“I have never seen a computer system which handles names properly and doubt one exists, anywhere. So, as a public service, I’m going to list assumptions your systems probably make about names. All of these assumptions are wrong.” | learn more
“The village of Hubyn was never officially evacuated—but over the last 30 years so many people have left that the effect is the same. Of a few dozen houses, most stand empty. A single multipurpose shop caters to an aging […]
“Back in June 2020, while gathering intelligence on a popular hacker forum, we stumbled upon a peculiar recruitment ad seemingly posted by a ransomware group. To glean valuable insights into the ransomware operators’ perspective, we decided to pose as a […]
A Vice reporter goes to Russia to meet a hacker in this short video. | learn more
This list of ~60 facts and charts reminds me of the late Hans Rosling and vast quality of life improvements happening throughout the world right now. | learn more
“In magic, choices are rarely what they seem. Magicians know how to manipulate us into a false sense of free will while really holding the puppet strings. Here’s a simple but clever example of a false choice used in magic.” | learn […]
“A data visualization celebrating the work of the great Italian design studios.” | learn more
Aircraft in WW2 used a “Identification, friend or foe (IFF)” system to avoid friendly fire. Before the D-Day invasion the Allies realized that the system wouldn’t scale to handle the thousands of aircraft involved in the invasion. So, they moved […]
“I wanted to be great at Guitar Hero. So I might have enlisted the help of robots and artificial intelligence…” Follow the link for an awesome video of the robot in action. | learn more
“The concept is simple, even if the allure is not immediately self-evident: “finsubs” (short for “financial submissives”) send monetary “tributes” to a financial dominatrix, who could be any gender, in exchange for being humiliated and degraded.” | learn more