Investigations
In 2012, a study on honesty was published in one of the most respected journals in American science. It claimed that having people sign an honesty pledge before filling out a form, rather than after, made them report more truthfully — a tidy, citable, real-world-tested finding. Nine years later,
Corporate Memo
The kegerators were never really about the beer. Once the IPO collapsed, neither was the culture.
Investigations
For as long as pornography has existed online, proving you were old enough to see it meant clicking a button that said so.
Obituaries
An algorithm built for speed instead of accuracy bought thousands of homes for more than they were worth.
Investigations
In September 1959, a Manhattan clerk named Joseph Miraglia filled out an application for a Carte Blanche card, honestly wrote down his salary — $73 a week — and got approved anyway. Within a month he'd charged roughly $10,000 across three countries. The card company had built its entire
Investigations
Same price, same plan, different service — depending on how seriously you took the word 'unlimited.'
News
Gather around, citizens of the digital age! The European Union has once again descended from the heavens to save us from ourselves, this time wielding the ultimate holy grail of cryptography: the Mandatory Age Verification System.
News
According to newly unearthed foreign-agent filings, a whole roster of elite, blue-check journalists from CNN, MSNBC, NPR, Vox, and the Times were treated to all-expenses-paid junkets by the China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF).
Revoked
A 20%-off coupon so generous it became the default price, until the company that printed it went bankrupt.
Investigations
Your shoes, your shampoo, and your laptop are all inconveniencing you because of specific people on specific flights on specific dates — decades ago.
Banned For Everyone
American railroads spent the late nineteenth century handing out free annual passes as a routine industry courtesy — to their own workers, to employees of connecting lines, and, generously, to newspaper editors and public officials. Nobody was supposed to be for sale. By the 1890s, plenty of people were, and the
Under Review
Timed entry actually worked. It got scrapped anyway in 2026 — and the gridlock came right back.