What is your relationship with the trash heap of digital history? Can you still connect your old hard drives? Still sifting through your old photos in the cloud? Do you ever low key snoop in the old electronics of other people, searching for treasure?
That's what Noah Simmons was doing a while back when he discovered something compelling in its simplicity: a homework assignment document, on an old laptop picked up at an estate sale. The title of the essay? "My Secret Place."
From there, the mystery of the author, and the meaning it had for so many people who got hit right in the feels by a nostalgic description of childhood, played out on TikTok. Like hundreds of thousands of people online, Team Endless Thread had to know more.
Credits: Co-hosted by Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson, produced by Frannie Monahan, Edited by Meg Cramer, and sound designed by Emily Jankowski. The rest of our team is Managing Producer Paul Vaitkus, Dean Russell, and Grace Tatter.
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Encore: The Internet's Most Hated Bird
As summer fades away, we bring you an encore episode about you shoreline companions and occasional bullies — gulls.
Gulls are not beloved creatures. Consult social media, where they are deemed relentless, dirty pests who steal our food and crowd our beaches. As one TikTok user puts it, "Seagulls are the worst animals to ever exist."
Such hatred overlooks truths about this intelligent, charismatic animal, and it is masking a big problem: While gulls may seem like they are everywhere, many species are dying.
Endless Thread goes on a journey to reconsider the seagull.
You can learn more and see photos of the gulls of Appledore here.
Credits: This episode was written and produced by Dean Russell. Mix and sound design by Emily Jankowski. The hosts are Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson. It was edited by managing producer, Samata Joshi.
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Introducing "Jaws Island"
Dun dun... This week, on Endless Thread... dun dun... something new is here... dun dun dun dun... a podcast mini-series about the 50th anniversary of the cinematic classic... DUN dun dun dun DUN dun dun dun..."Jaws!"
Part 1 of this mini-series, Jaws Island, is right here, right now, and it's all about the "finatics" (yes, that's what they call themselves). WBUR arts and culture correspondent Andrea Shea takes us to Martha's Vineyard — AKA "Amity Island," where Jaws was filmed — for the 50th anniversary celebration of the film.
Through conversations with "finatics," collectors, and cast members, Andrea learns how Steven Spielberg's enduring monster movie sank its teeth into us.
Parts 2 and 3 are right around the corner, so follow Jaws Island in your podcast app! ("You're gonna need a bigger podcast library!")
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AI and Relationships, Part 2: AI Therapists and Bot Boyfriends
What happens when we outsource aspects of our most personal moments to machines?
In the second installment of our two-part series on AI and relationships, we hear from Rhiannon Williams, a reporter for MIT Technology Review who spoke to people all over the world about how they're using AI to relate to their loved ones, including a man who turns to it during marital disputes, a French mother who uses it to craft nightly tales for her son, and a nursing student who calls her AI companion her "boyfriend."
Credits: This episode was produced by Grace Tatter and edited by Meg Cramer. It was co-hosted by Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson. Mix and sound design by Emily Jankowski.
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AI and Relationships, Part 1: Into the Woods
Amir Mizroch spent years deconstructing fairy tales for his children — and thinking that maybe, he could create something out of his analysis and storytelling for a wider audience. In the first episode of our two-part series on AI and relationships, we hear what Amir finally created, and explore the questions it raises about connection in the digital age.
Credits: This episode was produced by Grace Tatter, and edited by Meg Cramer. It was co-hosted by Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson. Mix and sound design by Emily Jankowski.
Hosts Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson dig into the internet's vast and curious ecosystem of online communities to find untold histories, unsolved mysteries, and other jaw-dropping stories online and IRL.
USA