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What Niagara Falls Looks Like Without Water
American Falls without water in 1969 (Robin Adair)This week, we were treated to some beautiful images of Niagara Falls mostly iced over, thanks to the Polar Vortex. This happens somewhat regularly, but...
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Ford's Most Popular Trucks Get A Little Lighter
Ford/Emma GreenThe new 2015 Ford 150, the best-selling truck and one of the best-selling vehicles in America, will be up to 700 pounds lighter than its predecessors. In a long-awaited move, Ford is...
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On Live-Tweeting One's Suffering
Ken Jennings—yes, that Ken Jennings—put it best. "Terrified I might get cancer," he tweeted this morning, "because what if Bill and Emma Keller yell at me." He was referring to a pair of opinion...
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5 Intriguing Things: Monday, 1/13
A programming note: Google sent my last newsletter into spam folders across the Internet and they stuck a scary note on top of the email saying, "Be careful with this message." The open-rate on the...
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What's the Last Photo on Your Phone?
In an effort to capture the connections between the digital world and our everyday human experiences, interactive artist Ivan Cash asked a group of strangers to share their last cellphone pictures....
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Reddit Is Big, Growing, and (Maybe) Turning Ever-More Inward
Over 2013, referrals from Reddit to other websites declined, according to a new study. (Shareaholic)Is Reddit declining as a clearinghouse for global Internet attention? A new report says: Yes and no....
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App Usage Exploded in 2013, Except for News and Magazine Apps
If mobile is eating the world, as analyst Benedict Evans contends, then journalism should be worried. The app analytics firm Flurry put out a new chart showing the year over year growth in app usage...
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The Artist Who Made Emoji IRL
“Who, me?” asks Nelson.Use an iPhone or Android, and you know emojis. They’re little iconic enigmas—Japanese in origin and not quite hieroglyphs, they’re chunky, glossy Wingdings. They’re also...
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Why Google Bought Nest: A Theory
ISU TechGoogle is acquiring Nest, makers of a smart thermostat, for a reported $3.2 billion. Perhaps it seems obvious why Google would want to buy the company, founded by former Apple executive Tony...
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5 Intriguing Things: 'Model View Culture' Guest Edition
Editor's note: I'm not the only one who has intriguing things to share. So from time to time, I'll pass the conch shell to guest editors for one edition. Our first guest eds are the co-founders of...
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Him: Love in the Time of Operating Systems
Warner Bros.Editor’s Note: This is not a review for people who haven’t seen the movie, but more of a discussion for those who have. In other words, there are some spoilers. Also, Reich wrote her...
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Almost No Americans Die From Lightning Strikes Anymore. Why?
Lightning strikes an open field in Clearwater, Kansas. (Reuters)In the first half of the 20th century, hundreds of Americans died each year from lightning strikes. The data is messy, but in the years...
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Meet 'Robosimian,' the Robot That Apes an Ape
It doesn't throw its own feces, but that's mostly because it doesn't have them. Meet the Robosimian, a four-limbed robot designed to look and act, as its name helpfully suggests, like a primate....
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These Two Guys Tried to Rebuild a Cray Supercomputer
The National Center for Atmospheric Research's Cray supercomputer (UCAR).There was a time when the word "supercomputer" inspired the same sort of giddy awe that infuses Superman or Superconducting...
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What Makes a Good Toilet
Zach GershkoffGrowing up in an American town and attending first-world schools, I learned that an organism must have food, water, and shelter in order to survive. The need to eliminate waste did not...
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The New York Times Had a Mistake on Its Front Page Every Day for More Than a...
New York Times/Rebecca J. RosenNobody knows exactly how it happened, but somehow, between February 6, 1898, and February 7, 1898, the issue numbering for The New York Times got a little ... off. It's...
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This App Reads Your Emotions on Your Face
If you've ever been confused about how you're feeling, and it happened to be the 1970s, you could always count on the mood ring. The jewelry fad claimed to read wearers' levels of anxiety or ebullience...
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5 Intriguing Things: Wednesday, 1/15
1. The Blackphone, a privacy-first device, was announced today by a team including Phil Zimmerman, creator of PGP. "It has the features necessary to do all the things you need, as well as all the...
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The Court's Net-Neutrality Ruling Isn't Actually That Bad
Bob Duran/FlickrFollowing the decision by the United States Court of Appeals in Verizon v. FCC, advocates of so-called network neutrality are out in force, decrying the end of the Internet as we know...
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What Happens When You Take an Obviously Viral Photo
About 5 hours ago, a woman named Amanda Traver was flying into LaGuardia airport, like so many other travelers. As her plane descended, New York (and much of the eastern seaboard) was fogged in, as...
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