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Reddit’s Earliest Days Were a NSFW Wonderland

Reddit’s come a long way since it first appeared online in 2006—but how has it changed over time? This visualization shows how the relative sizes of its subreddits have changed. Put together by Randal Olson from Michigan State University—whose viz of how subreddits overlap we saw last week—this chart plots “subreddit growth over time measured…

Science Proves That Rudolph’s Nose Really Does Glow

It might not be bright red, but Rudolph’s nose really does go glow. These thermal images of reindeer acquired by scientists show that Santa’s flying friends have incredibly warm noses. Because they live in cold climates, the noses of reindeer have adapted to have an increased blood to prevent them from freezing. In turn, that…

To address the problem that 80 percent of new contributions to Wikipedia are abandoned before they’re submitted, the online encyclopaedia now offers a drafting feature to help ease a little of the pressure.

How the Domino Effect Has Shaped History

When younger generations hear the word ‘dominoes,’ they usually associate it with the famous board game, while others–especially food lovers–might connect it with a delicious pizza. For those who are more politically aware, the word probably brings thoughts of the Cold War and the threat of the spread of communism. In addition, most economists today…

The Math Behind the NSA’s Email Hacks

We’re all outraged by the NSA’s invasions of privacy, sure—but we don’t perhaps understand exactly how it managed it. This video explains the maths behind the agency’s surveillance. Hacking into email and working through encryption schemes requires some interesting math, a lot of very large numbers, and a fair dollop of computer science savvy. In…

Samsung’s 2014 Smart TVs Will Be Controlled By Your Pointed Finger

Kinect may have been at it for years, but it’s taking most companies a fair old while to really get to grips with gesture control. Now, Samsung is planning to offer more fine-grained, finger-sensitive functionality in its 2014 smart TVs. https://gizmodo.com/leap-motion-controller-review-waiting-for-the-future-t-817895912 Its new hardware will support single-finger gestures, in contrast to this year’s rather granular…

The Weirdest Thing on the Internet Tonight: Systematic Disease

If the eyes are a window to the soul, are cataracts their Venetian blinds?

One Prayer Bowl Ringing

The sound of one prayer bowl ringing is quite a bit more than the familiar lulling waveform when that ringing is sent through myriad processing routines. This is why while Jason Charney’s “Pratītya,” named for the Buddhist concept of “pratītyasamutpāda,” veers from its opening ring tone, that which follows — overtones, and cicada chatter, percussive…

Deafheaven: Dream House

In highschool, I took it upon myself to learn how to enjoy scream-y music. It started innocently(?) enough with slightly-abrasive-but-still-pretty-tame Linkin Park, and moved on to Refused and Underoath, and somehow, Cap’n Jazz. It was a lot of work, but tracks like Deafheaven’s Dream House make it all worth while. https://gizmodo.com/capn-jazz-take-on-me-5943711 For all the screamy-type…

The luminous migration of the Pynock Angel

Every year, Ricky would grump when his brother hauled him out of bed at dawn to watch the annual migration of the Pynock Angel, but whenever the morning light hit the creature’s rainbow skin, he felt lucky to witness the beaming halos that gave the Angel its name. A work in progress by Dave Melvin.…

This Tricycle Is Headed Across the South Pole

Right now three people are competing in a bike race from the edge of Antarctica to the South Pole. The winner will be the first person to bike there ever. And 35-year-old Maria Leijerstam is attempting to trike there on a really weird/badass-looking tricycle. Leijerstam left the Novo Russian Airbase on December 17th on a…

A trainee Grim Reaper is no match for a wily prospector in this cartoon

If you want to thwart the Reaper, you better be prepared. And when Death (or rather Death’s agent-in-training) comes for the last denizen of a gold-rush town, he finds the prospector more than ready for a game of roadrunner and coyote. Jonas Martin Larsen, Øyvind Fiksdal, Eilef Sandnæs, Eskild Carlsen, and Yvonne Engbråten made Reaping…

Knives Aren’t Generally For Klutzes, But This One Kinda Is

It’s always better to have control of a knife you’re using, sure, but everyone makes mistakes. And you shouldn’t lose a perfectly good knife just because it sinks to the bottom of a lake or the shaft cracks on your tile floor. Is the solution bouncy knives? Sort of. Spanish design company Baladéo made the…

Parents recreate movie scenes with their baby and a lot of cardboard

Lilly and Leon have enlisted the aid of their baby Oscar, along with cardboard, paper bags, massive amounts of tape, and myriad other household objects for their Cardboard Box Office, in which they make homespun recreations of scenes from their favorite movies. Lilly and Leon look like they are having tons of fun in all…

Here’s What Marketing Could Look Like in 2014

Since 2014 is only a few days away, design aesthetics probably won’t be stunningly different come the new year. So that’s all the more reason to make some predictions! Let’s do this. 2013 was the year of learning that the word “skeuomorphic” was, you know, a word. And then learning what it meant. And then…

The Powerpuff Girls get a new look for their upcoming special

The Powerpuff Girls are returning to television in January for a new television special, but Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup won’t look quite like we remembered. This trailer shows us the new all-CG Powerpuff Girls. Sadly, Powerpuff Girls creator Craig McCracken wasn’t involved in the production of the special, which airs Monday, January 20 at 7:30…

Why good bests evil in Middle Earth: Evil has a Vitamin D deficiency

Why is it that the plucky Hobbit Bilbo Baggins triumph again and again over the likes of Gollum, the goblins, spiders, and Smaug? A cheeky medical paper suggests that good characters have an advantage over evil ones in Tolkien’s world because good characters spend more time in the sun and absorb more Vitamin D. The…

The Year in Amazing Photos from Reuters

Of course the year’s best photos can’t all come from the same place, but with photographers all over the world Reuters certainly gets some amazing stuff. And it’s kind of cool to watch three minutes that visually sum up 2013. From the Boston bombing to unrest in Syria to Miley twerking on Robin Thicke, Reuters…

Bourne’s Sleeping Beauty: The Vampire Ballet No One Knew Was Needed

A few weeks ago, Matthew Bourne’s Sleeping Beauty: A Gothic Romance ended its tour in Los Angeles, California. Much has been made of the way the well-known story was changed, but what was really striking was that the ballet actually felt like the natural collision of two of the biggest trends of the last decade:…

Scientific Data Is Disappearing All the Time

When a study gets published and its results enter our collective body of scientific knowledge it feels like it’s there to stay. But without the raw data behind the study, it’s hard to revisit the research and use it to take new ideas to the next level. Which is why it’s such a problem that…