All articles from Kottke.org
The 16th season of the Dissect podcast is a deep dive...
The 16th season of the Dissect podcast is a deep dive into Daft Punk; here’s the 1st episode.
Bodega Cats of New York
The Bodega Cats of New York project documents the working cats of NYC’s delis, bodegas, and corner stores. The cat at the local deli wasn’t a pet. She knew the regulars. She kept the mice out. She gav
A few years back, the Mini Cooper's taillights were...
A few years back, the Mini Cooper’s taillights were designed to look like the Union Jack flag, which is fine until you turn the blinker on and it looks like an arrow pointing in the wrong direction. I
Oh my gosh, look at these tiny snow leopard cubs from...
Oh my gosh, look at these tiny snow leopard cubs from the Melbourne Zoo. 🥹
The Astronomy Picture of the Day , in which the...
The Astronomy Picture of the Day, in which the International Space Station looks like it’s landing on the Moon.
Project Plowshare: Nukes for Peace!
I’d vaguely heard of Project Plowshare but good god, what a ridiculous and dangerous waste of time and money. At the height of the Cold War, nuclear weapons were seen not only as devices of destructio
" Here are some things that have been found in...
“Here are some things that have been found in donation bins: A live puppy. Live Japanese grenades. An 1854 tombstone for Rebecca Jane Nye. Old skulls. A stolen Frederic Remington sculpture. Customized
Historian Eric Cline, author of 1177 BC, explains how...
Historian Eric Cline, author of 1177 BC, explains how the collapse of several civilizations circa 1200 BC was the result of an “overly interdependent system that had no way to absorb multiple shocks a
Hollywood's World Map of California
This is a map published in 1927 by Paramount Studios showing the areas of California & Nevada that doubled as shooting locations for far-flung locales, including Siberia, Wales, the Nile, New England,
Researchers have found that some aspects of sperm...
Researchers have found that some aspects of sperm whales’ communication are “remarkably similar” to human languages.
What Was the Very First Plant in the World?...
What Was the Very First Plant in the World? “Scientists believe the first true plants evolved from green algae around 470 million years ago.”
The Brennan Self-Balancing Monorail
This is so cool: in the early 1900s, a mechanical engineer named Louis Brennan invented a self-balancing train that ran on a single track. This video demonstrates how the train worked using a clever s
I mentioned this book in a previous post but it deserves...
I mentioned this book in a previous post but it deserves its own thing: Timothy Ryback’s 53 Days: How Hitler Dismantled a Democracy will hit shelves in September. A must-read for me.
The People's Clock: a Timepiece Made of People
As part of his Real Time series, artist Maarten Baas has created The People’s Clock, a timepiece that lives in Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport. To create the clock’s “workings”, Baas recorded more than 1
The Great American GLP-1 Experiment . In the last few...
The Great American GLP-1 Experiment. In the last few years, people have come up with all sorts of off-label uses for GLP-1s, including treating concussions, menopause, long Covid, IBS, drug addiction,
A rare event to capture on video: an underwater volcanic...
A rare event to capture on video: an underwater volcanic eruption in the Solomon Islands.
From a few weeks ago: Bush's Tiny Desk Concert ....
From a few weeks ago: Bush’s Tiny Desk Concert. Machinehead and Glycerine still hit.
Your Backpack Got Worse On Purpose . "From a...
Your Backpack Got Worse On Purpose. “From a shareholder’s perspective, the bag that falls apart is the better product. That’s the business model. Repeat failure, repeat purchase, repeat revenue. The q
Two Japanese aquariums have released their 2026...
Two Japanese aquariums have released their 2026 flowcharts of their penguins’ relationships. “Penguin drama can include serious crushes and heartbreaks but also adultery and egg-stealing.”
Vintage Pan-Am Luggage Tags
I love these oversized prints of vintage Pan-Am luggage tags from artist Ella Freire. The typography and colors are just perfect. (via daringfireball) Tags: art · design · Ella
Fun trompe-l’œil graph paper drawings .
Fun trompe-l’œil graph paper drawings.
Don't Just Replace Chavez — Rethink Monuments ....
Don’t Just Replace Chavez — Rethink Monuments. “A memorial based on the great-man theory of history is a tale only half told.” And: “There are elegant ways to pay tribute to groups of people.”
The Testaments TV Series
I’d vaguely remembered that Hulu was adapting The Testaments, Margaret Atwood’s follow-up to The Handmaid’s Tale, as a sequel to the TV series of the same name, but I was surprised to find out that th
Listen to the NYC Subway play some Train Jazz ....
Listen to the NYC Subway play some Train Jazz. “Every dot is a real subway train. Eight hundred of them, give or take, form a small jazz combo (walking bass, piano, sax, vibes, brushes) that has been
The Engineer Guy Bill Hammack has written a book based on...
The Engineer Guy Bill Hammack has written a book based on his great YouTube channel: The Things We Make: The Unknown History of Invention from Cathedrals to Soda Cans.
It's Happening: More Signs of Life From Boards of Canada
I reported last week that signs of activity have been detected from Boards of Canada in the form of mysterious VHS tapes sent out to fans. Yesterday, the group’s record label posted a bunch of photos
If Every Congressman Facing Credible Rape Allegations...
If Every Congressman Facing Credible Rape Allegations Resigned, We’d Have No One Left to Govern the Country. “It’s naïve to imagine the government can continue to function without the tireless dedicat
Authoritarian Megalomaniacs Love Gaudy Buildings
You know who else wanted to construct gaudy buildings in his own image? Here’s Timothy Ryback on Adolf Hitler’s obsession “with adding an expensive new wing to the Reich chancellery”. The new annex, c
This looks interesting: Quiche is a highly customizable...
This looks interesting: Quiche is a highly customizable but simple browser for iOS.
" The internet known within China is a very...
“The internet known within China is a very different internet to the one known by the world at large. It is censored, regulated and structured quite differently. It is controlled and managed, rather t
Now Online: a Treasure Trove of 1000s of Secret Concert Recordings
For decades, a guy named Aadam Jacobs has been recording live music shows. His collection of over 10,000 shows since 1984 feature the likes of Nirvana, R.E.M., The Pixies, Björk, Depeche Mode, Liz Pha
On the network effect of the weekend : "The...
On the network effect of the weekend: “The essential characteristic of the weekend is not just the having of a day off, but rather that other people have the day off.”
A Collection of Transit Tickets
A brand designer’s “compendium of transit tickets” from around the world. Many of these are from the 90s and 00s. Design inspiration for daaaaays. (via meanwhile) Tags: de
The Death of the Basic American Car . "Today,...
The Death of the Basic American Car. “Today, there are so many wealthy people who can afford luxury cars that it simply isn’t that profitable for companies to produce cars for the bottom 40 percent of
An AI bot created by Andon Labs is running its own...
An AI bot created by Andon Labs is running its own retail store in San Francisco. The bot has hired a pair of human employees and “has a corporate card, a phone number, email, internet access and eyes
"Gerontocracy has always thrived in undemocratic...
“Gerontocracy has always thrived in undemocratic places — Communist people’s republics, Gulf monarchies — where only death could pry power from the ruling elders. American gerontocracy is exceptional
An interactive explainer on the physics of GPS ....
An interactive explainer on the physics of GPS. “The answer is in some ways simpler than you’d expect, and in other ways more complex. GPS is fundamentally a translation tool: it converts time into di
Media companies are increasingly blocking the Internet...
Media companies are increasingly blocking the Internet Archive from archiving their material (but at the same time using the site to gather data for their stories).
The Christophers
I’m so glad Steven Soderbergh unretired from filmmaking. His newest film, The Christophers, looks amazing. It stars Ian McKellen as a famous artist and Michaela Coel as his assistant — but of course t
We love a slime mold around here. "From mottled...
We love a slime mold around here. “From mottled gray bulbs that look like snow-covered trees to pink, coral-like tendrils, Webb chronicles a huge array of colors and shapes.”
This is incredible: Google Has a Secret Reference Desk....
This is incredible: Google Has a Secret Reference Desk. Here’s How to Use It. I knew some of these but not all, e.g. verbatim mode “returns results for exactly what you typed, stripped of personaliza
The Crystal Skull
David Altmejd’s 2017 sculpture entitled “God” is one of the most disturbing artworks I’ve seen recently, so naturally I had to show all of you. If you need further wigging out, here you go. Lots more
Great new Patrick Radden Keefe piece on a New Orleans...
Great new Patrick Radden Keefe piece on a New Orleans insurance fraud scheme involving big rigs. “After all, who would agree to be cut open on an operating table if it weren’t necessary? Quite a lot o
Fred Again's Tiny Desk Concert
Almost three years ago exactly, Fred Again rolled into the NPR studios and did a Tiny Desk Concert. When Fred again.. first proposed a Tiny Desk concert, it wasn’t immediately clear how he was going t
Why Japan Has Such Good Railways . "Their system...
Why Japan Has Such Good Railways. “Their system excels because of good public policy: business structure, land use rules, driving rules, superior models for privatization, and sound regulation.” Other
Rebecca Solnit: " The United States is being...
Rebecca Solnit: “The United States is being murdered, and it’s an inside job. Every department, every branch, every bureau and function of the federal government is being fatally corrupted or altogeth
Hungarian Opposition Ousts Viktor Orbán After 16 Years...
Hungarian Opposition Ousts Viktor Orbán After 16 Years in Power. “Magyar…pledged to repair Hungary’s strained relationship with the EU, crack down on corruption and funnel funds towards long-neglected
Interviews with five novelists (Jesmyn Ward, Joyce Carol...
Interviews with five novelists (Jesmyn Ward, Joyce Carol Oates, Jhumpa Lahiri, Ottessa Moshfegh, Margaret Atwood) on writing something true with fiction. Oates: “If you could read Toni Morrison, why w
From Daphni (aka Caribou), a 7hr DJ set . 7 hours!
From Daphni (aka Caribou), a 7hr DJ set. 7 hours!
The trailer for Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the...
The trailer for Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World. The film is showing in select locations around the country and will air on PBS this summer.
Ultimate Online Phreak Box . "This is a free...
Ultimate Online Phreak Box. “This is a free online blue box, red box, and silver box.” (With this and a time machine, you could make free phone calls in the 1970s.)
A tour of the mannequin storage room at FIT . Each...
A tour of the mannequin storage room at FIT. Each era’s mannequins are designed to mimic the “fashionable body” of that time period.
An interview with Ronald Wayne , Apple's forgotten...
An interview with Ronald Wayne, Apple’s forgotten third founder. (He was with the company all of 2 weeks.)
Radiohead Covers Joy Division's Ceremony
From a livestream recorded many years ago, this is Radiohead covering Joy Division’s Ceremony. The song was originally written by Joy Division but the version most people know is New Order’s — it was
Oh wow, this is a trippy game inspired by MC Escher . My...
Oh wow, this is a trippy game inspired by MC Escher. My brain may be permanently broken by this.
A short analysis of what makes Mark Antony's...
A short analysis of what makes Mark Antony’s “Friends, Romans, countrymen…” speech from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar so good and effective.
Using wiki software, old photos, family stories, bank...
Using wiki software, old photos, family stories, bank transactions, social media posts, and an LLM to sift through everything to build a personal encyclopedia.
"Stalin's task in building what Senior calls...
“Stalin’s task in building what Senior calls his ‘Red Empire’ was made so much easier, and so much more brutal, by the intelligence the Cambridge spies passed to Moscow.”
Charcuterie is a visual Unicode symbol explorer. Click...
Charcuterie is a visual Unicode symbol explorer. Click around, search, or use the pencil in the upper left to draw the shape you’re looking for. This is very cool.
Diary Comics From the 1940s
This is wonderful: a Redditor uploaded some of their grandmother’s comics that she made in the 1940s, documenting her marriage to the deployment of her husband for World War II. I never got to meet m
Well, this blows: FSG has shuttered their MCD imprint &...
Well, this blows: FSG has shuttered their MCD imprint & Sean McDonald is leaving the company. MCD published so many good titles/authors: Questlove, Enshittification, Robin Sloan, Jeff VanderMeer, Sloa
This tiny e-ink reader is small enough to attach to...
This tiny e-ink reader is small enough to attach to the back of your phone.
The Headless Mary Magdalene by Artemisia Gentileschi
I’m charmed by this fragment of Artemisia Gentileschi’s painting of Mary Magdalene that’s up for auction later this month. For many years it was in a private collection in Germany where it lay rolled
Between the Impossible and the Inevitable: The Case for...
Between the Impossible and the Inevitable: The Case for Defiance (aka Never F**king Surrender). “We make the future in the present, when we show up. Don’t surrender it to those who would destroy it.”
Hostile Volume is a simple and maddening game where you...
Hostile Volume is a simple and maddening game where you need to hold the audio volume at 25%, which gets increasingly difficult with each level.
International Chess Federation Adds Race Car Piece ....
International Chess Federation Adds Race Car Piece. “The race car piece gets to go twice in one turn because it’s so fast.” Smart to capitalize on F1’s popularity; they should do my fave Monopoly piec
The Fabulous Engineering and Design of Duct Tape
Bill Hammack, aka The Engineer Guy, is an amazing engineering educator and in this video he explains how duct tape is designed to simultaneously do three things well: “a) adhere with light pressure, b
Someone ported Mac OS X to the Nintendo Wii ....
Someone ported Mac OS X to the Nintendo Wii. “Since its launch in 2007, the Wii has seen several operating systems ported to it: Linux, NetBSD, and most-recently, Windows NT. Today, Mac OS X joins tha
"Working with agents feels much less like classic...
“Working with agents feels much less like classic deep work, and much more like playing a game.”
How to Guess If Your Job Will Exist in Five Years ....
How to Guess If Your Job Will Exist in Five Years. “There’s a better question for white-collar workers to ask themselves: Am I coal, or am I a horse?”
Post-Digital Digital Glitch Collages
I really love these collages by Anton Elfilter (Instagram, Threads). They are digital-ish? But also not? And does anyone else see the influence of Hilma af Klint in these? (via moss & fog)
Farmers won their right-to-repair fight against John...
Farmers won their right-to-repair fight against John Deere. The settlement includes a 10-year “agreement by Deere to provide ‘the digital tools required for the maintenance, diagnosis, and repair’ of
This sounds like an interesting podcast series from M....
This sounds like an interesting podcast series from M. Gessen: The Idiot. “Compassion has its limits when it comes to your own cousin.”
Trump Administration Orders Dismantling of the U.S....
Trump Administration Orders Dismantling of the U.S. Forest Service. “…the most devastating attack on the U.S. Forest Service in the agency’s 121-year history. Not a budget cut. Not a policy shift. Not
A Day in the Life of an Enshittificator
From the Norwegian Consumer Council, a funny video that warns against the dangers of enshittification. It’s part of their Breaking Free initiative: Digital products and services are steadily becoming
What it's like to take an 11-day filmmaking...
What it’s like to take an 11-day filmmaking workshop with Werner Herzog (in the Azores). “Take your camera, get the shot, forgo storyboards, don’t overdo it and, above all else, do the doable.” But al
Nine Inch Nails and Boys Noize are releasing a...
Nine Inch Nails and Boys Noize are releasing a collaborative album called (maybe?) Nine Inch Noize. Available April 17.
The Most Beautiful Moment of the Artemis II Mission . It...
The Most Beautiful Moment of the Artemis II Mission. It had little to do with science or celestial bodies; instead it was a moment shared by four curious, caring humans, united in purpose, far from ho
The Sunshine Recorder
I went into this video not knowing anything about how a mid-19th century sunshine recorder might work and was genuinely delighted by the reveal. If you’d like to be similarly surprised, stop reading n
Oh, about that story you may have read about one guy...
Oh, about that story you may have read about one guy single-handedly building a “billion-dollar company” using AI: The New York Times Got Played By A Telehealth Scam And Called It The Future Of AI. Oo
The latest big exposé on the identity of Satoshi...
The latest big exposé on the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto, the secretive inventor of Bitcoin, names cryptographer Adam Back as the likeliest suspect. John Carreyrou has won Pulitzers & helped expose t
Stunning Artemis II Phone Wallpapers
NASA has made available more than a dozen mobile wallpapers of photos taken during the Artemis II mission for free download. Basic Apple Guy has made some wallpapers of his own (that are slightly larg
"I have a feeling that everyone likes using AI...
“I have a feeling that everyone likes using AI tools to try doing someone else’s profession. They’re much less keen when someone else uses it for their profession.”
Resident Advisor: there are signs that Boards of Canada...
Resident Advisor: there are signs that Boards of Canada might release some new music soon. Please let this be true, we need this!
A guide to which Apple chargers to use with which Apple...
A guide to which Apple chargers to use with which Apple products in order to charge the quickest. (Your charger’s wattage really matters when the device’s battery level is 0-50%. After that, less so.)
Solar Eclipse From the Far Side of the Moon
This shot from Artemis II of the Moon eclipsing the Sun is one of the most breathtaking astronomical photos I’ve ever seen. Holy shit. Captured by the Artemis II crew during their lunar flyby on April
I missed that author Tracy Kidder died a few weeks ago ....
I missed that author Tracy Kidder died a few weeks ago. Kidder wrote the excellent The Soul of a New Machine, which won a National Book Award and a Pulitzer Prize.
Hollywood, Ending is John Green's forthcoming...
Hollywood, Ending is John Green’s forthcoming book, “a deeply observed novel about the tension between a public and a private life, and finding your safe someone to hold onto”.
A Catalog of an Entire House/Life
In a period of four years, Belgian photographer Barbara Iweins took a photo of every single thing in her house, “from my daughters torn sock to my sons Lego, but also my vibrator, my anxiolytics… abso
Teenager Michael Haskell " buys abandoned storage...
Teenager Michael Haskell “buys abandoned storage lockers at bargain prices…with the aim of selling their contents for profit”. But: “Two years into his pursuit, he knows all too well that every locker
Shoe Pop Dream Gaze , a three-hour playlist from...
Shoe Pop Dream Gaze, a three-hour playlist from Christina Hendricks’ all-vinyl DJ set. (You may remember Hendricks as Joan on Mad Men.)
"What caught my eye as a designer, as with most...
“What caught my eye as a designer, as with most industrial plants and control rooms of that time, besides the knobs, levers, and buttons, was the use of a very specific seafoam green…” It’s time for s
Really interesting piece from Jodi Ettenberg about...
Really interesting piece from Jodi Ettenberg about microdosing a GLP-1 to manage her mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS). She’s noticed “way less pain” and can eat more foods without reactions (yoghu
The Astor Place Riots of 1849 resulted in "the...
The Astor Place Riots of 1849 resulted in “the greatest loss of life in a civic insurrection in American history up to that time”. And they were incited over the “wrong” actor playing Macbeth.
Transcription by Ben Lerner
I’ve been hearing nothing but good things about Ben Lerner’s new novel Transcription (Amazon) which comes out tomorrow. From the book’s description: What unfolds from this dreamlike circumstance is th
A visual history of exploring the far side of the Moon ....
A visual history of exploring the far side of the Moon. “The Moon is tidally locked, meaning that only one side of the Moon ever faces the Earth. [For millenia,] there was an entire half of our natura
Livestream: Artemis II is about to fly around the Moon ....
Livestream: Artemis II is about to fly around the Moon. At around 1:56pm ET, they’ll surpass the Apollo 13 distance record. And: “At their closest point, they’ll pass roughly 4,000 miles above the lun
New vocabulary word: "RAM harvester" . RAM...
New vocabulary word: “RAM harvester”. RAM chips are so expensive right now that RAM harvesters are stealing them out of demo computers at electronics stores.
Missed this last week: Lane 8 dropped their Spring 2026...
Missed this last week: Lane 8 dropped their Spring 2026 Mixtape. Available on YouTube and Soundcloud.
Pattern Index, Max Cooper
Max Cooper’s music videos are always worth a look. This one, directed by Katia Schutz, is for a song called Pattern Index from his forthcoming album (Feeling Is Structure, May 8). Cooper describes Fee
Lessons from fighting cancer that apply to resisting...
Lessons from fighting cancer that apply to resisting authoritarianism. 1. We need each other. 2. We must move, even when on uncertain ground. 3. Past trauma will bring us down if we do not release its
"The promise of the open web was colonized by...
“The promise of the open web was colonized by internet giants. But the power of LLMs and agentic coding means we can start to take it back. We can build customized, personal software for ourselves tha
Louisiana, Virginia, Massachusetts, New York, and...
Louisiana, Virginia, Massachusetts, New York, and Maryland: only five US states have ever had a Black governor.