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Jared Diamond on Why Societies Collapse

If you've gotten enough election coverage, why not spend eighteen minutes watching Jared Diamond talk about societal collapse? You may know Diamond from his books Guns, Germs, and Steel and Collapse. Aficionados admire his spectacular combover. But anyway, Diamond's greatest contribution is his studious framework for understanding societal collapse. (Although in this talk he has five areas in his framework, by 2005's Collapse it's up to eight.) Hear Diamond talk through an example of his framework,... READ ON

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Notable Bathtubs in History

Ah, the pleasure of soaking in a warm bathtub! People have been bathing in artificial facilities since about 3300 BC, so there are bound to be some great bathtub stories in our history books. I found a few interesting ones.... READ ON

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Early Bird Gets the Internet Worm

When Robert Tappan Morris was a graduate student at Cornell in 1988, he had a clever idea: he would release a self-replicating program (or "worm") onto the Internet, reportedly in an effort to highlight security problems in computer networks. Morris's worm exploited vulnerabilities in common computer systems, allowing it to propagate at will onto new computers via the Internet. The worm was designed to use minimal computer resources, but in the wild its effect proved to be devastating. Morris... READ ON

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America's Most Haunted: Six Seriously Spooky Sites

Having recently bought a 103-year-old house with some scary stories of its own, I approached this subject with some trepidation. After doing the research, I probably won't sleep for days. The Ghost of... READ ON

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Wikipedia for Schools

The Wikipedia for Schools project is an effort to distill the vast content of Wikipedia onto one DVD. This single-DVD version is very portable, and can be used in schools worldwide, though its focus on articles written in English probably limits its global appeal. The project focuses on children, and what's most interesting (and appropriate) for them in a school environment; project volunteers selected articles for quality and appropriateness, then manually reviewed them for content (avoiding "adult"... READ ON

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Frontline: The Choice 2008

With just two weeks left until election day in the U.S., the race is no longer heating up: it's at a steady boil. Early voting has begun, a full eight national tracking polls are cranking out numbers daily, and the campaigns are on the ground nationwide Getting Out the Vote. If you haven't voted yet (or if you just can't get enough political coverage), I urge you to check out Frontline's The Choice 2008 program online. You can watch the whole thing for free -- and I think you'll find it worthwhile.... READ ON

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Documentary: The London Underground Map

In 1931, Harry Beck drew a diagram of the London Underground (aka the Tube), making visual sense of an extremely complex system. Today Beck's map is displayed in the Museum of Modern Art, and is considered a classic work of design. Beck's work is the template for modern subway and train maps, and his influence is seen worldwide in the way we conceptualize public transportation. Beck's central breakthrough was making a map that simplified geography to achieve maximum clarity. He reasoned that the... READ ON

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The Panic of 1873

The Panic of 1873 marked the beginning of The Long Depression. Although most of us today think of The Great Depression as the canonical American Depression, The Long Depression was a big deal in its own right, and has worldwide effects. It lasted twenty-three years, and according to Wikipedia, "The primary cause of the depression was a shortage of available money to facilitate trade." Sound familiar?Today New York Times writer Jennifer 8. Lee (yes, her middle initial is a number) looks at the... READ ON

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Who Was Dr. Frankenstein?

Was there a real Dr. Frankenstein? Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus is considered by many to be the first science fiction novel. It was written in 1816-1817, during a time when bringing the dead back to life was a... READ ON

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On the Typography of "Mad Men"

Mad Men is a fantastic drama currently running its second season on AMC. It has racked up a bunch of awards, and rightfully so -- all aspects of the production are excellent, and the show also appeals to a broad cross-section of ages (all the way from grownups to old people...sorry kids). The show is set in the very first years of the 1960s, and the production is carefully designed to use period-appropriate sets, clothes, cars, everything. The attention to detail is stunning, and is often cited as a... READ ON