On the Media

On Tuesday, the Philadelphia Police released a video of some unidentified suspects in a brutal attack on a gay couple. Within a few hours, a Philly sports fan and his online friends had identified some of the people in the video without the blizzard of false accusations that usually accompany an online investigation. On the latest episode of TLDR, Alex speaks to "Fan Since 09" about how he managed to corral a online mob into potentially solving a crime.

TLDR #36 - The Mystery of Childish Gambino Ever heard the story...

Tue, 16 Sep 2014 20:06:00 -0400

TLDR #36 - The Mystery of Childish Gambino

Ever heard the story of where Donald Glover got the name Childish Gambino? This TLDR podcast tells the story. It involves WuTang, old school Internet games and the question: is Donald Glover being Childish Gambino a very fact of the Universe?

Yesterday was the 13th anniversary of the september 11th...

Fri, 12 Sep 2014 11:02:07 -0400

Yesterday was the 13th anniversary of the september 11th attacks, and it passed with the usual volume of memorials, think pieces, and status reports on the forever changed post 9-11 America. But one thing that seems conspicuously absent from the web are “of the moment” accounts of the attacks as they were taking place.

The web of 2001 was much less immediate and interactive. Today, we would have an incredible corpus of by-the-minute reactions to the event, but 13 years ago, live interaction that remains archived and available in perpetuity was scarce. Yesterday, the Smithsonian ran an article about one of the best primary digital documents, a thread on the website Metafilter of people’s reactions to the event as it happened.

Against their better judgment, TLDR wrote about Gamergate.

Fri, 05 Sep 2014 12:47:41 -0400

Against their better judgment, TLDR wrote about Gamergate.

We’re pretty sure Brooke is supposed to be Padme (Amidala)...

Thu, 04 Sep 2014 14:25:00 -0400

We’re pretty sure Brooke is supposed to be Padme (Amidala) here. I’m sure you’ll let us know if we’re wrong. Here’s the rest:

Mace Windu (Glynn Washington)

Anakin Skywalker (Ira)

Senator Organa (Jad)

Obi-Wan Kenobi (Terry Gross)

Crafted (with affection, I assume) by WFAE, Charlotte, NC

“I think it’s just part of relationships now - along...

Wed, 03 Sep 2014 16:46:26 -0400

“I think it’s just part of relationships now - along with kissing and making out and circling the bases, I think we send dirty photos to each other, it’s just part of digital courtship.”

-Kashmir Hill on the theft of celebrity nudes earlier this week on TLDR.

There is a tiny Twitter tempest going on right now regarding an...

Tue, 26 Aug 2014 15:10:00 -0400

There is a tiny Twitter tempest going on right now regarding an article on The Atlantictoday by freelancer Dave Eagle, about finding out his 9-year-old son was viewing pornography. The anger is over whether Eagle’s son is too young to decide if he wanted his real name to be used, and how this article, which will likely live in perpetuity on the web, will affect him in the future. Did this article violate his son’s right to privacy?

BREAKMASTER CYLINDER'S ULTIMATE ALL THINGS CONSIDERED REMIX

Tue, 19 Aug 2014 11:45:20 -0400

You may know Breakmaster Cylinder as the mysterious genius behind the TLDR Theme Song. But did you also know he’s a hot steppin’ NPR fan? Just listen to his remix of npr’s All Things Considered theme (featuring vocals by Laskhmi Singh!).

Facebook is running a test on some users where it attempts to...

Mon, 18 Aug 2014 13:16:45 -0400

Facebook is running a test on some users where it attempts to more clearly demarcate articles from The Onion as satire, by including a “satire” tag.

Steve Terrill is a journalist who works in Rwanda. Or at least...

Mon, 18 Aug 2014 11:21:06 -0400

Steve Terrill is a journalist who works in Rwanda. Or at least he worked in Rwanda, until he accidentally got the office of Rwanda’s president Paul Kagame to implicate itself in a long-running online harassment campaign. On the latest episode of TLDR, Alex talks to Steve about inadvertently exposing the Rwandan government’s most prolific troll, and being banned from the country as a result.

Anonymous Claims They’ve Identified the Police Officer Who...

Thu, 14 Aug 2014 11:47:50 -0400

Anonymous Claims They’ve Identified the Police Officer Who Shot Michael Brown. What Should We Do With That Information?

On Twitter, people are using the hashtag #IfTheyGunnedMeDown to...

Mon, 11 Aug 2014 11:16:09 -0400

On Twitter, people are using the hashtag #IfTheyGunnedMeDown to respond to media portrayals of young black men killed by police

Why Are 2 Million People Still Signed up For AOL’s Dial-Up...

Fri, 08 Aug 2014 10:58:39 -0400

Why Are 2 Million People Still Signed up For AOL’s Dial-Up Internet?

Congress, Copyright and Monkeys

Wed, 06 Aug 2014 11:07:27 -0400

Congress, Copyright and Monkeys:

Wikimedia is refusing to remove a monkey selfie photo because, they argue, a human can’t copyright a monkey selfie. Here’s an OTM story about how this glorious sentence came to be.