Ben Richmond
2018 Is the Last Year of America's Public Domain Drought
Happy Public Domain Day to everyone except America.
Nobel Winner Kazuo Ishiguro's ‘Never Let Me Go’ Predicted the Gene Editing Debate
On Thursday, Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
With 'Lazarus,' David Bowie's Science Fiction Falls to Earth
"Lazarus" lacks the characters or pointed societal critique that make for truly memorable science fiction or musicals, but still, it's Bowie.
Rap Tracks Written by Algorithms May End Up Not Being Anything to Fuck With
In a fusion of something cool with something very square, Big Data has entered the realm of Biggie Smalls.
Researchers Studied New Yorker Cartoons to See What Rich People Think About Kids
There's a sort of hipsterfication going on with parenthood: Fewer people are doing it, but the people who get into it get way into it.
How Burned Iron Age Villages Recorded the Earth’s Magnetic Field
Researchers found evidence of a time of "rapid change" in Earth's magnetic field from the 13th to 16th centuries.
Three British Street Photographers Captured the Faces of China
“China” looms so large as a monolithic concept in America that it's sometimes hard to picture life on a human scale for the individuals comprising the world's most populous nation.
Phone Data Can Show Signs of Depression
The more we learn about phone data, there's less and less noise for patterns to hide in.
Firing Squad Synchronization, Computer Science's Most Macabre-Sounding Problem
The question, first formulated in the 1950s, was essential to automata theory, which became the foundation of computer science.
Too Many Notes! How a Silicon Valley Designer Is Disrupting Piano Music
The bleeding edge of piano music takes an idea from the 14th century and 14-year-old guitarists: tablature.
A Guide to Surviving the Portuguese Man-o-War Invasion
A long, holiday weekend seems like the perfect time to slip off to the beach. Which also makes it the perfect time for Portuguese man-o-wars to make their attack.
Scribd Is Culling Erotica Because Popularity Is Just Another Route to Failure
Fans of romance and erotica prove that nothing works on the damn internet.