The Fateful Eight

THE STORY BEHIND THE MOST CONSEQUENTIAL TECHNOLOGICAL PAPER IN RECENT HISTORY.

Can the Internet's Greatest Authenticity Machine Survive Wall Street?

When thousands of subreddits went dark in protest last summer, it exposed the tension at the core of Reddit - on the eve of the company's IPO. Now that synthetic media is flooding the internet, does the web's most reliably human forum represent a gold mine for investors, or an old-fashioned dumpster fire?

The Unnerving Presence of Javier Bardem

He's known for playing fanatics and murderous psychopaths. In real life, he loves his wife (and Brad Pitt) and cries during E.T.

THE MYTH OF METAL

How I became a Python programmer - and learned to love our abstract world.

SO YOU WANT TO REWIRE BRAINS

There's a lot to like about brain-computer interfaces, those sci-fi-sounding devices that jack into your skull and turn neural signals into software commands. Experimental BCIS help paralyzed people communicate, use the internet, and move prosthetic limbs.

FOR GIANT LIZARDS, PLEASE HOLD

The sounds of Slack have a secret history.

WOMEN AT THE BOTTOM OF THE WORLD

They go to Antarctica with dreams of studying the unknown. What they discover there is the stuff of nightmares.

IN DEFENSE OF JAVASCRIPT

Mock it all you want-but it runs the world. Possibly even literally.

EVERY WOMAN IS AN ISLAND

Matriarchy, money, and a modern mariner named Marina.

THE PROVINCE OF ALL MANKIND

TWO NATIONS. A HORRIBLE ACCIDENT. AND THE URGENT NEED TO UNDERSTAND THE LAWS OF SPACE RIGHT NOW.

DEATH OF A PRESIDENT

Three decades after a devastating nuclear war between the US and China, a divided America faces a new threat to its very DNA. An excerpt from 2054: A Novel.

THE Algorithmic Authenticity OF Shou Zi Chew

The CEO of the world's most influential social media company likes tacos, Sheryl Crow, and Diablo IV. Is he for real-ora really good politician?

The Fractal Immortality of Grimes

I thought my interview with Grimes-the mysterious techno artist, fan of all nerddom, and the deepest of insiders in Elon Musk's world-would be one-on-one. Instead it wound up as a roundtable discussion. Turns out there are multiple personas embedded in the surprisingly haimish human who sat under a tree with me and spent the waning hours of an afternoon in conversation. There was Claire Boucher, the given name of a Vancouver kid obsessed with video games and devoted to provoking adults with misbehavior and the embrace of taboo subjects. There was Grimes, the self-invented, scrappy DIY musician and provocateur who weaves sci-fi into her work and released what Pitchfork judged to be the second-best song of the 2010s. And there was her preferred nomenclature, "c," invoking the speed of light

A.I. Is a Fiction

Stop freaking out when chatbots say they're in love or make disturbing threats. Just treat them like Pinocchio.

FRAUD TRACKER

With her blog Web3 Is Going Just Great, software engineer Molly White rains on the crypto parade. She doesn't feel great about it

BRING THE NOISE

A vast array of gadgets make it easy to blot out sonic intrusions-maybe a little too easy

MIND WIDE OPEN

Kids soak up new skills, adults not so much. But neuroscientist Gül Dölen might have found a way to help grownups learn like littles and heal from stroke and trauma. Step one: Take psychedelics.

Watch This Space

French satellite giant Eutelsat is taking on Elon Musk's Starlink-while navigating Russia's war in Ukraine, Brexit politics, and Iranian jamming attacks

Christopher Bouzy – "Building a Platform Like Twitter is Not Difficult"

When Elon Musk's reign of toxic chaos began, Christopher Bouzy didn't just go looking for a rival place to post. He joined the crowded race to create one. (It got difficult.)

SONIC BOOM

With hundreds of thousands of podcasts competing for listeners, hosts are using IRL events and other strategies to make their shows more of an \"experience.\" Fans dig it

THE THREE MOUNDS AT RED CLOUD

How much truth and healing can forensic technology really bring? On the sites of Native American boarding schools, Marsha Small has made it her life's mission to find out

THE CASE FOR SOFTWARE CRITICISM

Software may be the defining cultural artifact of our age. It's time to build a culture of critical analysis around it

THE UNPARALLELED SQUARENESS OF PETE BUTTIGIEG

Sure, the US secretary of transportation has thoughts on building bridges. But infrastructure occupies just a sliver of his voluminous mind

THE APOCALYPTIC OPTIMISM OF CHRISTOPHER NOLAN

The director says his new biopic, Oppenheimer, might just terrify you. At the very least, it'll force you to ask questions about history, fear, technology-all of it

Remote Workers of the World Unite

Zoom did not set us free. But a bit of solidarity can help remote work live up to its promise.

SHOOT THE MOON

Andrew McCarthy produces images worthy of the James Webb Telescope from his backyard-with gear that doesn't require a NASA-grade budget.

SAVE THE METAVERSE!

The internet is already ruined, but there's still a chance for the virtual universe to follow a different path.

ChatGPT Has Entered the Classroom

The Al chatbot has stoked fears of an educational apocalypse. Some teachers see it as a sorely needed reboot.

HOME KEY

Forget crypto, VR, AI. When it comes to empowering humans, new tech has nothing on the well-tempered clavier.

THERE IS NO CURE

New drugs like Mounjaro and Ozempic may help people lose weight, but what we really need is a treatment for fatphobia.