On Endless Thread, we talk about the blurring lines between our online and offline worlds. This week, we discuss the role online platforms played in the mass shooting on May 14, 2022, in Buffalo, New York. We also ask experts how content moderation on tech platforms can be managed better in order to prevent violence like this from happening again. (Nora Saks, an Endless Thread producer, is filling in for Amory Sivertson as co-host for this episode.)
May 20, 2022•25 min
Since the dawn of the internet, cyberwitches have traded in their broomsticks and cauldrons for floppy disks and smartphones. This week on Endless Thread, we go into the history of cyberwitches, attend a Zoom ritual, and talk to members of a cyber coven.
May 13, 2022•33 min
From a young age, "Andy" wanted to be a police officer. But in 2021, after 15 years on the job, he quit. Andy wrote about his decision in the r/OffMyChest community on Reddit — a choice that left him "half-heartbroken and half-relieved". In this episode, Andy talks about the ethical dilemmas that led him to leave law enforcement for good.
May 06, 2022•29 min
When a colleague sent us a viral Reddit post from WallStreetBets, we set out to investigate. A redditor who goes by u/throwmetfawaythanks tricked thousands into thinking he cashed in on Fresh Hen Egg Futures, and awaiting delivery on one million eggs. But many failed to notice one small detail: the story was indeed a s**tpost.
Apr 29, 2022•26 min
Sixteen-year-old M.H. was excited for another year on her cheerleading squad in suburban Pennsylvania. But the year was cut short when an anonymous number texted a video of her vaping to her parents and the cheerleading coaches. Vaping was against the squad’s code of conduct. The thing was, when local police investigated, they determined that the video wasn’t of M.H. According to officials, it was a deepfake sent by another cheerleader’s mother. ****** Credits: This episode was written and produ...
Apr 22, 2022•37 min
After its first successful iteration in 2017, r/place returned on April 1, 2022 for four days of battling fandoms vying for space inside a pixelated canvas. We talk to two Redditors who recount the challenges of claiming their stake in r/place—despite being vastly outnumbered.
Apr 15, 2022•23 min
A deep dive into The Herman Cain Award subreddit, which ironically awards those who die from COVID after publicly expressing anti-vaxx sentiments or pandemic-denying memes online. We meet a moderator and a Herman Cain Award nominee, who may have more in common than they realize.
Apr 08, 2022•37 min
Thousands of years ago, a massive meteoroid seared through the Earth’s atmosphere and split into fragments over Greenland. Its pieces were later used for toolmaking by the Inughuit that inhabited northwestern Greenland. In other words: Inughuit people used space knives. This fact, featured in a viral Reddit post on r/todayilearned, spurred an Endless Thread deep dive into a forgotten history of American exploration and exploitation abroad.
Apr 01, 2022•39 min
Ben and Amory are, sadly, not the type of people who truly "unplug" when they go on vacation, but this week's story is proof that those people do, in fact, exist! It comes to us from "Shared State" — a podcast from the Montana Free Press, Montana Public Radio and Yellowstone Public Radio — and it's the story of a couple who returned from a vacation off the grid to discover that they were entangled in a viral political feud with one of Fox News' most controversial commentators.
Mar 25, 2022•27 min
In times like these, you've got to take joy wherever and however you can get it. Amory and Ben swap unexpected sources of joy they've bumped into recently — from a goblin-themed Reddit post, to the scariest toe talons on the internet, to a funky 1980's little-known bop about going to the beach on Massachusetts' North Shore.
Mar 18, 2022•24 min
This is the story of a shocking event that sent Endless Thread producer Quincy Walters, and countless others, down a disturbing and fascinating rabbit hole about a small, daring group of people called wing walkers and a woman who wanted to live her life "to its optimum."
Mar 11, 2022•42 min
"How to prepare your house for an active wartime?" This was the title of a post on r/NoStupidQuestions about a month ago. The Reddit user, a 32-year old Ukrainian name Eugene, asked other users for advice in case Russia invaded. On Feb. 24, Eugene updated the post: "It happened. Nothing can prepare you to waking up at 5am from explosions, it was the single most scary experience of my life." This week, Ben and Amory hear from Eugene as he navigates life in Kyiv and struggles to assess the reality...
Mar 04, 2022•31 min
"I know how to take meat away from a dog. How do I take a dog away from meat?" This was a real question posed in Salon.com's Table Talk forum in 1999. What ensued from there played out like, well, a play. The Endless Thread team performs the accidental, online, collaborative comedy that came to be known as "Dogs in Elk" by the people who made this strange story an early viral internet sensation.
Feb 25, 2022•29 min
On December 28, 2004, CalTech astronomer Mike Brown and his colleagues found an unnamed dwarf planet drifting through the far reaches of the solar system. But before they could go public with their finding — as they were dotting their scientific i’s — a little-known team of Spanish astronomers beat them to the punch. José Luis Ortiz Moreno and Pablo Santo-Sanz announced the discovery of what turned out to be the same dwarf planet. Something seemed off, though. Users of an online astronomical mes...
Feb 18, 2022•40 min
While you were tending to your quarantine sourdough starter, Chinese YouTube star Li Ziqi was growing mushrooms, making peach blossom crowns and listening to the sound of blooming roses. Join Amory and Ben as they explore Li Ziqi, and why millions of isolated people worldwide have been drawn to the quiet intricacy and beauty of her videos.
Feb 11, 2022•41 min
Jack Murphy, or "Murph the Surf," is best known for pulling off the biggest jewel heist in New York City history. But Amory's here to tell you about his more sinister past, and to question why we allow powerful figures to control their own narratives. This week on Endless Thread, we bring you an episode from the brand new season of "Last Seen," a genre-bending podcast about people, places, and things that have gone missing.
Feb 03, 2022•39 min
"Unemployment for all, not just the rich!" That's the catchphrase of r/antiwork, a Reddit community of more than 1.7 million people who want to end work as we know it and reimagine its role in our lives. In this episode, we hear from members of this fast-growing community about what brought them to this online space, but also about recent turmoil within the subreddit that has left some wondering if it will endure.
Jan 28, 2022•33 min
Heads up: This episode mentions the tragic death of a dog. Take care when listening, and hug your furry loved ones. Amory, Ben, and producer Quincy explore three stories, in which a man's furry best friend is shot by a police officer, a person accuses Reese Witherspoon of stealing her horse, and cats are... ethnically stereotyped?
Jan 20, 2022•26 min
Emoji might not be 66 million years old, but they are pretty much everywhere. Join Ben and Amory as they explore the history of dinosaur emoji in LGBTQ+ communities and their more recent use as an online dog-whistle for anti-trans activists. What happens when one symbol is used for conflicting reasons? And can the dinosaur emoji avoid redefinition — or extinction?
Jan 14, 2022•27 min
On November 22nd, 1987, two TV stations in Chicago had their broadcast signals hijacked by someone wearing a Max Headroom mask. In the years since, Redditors have played an integral role in getting to the bottom of this case. Who dunnit? Why? How? We dig into the story.
Jan 06, 2022•37 min
10 years ago, Justin found himself on the side of the road with a blown out tire. Hours went by and no one stopped to help. But just as he was about to give up, something happened that changed Justin forever.
Dec 21, 2021•24 min
Three autistic Redditors talk to us about their view of the world, their view of autism, and their hopes for greater representation in society.
Dec 21, 2021•42 min
Amory and Ben team up with NPR to take on Twitter Spaces. This bonus episode is a recording of ET's 11/30 livestream chat with meme experts Kenyatta Cheese (Know Your Meme), "meme librarian" Amanda Brennan and Garbage Day newsletter author Ryan Broderick.
Dec 16, 2021•28 min
In this episode, we cross-examine memes and their relevance, and look at a surprising hypothesis that draws a through-line from TikTok to much farther back in history –- all the way to the very beginning of human culture. Ultimately, we investigate why memes are such an obsession right now, and whether we should think about them in a completely new way.
Dec 09, 2021•34 min
Unlike some of the other everyday-people-turned-memes featured in this series, Laina Morris leaned in big-time when her parody entry in a Justin Bieber fan contest turned into the epic meme Overly Attached Girlfriend in 2012. The screenshot from the video that launched Laina’s face into online ubiquity featured an intentionally off-putting open-mouthed, wide-eyed stare. She continued making YouTube videos until 2019 when she announced that she was ending her online career to address her mental h...
Dec 07, 2021•17 min
We know that there have been meme wars in America, and that Donald Trump has been called the “first president meme’d into office.” But in Kenya—a country where one of the only feasible forms of political expression is memes, and meme creators are being jailed for criticizing the government, it is a very different story. Western media told countless stories about the viral music video character known as “Makmende.” They called Makmende “The Kenyan Chuck Norris,” or a sound-alike of the famous Nor...
Dec 02, 2021•36 min
For being the internet's poster boy for bad luck, Kyle Craven thinks he sure got lucky. In this bonus episode of our meme series, Ben and Amory chat with Craven, better known as the face of the Bad Luck Brian meme that has circulated the web since 2012. Now a 31-year-old husband and father of two, Craven is frozen in time online as a pimply, brace-faced teenager. Despite the unflattering photo, he says meme stardom has brought nothing but good luck.
Nov 24, 2021•25 min
Anybody old enough to remember life before cutting the cord has probably seen the work of TV pitchman Billy Mays. But people much younger still know his face and squeaky OxiClean personality. While Mays died years ago, he’s lived on in meme form, from the famous product launches of Apple to more obvious image macros with Impact font. Why? We ask his son Billy Mays III, his biggest frenemy, and a host of others to explain why someone who was squarely in the age of television continues to appear o...
Nov 18, 2021•47 min
If you typed “inauguration” into your web browser anytime between 2017 and 2020, you likely saw, near the top of your search results, an image of a person in a neon green jacket, black winter hat and glasses screaming “Nooooooooooo!” That person was Jess, who was in Washington D.C. on January 20, 2017 to protest the inauguration of President Donald Trump. This “Nooooooooooo!” flew out of Jess after the oath of office, during what seemed to be a deeply painful and private moment. But what Jess di...
Nov 10, 2021•34 min
In 2013, four white musicians turned a local TV news clip featuring a Black man named Charles Ramsey into a song and uploaded it to YouTube. The auto-tuned meme, titled "Dead Giveaway," gained tens of millions of views virtually overnight. But the musicians, known as The Gregory Brothers, had not asked for Ramsey's permission, leaving him to wonder: Is this flattery or mockery — or bigotry?
Nov 04, 2021•38 min
