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The Bizarre Drama Over the Internet's Domain Naming System
(Photo: Gage Skidmore/CC BY-SA 3.0)If you've ever registered a website, you may have dealt with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), but for a lot of others, it remains an...
View ArticleSee Striking Portraits Entirely Made With Dollar Bills
When the collage artist Mark Wagner first started creating his signature pieces, he faced every day with a significant decision: save that fresh stack of one-dollar bills sitting on his drafting table...
View ArticleFound: A Goddess Statue That's 8,000 Years Old
This statue is 8,000 years old. (Photo: Çatalhöyük Research Project)As soon as archaeologists found this statue, they knew it was special.It was found at a Neolithic site in Central Turkey, where it...
View ArticleWatch a Cold War Era Video That Advises You How to Survive a Nuclear Attack
The threat of nuclear attack loomed large for Americans in the 1950s. In an effort to prepare for such a scenario, President Truman formed the Federal Civil Defense Administration, and commissioned...
View ArticleA Fly With a Forked Penis Was Accidentally Found in Australia
The fly's forked penis. (Photo: NSW Office of Environment and Heritage/Used with Permission)When it comes to insect genitalia, it’s not size that matters, but apparently how many you’ve got. At least...
View ArticleHow 'All the President's Men' Defined the Look of Journalism on Screen
We live in weird times, when the press ranks almost as low as Putin in national polls yet reporters in TV and movies can still be heroes. The 2015 film Spotlight, which dramatized the work of The...
View ArticleOverly Smiley Man Sues France Over Passport Photo
In this painting by Hans Holbein the Younger, two Frenchmen demonstrate appropriate neutral expressions. (Photo: Public Domain)Getting a new passport or ID can be exciting. Maybe you're beginning a...
View ArticleLovely Hidden Paintings Adorned the Edges of Historic Books
Spider monkeys from a fore-edge painting on The Natural History of Monkeys (1838). (Photo: Courtesy of The Swem Library)While you don’t see them very often these days, fore-edge paintings were once...
View ArticleReykjavik Turned Off Its Street Lights to Watch the Northern Lights
About yesterday 🌌✨ #reykjavikA photo posted by belakarsai (@belakarsai) on Sep 28, 2016 at 11:31pm PDTLiving in Reykjavik, the northernmost capital in the world, has its perks, including, of course,...
View ArticleThe Mysterious Siren Behind Mexico City's Junk Collectors
La Condesa neighborhood of Mexico City, where La Llorona is likely to be heard. (Photo: Keizers/CC BY-SA 3.0)There are many reasons to fall in love with Mexico City, but among the most understandable...
View ArticleThe Once Glamorous Salton Sea is Now Rife With Toxic Dust and Dying Fish
Abandoned pier on the Salton Sea, California. (Photo: Hank Shiffman/shutterstock.com)In the Imperial Valley of California’s southeastern desert is an unexpected, almost oasis-like sight: a vast saline...
View Article9 Amazing Things Disguised as Boring Things
Narnia hid behind a wardrobe. Doctor Who's Tardis was disguised as a blue police call box. With no signage and no flags, these out of the ordinary things are hidden away disguised as something utterly...
View ArticleA Frog from Panama Just Went Extinct
(Photo: Brian Gratwicke/CC BY 2.0)The Rabbs' fringe-limbed treefrog wasn't discovered until 2005, and only named three years later, but now the last known Rabbs' fringe-limbed treefrog is dead.Toughie...
View ArticleIf There is a God, This Facebook Post By a Cop Looking For Clowns Will Go Viral
From the world's best clown police post. (Courtesy Rolla Police Department)Whether it's because it's an election year, or because hysteria's tend to take on lives of their own, clowns, this year, have...
View ArticleStrangely Captivating Vintage Photos of People Knitting
In 1915, the manager of the New York Philharmonic Society’s Concert Hall had a unique problem. There had been some unusual disturbances during performances, and to address this, he included a notice in...
View ArticleFound: An Underwater Cave 1,325 Feet Deep—A New Record
Hranická propast, the Hranice abyss (Photo: Jiří Komárek/CC BY-SA 4.0)Krzysztof Starnawski, a diver from Poland, found the cave in 1999. Even back then, he knew it was an unusual cave: the water made...
View ArticleThe World's Deepest Rail Station Will Be Built Underneath the Great Wall of...
It can't protect against underground trains. (Photo: Marianna/CC BY 2.0)Walking across the top of the Great Wall of China is a classic tourist go-to, but soon enough, traveling under it may be just as...
View ArticleVideocasette Dating Let Singles Fast-Forward to Love
Imagine: it's 1976, and you're a busy professional living in LA. You're also single, and looking, but it isn't working. You've been on dozens of first dates, and gamely accepted every introduction...
View ArticleWhy the Hallmark Card Company Owns Thousands of Priceless Artworks
While visiting a Brooklyn church whose subterranean tunnels were part of the Underground Railroad, I came across an arresting painting. It was a copy of an 1860 oil painting by Eastman Johnson called...
View ArticleVideocassette Dating Let Singles Fast-Forward to Love
Imagine: it's 1976, and you're a busy professional living in LA. You're also single, and looking, but it isn't working. You've been on dozens of first dates, and gamely accepted every introduction...
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