, founder and CEO of Frost Methane Labs. Olya unpacks the full lifecycle of methane emissions in gas-powered data centers, and considers why the actual warming impact of behind-the-meter gas may be double current estimates. Olya says practical, relatively low-cost strategies could…

‘A Golden Age of Science’ Brought to You by the White House

The Trump administration wants to accelerate the use of artificial intelligence for scientific discovery. But can its plan succeed without prioritizing universities?

Guest host Tyler Cowen speaks with Michael Kratsios, President Trump’s top science and technology adviser, about the White House’s new blueprint for American innovation and what it means for the next generation of scientists.

00:54 The model for scientific research today

Episode 598: A More Humanized Experience in Honolulu

This week on the Talking Headways podcast, we're joined by Jon Nouchi, Director of Transit at the City and County of Honolulu. At the Mpact conference in Toronto, we discussed the idea of iconic transit systems, time as a performance metric, humanizing transit systems, and the Skyline rail line.

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Alchemical Sisters: Alchemical Sisters

For their collaborative full-length debut, Eris Drew and Octo Octa hunkered down in their New Hampshire cabin to craft a celebratory, sample-heavy tribute to the maximalist dance music of yore.

7: Democrats Hit New High in Election Odds

Nate, Galen, and Clare dive into the latest midterms numbers, including FLIPR’s updated forecast giving Democrats a 77 percent chance of winning the Senate and the final Times/Siena national poll of the election, which finds Trump’s approval rating at a new low. They also discuss concerns about polling accuracy after a firm admits to faking its data, and the problems that raises for pollsters, candidates, and the country. Then, they take a look at the issues Democrats and Republicans are focusing on as seen through their political ads and analyze what that tells us about the state of the…

Day Pass Season 2 — Official Trailer

Day Pass is back, and this time we're in Asia!

Sign up to see every episode exclusively on Nebula at

With a public transit day pass, Jason Slaughter from Not Just Bikes tries to visit every must-see attraction on his list, while also riding as much public transit as possible across six cities in Asia.

How Does Philadelphia Even Exist

Go to https://hensonshaving.com/CITYNERD and enter "CITYNERD" at checkout to get 100 free blades with your purchase.

When I do "undervalued cities" lists, Philadelphia always shows up. Why? Let's investigate some close-in neighborhoods and make some wild claims.

Want to support a political action committee that works toward a more accessible, sustainable, and equitable Philadelphia? Join 5th Square, Philly's urbanist PAC!

The Race to Demolish Fukushima

How do you solve a problem like this?

Inspire the future scientists and engineers that you love by visiting https://www.kiwico.com/theb1m today. Use the code THEB1M for a whopping 50% off of your first monthly crate!

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Is “Build It and They Will Come” Backward?

“Build it and they will come” sounds confident until the project is finished and nobody comes. The Neighborhood Playbook, a placemaking guide built around testing what people actually respond to before making larger investments, turns 10 this year. Carlee Alm-LaBar revisits it with coauthor Joe Nickol of Yard & Company and Max Musicant of The Musicant Group, asking what a decade of use says about planning places through action instead of prediction. The tension between planning and doing remains: how much should a place decide up front, and how much should it discover through action?

"Activatin…

The Weird State-Level Races That Matter for Climate Change

Every midterm, the focus is on Congress — and for good reason. But in two weeks, Americans will vote on a number of state races that will matter immensely to the energy system, the power grid, and the future direction of greenhouse gas emissions.

Climate Cabinet tracks those races, using what it calls “the moneyball approach” to identify the local offices nationwide with the most potential climate impact. On this episode of Shift Key, Caroline Spears, the founder and executive director of Climate Cabinet, joins Rob to discuss what's at stake this election, which state races will matter the…

Ep. 897 - Street Fighter (2026)

David, Devindra, and Jeff revisit the art-house horrors of Ken Russell’s The Devils, examine the balance of faith and crime with Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother, and take stock of a deadpan master with Norm: The Tale of Norm Macdonald. Then they enter the ring with Street Fighter.

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Immortal Beloved: Krishna and Rādhā Exchanging Clothes (ca. 1700–1900)

Indian images that grapple with the unbearable fact that lover and beloved are not one.

Everything Is Changing, and Nothing Is Changing

Ethan Mollick is probably the single best explainer of what AI models can do for people—at work, at leisure, or in the messy space in between. More than an everyman’s Virgil into the weird underworld of AI capabilities, he’s also excellent at explaining how not to use AI tools. As the media theorist Marshall McLuhan once said, every technology is both an “extension” and an “amputation.” A machine that extends human intelligence is also a machine that cuts off the need for humans to be intelligent. When in possession of a tool that can reduce struggle and friction, we have to ask ourselves:…

Doug Ford Versus Toronto's Bike Lanes

Ontario Premier Doug Ford has been laser-focused on ridding Toronto of as many bike lanes as possible, passing a new law to prevent the city from building new bike lanes and using the power of the provincial government to rip out existing ones. Targeted for removal are approximately 19 kilometers of bike lanes on Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue, important parts of the city's bike lane network. In just the last week, courageous activists have taken to the streets by the hundreds, with many people putting their bodies on the line every day to stop crews from dismantling bike…

Episode 200: Mondays at the Overhead Wire - What is Our Future?

This week on Mondays at The Overhead Wire, Tracy McMillan and Chrissy Mancini-Nichols join the show for episode 200!!! We talk about a mobility idea that's like cap and trade, the idea of time, nostalgia and an imagined future for ourselves, measuring the GDP outcomes of our transportation investments, and the big questions about auto dependence. Lots of great discussion and fun ideas like maybe we should start a book club or a book segment! Let us know what you think.

Many thanks to Bob Nanna for our intro/outro music.

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Six Gutenberg Revolutions in a Row

Two science fiction authors imagine the future.

642: iOS is Weird Now

Just as we're busy pondering the HomeView and preparing for the iPhone Duo launch, word arrives of another Apple event on the horizon! Plus, Apple and Meta bond over local AI.

This episode of Upgrade is sponsored by:

Squarespace: Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code UPGRADE.

Roman love

Samuel Hughes reviews From Shame to Sin by Kyle Harper

Sichuan and the Sun Belt

Don’t put all your eggs in one city

Cardi B: Tiny Desk Concert

It’s rare that we have to turn people away, but when word got out that Cardi B would be at the NPR Music office, we drew one of the biggest crowds I’ve ever seen here. People from all walks of life lined up to watch one of rap’s most unfiltered stars take over the Desk. In leather pants and a power blazer, Cardi brings a humble and humorous spirit as she runs through a set packed with hits.

The haunting synths and outright confidence of “Hello” sets the tone right away. Cardi rides that energy into a reimagined “ErrTime.” Then she shifts gears for the vulnerable “Man of Your Word” and “Be…

Worldpeace DMT: Stick Around for Tea

The irreverent duo of Leo Fincham and Rowan Please plies its brilliantly digitized indie-pop bricolage on an album with the ragtag splendor of a low-budget musical.

Come to Brazil

The world’s third best Italian food.

When do people experience mental health conditions for the first time?

Knowing when people are most at risk allows us to offer support when it might make the biggest difference.

Elizabeth Holmes and Nathan Fielder Keep Us Guessing

The comedian Nathan Fielder came to fame as the creator and host of the Comedy Central series “Nathan for You.” The show followed Fielder as he devised outrageous schemes, ostensibly with the aim of helping various small businesses. What became clear, though, was that Fielder was less interested in helping business owners generate profits than he was in understanding the people ensnared in his plots. His next project, the HBO series “The Rehearsal,” was a similar offbeat portrait of offbeat people. At the center of both projects is Fielder himself, a documentarian whose motives can sometimes…

Reading List 10/17/26

Welcome to the reading list, a weekly roundup of news and links related to buildings, infrastructure, and industrial technology. This week we look at Icon’s fundraising, employment in China’s solar industry, grid-scale battery reliability, Tesla’s flying roadster, and more. Roughly 2/3rds of the reading list is paywalled, so for full access become a paid subscriber.

Housekeeping items this week:

I was on MTS Live talking about robots, prefabricated construction, and other things.

Djrum: DJ-Kicks

The UK selector throws caution—and genre—to the winds on an audacious 82-minute set that careens between ambient, drill’n’bass, post-punk, breakcore, and more.

Zach Bryan: “Lies”

Star-crossed lovers sing right past each other on the duet from Bryan’s new Young Manhood and Other Donatable Organs EP.

The Smell of Hell

Throughout human history, there’s been one element we’ve always associated with death. Just the smell of it is an alarm bell that says, “something here is dangerous.” But what if our noses have been wrong all along?

In this episode of our series Viscera: Gripping Tales of the Human Body, we take you to a live performance in Boston where we reveal how this much-maligned element might be better understood as the smell of life.

Want to see a Viscera show? Join us for Radiolab Presents: Viscera, live in New York City on Thursday, November 5th. All about the sometimes freaky world of organ…

Olivia Rodrigo / Chappell Roan: “expectations”

If there were ever a song Chappie was born to add some sauce to, it’s “expectations.”

Why No One Can Look Away From Elizabeth Holmes

This week, there’s a new blockbuster Elizabeth Holmes documentary out, and we’ve assembled an expert panel to discuss the movie and what Holmes means to the tech world of today. Max Read is joined by John Carreyrou, who, through his investigative reporting for The Wall Street Journal and his book “Bad Blood,” revealed the fraud at the heart of Theranos; Erin Griffith, a tech reporter who extensively covered Holmes’s trail; and Caitlin Roper, the New York Times executive producer who wrote the first-ever magazine piece about Holmes for Wired back in 2013.

We end with a rundown of what else is…

Should Climate Activists Keep Fighting Fossil Fuel Infrastructure?

No researcher has been more cited in lawsuits against fossil fuel infrastructure than Peter Erickson. As an affiliated researcher at the Stockholm Environment Institute, Peter studies how pipelines and other oil and gas supply expansions can increase global carbon emissions. His work has been critical to the activist fights against the Keystone XL pipeline, the Enbridge pipeline, and others.

But in recent years, he’s taken a more nuanced approach to fossil fuel supply — in part because, as he has shown, it can enrich the oil and gas industry in a surprising but direct way. On this episode of…

Why Zara Larsson Refuses to Censor Herself – or Dim Her Joy

The Swedish pop star Zara Larsson sat down with Joe and Jon to discuss her stratospheric year of taking control of her career and stepping into a new era of bonafide pop superstardom. She spoke about her surge in cultural relevance — from the TikTok resurrection of her 2015 hit “Lush Life” to her remix version of “Stateside” by PinkPantheress being skated to by gold medalist Alysa Liu at the 2026 Winter Olympics — as well as taking joyful music seriously, learning to embrace self-promotion and whether any amount of money is worth trading for being politically outspoken.

Popcast is The New York…

@: Autosmile

The Philly duo’s folk music radiates a special kind of energy. Their second album is tinged with psychedelia, a wicker wunderkammer of songs, spells, and secrets.

Los Tigres del Norte: Tiny Desk Concert

As our longtime fans of Tiny Desk know, we don’t typically publish introductions for our concerts. We’ve restored the full introduction on NPR.org and here on YouTube after temporarily removing it for editorial review, acknowledging the topic shared is emotional and complex and something many listeners and newsroom staff are grappling with.

From jazz and Tejano to norteño and ska, 'El Tiny' returns with a takeover from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 for Latin Music Month.

There is no stage too small for Los Tigres del Norte, yet none can contain its impact. For the last 60 years, the Mexican norteño band…

What the Frontier Labs Know That We Don’t

Dwarkesh Patel is one of the most important voices in the artificial intelligence world. Deeply embedded in San Francisco’s tech community, he has interviewed nearly every tech chief executive at length.

This week’s guest host, Tyler Cowen, a professor of economics at George Mason University, sits down with Mr. Patel to discuss why researchers are resigning, whether A.I. could become conscious and if he’ll ever get an A.I. girlfriend.

Note: As we work on relaunching “Interesting Times,” the show will feature a series of guest hosts in the coming months.

6: What Could Still Change Before the Midterms?

Clare, Nate, and Galen check the latest in the FLIPR midterms forecast and discuss whether the election has solidified, or if Republicans can mount a last ditch recovery. Then, in “Do You Buy It?” they put conventional wisdom to the test, unpacking the latest midterms headlines and examining whether the assumptions behind the stories actually hold up. They close by answering audience questions about the Epstein files’ impact on the midterms and whether a 20th century midterms election offers parallels to the current one.

Become a subscriber to Crooked Media! It’s the best way to directly…

The Skyscraper That's Dividing Europe

Is this luxury redevelopment what Greece needs?

Rayon is the all-in-one, effortless CAD tool for going from concept to completion. Try it (for free) here 👉 https://rayon.design/r/b1m_october2026_signup

Have a go at your own Greek dream home floorplan too 👉 https://rayon.design/r/b1m_october2026

“Men with Queer Nerves”: The Jumping Frenchmen of Maine

In the late nineteenth century, visitors to Maine observed something strange: French-Canadian lumberjacks who, at the slightest stimulus, seemed to jump, strike out with their limbs, or mimic languages they could not speak. Ross Bullen introduces us to these so-called “Jumping Frenchmen” and to their greatest investigator, George M. Beard, who saw a link in their behavior between religious frenzy and neurasthenia.

The Dream of an Aristotelian Machine

Why alignment science took a turn towards virtue ethics.

Living Well

Welcome to Issue 16.

Signing “The Planner’s Pledge”

I’ve just signed The Planner’s Pledge, a statement assembled by a team of leading US urban designers including my friend Jeff Speck, author of the Walkable City books. It’s an attempt to create a clear statement of principles, from the planning professions, about the past harms done by the profession and the things that must be done differently. It’s preamble is unsparing:

As practitioners of a discipline that has advocated for what it believed to be best practices while inevitably advancing the dominant ideology of its society, we professional planners wish to formally apologize for the…

Rudolf Kalvach’s Wiener Werkstätte Postcards (1907)

Postcards that summon medieval grotesques and brightly coloured folk art, but also feel distinctly modern.

Draco Rosa: Tiny Desk Concert

From jazz and Tejano to norteño and ska, 'El Tiny' returns with a takeover from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 for Latin Music Month.

Draco Rosa's trajectory from '80s boy band star to enigmatic solo performer music fascinates me to no end. Behind the Desk, Rosa creates shimmering, electric guitar-driven ruminations on life and love.

After his tenure in Menudo and some solo success, Rosa went on to produce and co-write some of his former bandmate Ricky Martin's biggest pop hits, including "Livin' la Vida Loca," "She Bangs" and "The Cup of Life (La Copa de la Vida)." But it was in 1996 that Rosa released…

Jess Williamson: A Mile South of Heaven

Torn between Texas and Topanga but fully herself, the songwriter sounds at home in the outlaw country idiom on an intimate, searching new record produced by Shooter Jennings.

Inside North Korea's Secret Beach Resort

A holiday resort with a difference...

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Marina Herlop: Dja Dja

Modeled after the literary concept of the hero’s journey, the Catalan composer’s latest album is her most ambitious yet: It’s weirder, wilder, and more dazzling than anything she’s done to date.

Inside The World's Darkest Airport

What does the future look like for Germany's darkest airport?

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Cameron Winter: Live at Carnegie Hall

With new songs that rank among his very best, the Geese frontman’s solo live album is an exquisite rendering of a had-to-be-there night and a work of real-time mythmaking.

Los Texmaniacs: Tiny Desk Concert

From jazz and Tejano to norteño and ska, 'El Tiny' returns with a takeover from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 for Latin Music Month.

Los Texmaniacs' music is a living history lesson. The conjunto sound is driven by the button accordion, a mid-19th century instrument that made its way to the U.S.-Mexico border by way of German, Czech and Polish immigrants. But this music is also just perfect for twirling on the dance floor to songs about true love, heartbreak, folk heroes and reflections on life.

In this band, everything goes back to Flaco Jimenez, the late Tex-Mex accordion master whose rootsy sound came…

5: Our First 2028 Democratic Primary Draft!

Galen, Clare, and Nate check the latest FLIPR forecasts for the House and Senate before discussing the closer than expected Senate race in Minnesota. Then it’s time for the first-ever Still Counting Draft! The hosts make their picks for the 2028 Democratic presidential primary, including frontrunners like AOC and Gavin Newsom. They also talk about the reason for doing a draft now and after the midterms and Nate explains why there are only two good candidate options.

You can request a transcript by emailing transcripts@crooked.com. Include the podcast name, episode title, and air date. Please…

A 73% average decline in wildlife populations: an overview of the 2026 Living Planet Index report

A guide to understanding the Living Planet Index and what it does and doesn’t mean.

Star Moles: “Born Again”

Following her 2026 breakthrough, Highway to Hell, Philly songwriter Emily Moales marks her signing to Dead Oceans with a chugging, conversational new single.

Should I Vote for a Tax to Fund Public Transit?

My new (October 2026) article on this question is here! In it, I try to address the issues that come up over and over in campaigns. I hope it will be useful not just for this US election season, but for many in the future. Read it here.

The post Should I Vote for a Tax to Fund Public Transit? appeared first on Human Transit.

Who Broke Your Power Bill?

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When a Sun Belt City Isn’t a Sun Belt City

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Paul Carus’ The History of the Devil and the Idea of Evil (1899)

A history of the Evil One, from the earliest times to the present.

The Alchemical Transformations of the Mutus Liber (1677)

Carl Jung’s copy of the “mute book”, an alchemical manual charting (through a series of images) the “humid way” of forging the Philosopher’s Stone.

Tim Bernardes: Tiny Desk Concert

From jazz and Tejano to norteño and ska, 'El Tiny' returns with a takeover from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 for Latin Music Month.

"I will no longer carry the weight and burdens that aren't mine," Tim Bernardes coos behind the Desk. The Brazilian singer-songwriter sits easily in the poetry of the cosmos and his country, but communicates every emotion with tangible complexity.

Like so many great Brazilian artists, Bernardes translates hope and tragedy with the airiness of a butterfly but the precision of a surgeon. And beyond that, he integrates all of that sadness into his guitar. It's a wonder to…

What Will Happen to Indian IT?

The past and future of the “world’s back office.”

What impact will climate change have on malaria?

More than 600,000 people die from malaria every year. Will climate change make this worse?

The Strange World of William Shatner's "Has Been"

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Panteón Rococó: Tiny Desk Concert

From jazz and Tejano to norteño and ska, 'El Tiny' returns with a takeover from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 for Latin Music Month.

Panteón Rococó has been at the forefront of Mexican ska for over three decades. With lyrics that stare down its country’s toughest sociopolitical struggles, the band’s skankin’ grooves slide easily between cumbia and Afro-Caribbean rhythms. At El Tiny, the music and the message is heard loud and clear.

After “Arreglame el Alma,” lead singer Dr. Shenka greets the crowd and launches into “1993…,” a devastating testimonial about the countless desaparecidos (missing) throughout…

300SkullsAndCounting / Jenny Sparks: THIS IS SPA TOWN!

The UK artist brings a frenzy of club-grime provocation and internet humor to his glitched-out emo, but his portrayal of small-town malaise is what makes it a riot.

4: Are Democrats Losing Maine?

Nate, Galen, and Clare break down the latest midterm polling in some of the most competitive congressional contests and Democrats’ continued edge. In Maine, they discuss the NYT/Siena numbers and what Senator Susan Collins’ lead over Troy Jackson in that poll indicates about the race. In Ohio, they unpack what Republican Senator Jon Husted’s low name recognition means for his unusual matchup against Sherrod Brown. And in Alaska, they zoom out on the discourse around Senate candidate Mary Peltola and her alleged mistreatment of staffers.

You can request a transcript by emailing…

Philip Sidney and the Extreme (Dis)graces of the Parenthesis

Erasmus called them “little moons” and George Puttenham praised them as “figures of tolerable disorder” (if used not too often “nor too thick”). For Philip Sidney, they were simply indispensable. Florence Hazrat introduces us to the uncontested early modern king of brackets and to his romance Arcadia, which abruptly ends, like its author’s life, hanging on a parenthesis.

“There is Nothing but Immortality!”: Walt Whitman and The Book of Heavenly Death (1905)

Choice excerpts from Leaves of Grass that speak to Whitman’s conception of immortality.

Tinashe: Popstar

Tinashe’s eighth album is her best and bravest yet: more ambitious, more focused, and effortlessly in touch with the zeitgeist. It’s the best pop album of the year.

Cycling Made Difficult (but it's getting better!)

Made by humans for humans. No AI voices or generative AI was used in the making of this video.

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How Kyle Gordon Makes Music Funny

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Stream Kyle Gordon's third album, KYLE GORDON IS EVERYWHERE on October 2nd.

Day Pass Season 2 — Official Teaser

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With a public transit day pass, Jason Slaughter from Not Just Bikes tries to visit every must-see attraction on his list, while also riding as much public transit as possible across six cities in Asia.

They Finally Built Good Transit!?

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The Real Villain of The Backrooms

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The Backrooms sprung into being as folklore from the internet age. But what exactly does this expressionist space say about the world around us? What are The Backrooms trying to convey?

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