The Obama Mega Donor Who Got Lost In The Crowd
Meet Kareem Ahmed, the President’s reclusive bankroller.
Chris Jones (Live in Romania)
Evan Ratliff interviews Chris Jones before a live audience in Bucharest, hosted by the Romanian magazine Decât o Revistă.
"It just feels good to fucking win ... If you want to say 'Let's get rid of [journalism awards],' no problem. But if they exist, I want to win them. Just because I won two—I know Gary Smith has won four. I want five. Unless Gary Smith wins five, and then I want six. That's just how I work. And maybe that's a terrible, competitive, creepy thing. But journalism is competitive."
Thanks to TinyLetter for sponsoring this week's episode!
The Swingers’ Guide To Islam
A Javanese shrine where Muslim pilgrims seeking good fortune must peform a ritual: find a stranger, have sex with them.
Peeling Oniontown
Unraveling the layers of upstate New York’s most reclusive community.
The Beautiful Game
In Argentina, where the fútbol underworld controls everything from t-shirt vending to murder, and “rowdy gangs” have turned the stadium into a battleground.
Behind Enemy Lines With a Suburban Counterterrorist
How one woman is monitoring the jihadi network from a home office in Montana.
The CIA Burglar Who Went Rogue
A spy takes on his own agency.
The New Price of American Politics
Why the flood of money in this election is just the beginning.
"The Promise"
On Bruce Springsteen’s song, and growing up in a factory town.
The iEconomy (Pt. 1-7)
The complete (to date) New York Times series on the globalization of high tech industries.
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1. How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work (by Charles Duhigg & Keith Bradsher, Jan 2012)
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2. In China, Human Costs Are Built Into an iPad (by Charles Duhigg & David Barboza, Jan 2012)
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3. How Apple Sidesteps Billions in Taxes (by Charles Duhigg & David Kocienewski, Apr 2012)
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4. Apples Retail Army, Long on Loyalty but Short on Pay (by David Segal, Jun 2012)
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5. In Pursuit of Nissan, a Jobs Lesson for the Tech Industry? (by Bill Vlasic, Hiroko Tabuchi & Charles Duhigg, Aug 2012)
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6. Skilled Work, Without the Worker (by John Markoff, Aug 2012)
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7. The Patent, Used as a Sword (by Charles Duhigg & Steve Lohr, Oct 2012)
The Patent, Used as a Sword
For the first time, the giants of the tech industry are spending more on creating, buying, and fighting patents than they are on R&D.
Part of New York Times’ ongoing iEconomy series.
At Home at the End of Google Earth
Separated from his older brother at a train, five-year-old Saroo Munshi Khan found himself lost in the slums of Calcutta. In his 20s, living in Australia, he began his search for his birth home armed with nothing but hazy memories and Google Earth.
Life of a Salesman
Frank Firetti, a 54-year-old pool salesman in Virginia, and his fading American dream.
God Wielded the Buzzer
On a biography of David Foster Wallace.
Here & Gone
On the strange relationship between Lionel Messi and his Argentinian hometown.
The Supermarket of Struggling Artists
On the staff of a Trader Joe’s in New York City.
Masquerade
A clue-filled children’s book, a golden hare, and Britain’s greatest treasure hunt.
From Porky's to Hell
How Tony Galeota went from mobbed-up teen on Long Island to legendary strip club manager in Miami to distraught prisoner in a Panamanian jail.
Down and Out in the Top 10
Grizzly Bear and the surprisingly crappy economics of indie rock stardom.
How The Pirate Bay Four Dodged Swedish Justice—For a While
Convicted and facing jail time plus a crippling fine in Sweden, the founders of the torrent site The Pirate’s Bay have scattered across the world towards new lives: fatherhood in Laos, a junkie’s life in Phnom Penh, and start-up work in Berlin.
Exodus
A Kosovar refugee must decide between love and family.
Sponsored
Sponsor: The Atavist
A moving story of exploitation, bravery, and survival—in comics form.
In “Stowaway,” the new enhanced e-comic from The Atavist, award-winning cartoonist Josh Neufeld and investigative journalist Tori Marlan bring a human trafficking victim’s story to the comics medium.
Factory Girls
On the rise of K-pop.
Life As A Replacement Ref
When the best three months of your life are “called three of the uglier months in the recent history of the National Football League.”
Jeanne Marie Laskas is the author of the new book Hidden America and a correspondent for GQ.
"I'm just a writer going into [people's lives], you know? What do you do with that kind of intensity of a relationship when you're job is to invoke it on the page? It's a huge ... not just privilege but responsibility. Because, you know, it's just for a story. And I tell them that: 'I'm asking you trust me, but at the same time don't trust me. I'm kind of like a vulture in this relationship—we're not friends.'"
