Getting arrested was the best thing to ever happen to Jeremy Meeks.

The Piano Man of Yarmouk fled the ruins of Damascus to a life of criss-crossing Germany playing songs about his old neighborhood to huge crowds. Because of refugee law, he is paid nothing.

When a wealthy businessman set out to divorce his wife, their fortune vanished. The quest to find it would reveal the depths of an offshore financial system bigger than the U.S. economy.

In the not-so-distant future, all of our objects will talk to each other. They’ll make our coffee, find our keys, save our lives. The roadmap to a fully networked existence.

The author comments on the medium of the graduation cliché while still advancing it:

Of course the main requirement of speeches like this is that I'm supposed to talk about your liberal arts education's meaning, to try to explain why the degree you are about to receive has actual human value instead of just a material payoff. So let's talk about the single most pervasive cliché in the commencement speech genre, which is that a liberal arts education is not so much about filling you up with knowledge as it is about "teaching you how to think". If you're like me as a student, you've never liked hearing this, and you tend to feel a bit insulted by the claim that you needed anybody to teach you how to think, since the fact that you even got admitted to a college this good seems like proof that you already know how to think.

On January 1st, 2011, the U.S. estate tax will jump from zero to around 50%, which gives a lot of very rich elders (or perhaps more accurately, their heirs) millions of dollars in incentive to expedite death.

Franklin Chang Díaz immigrated to the U.S. at 18, became an astronaut, tied the record for most spaceflights, and now might hold the key to deep space travel.

When Sonia Vallabh lost her mother to a rare disease, then was diagnosed with it herself, she and her husband set out to find a cure.

Cancer has taken his voice, but the unlikeliest movie star in Hollywood history still has a lot he wants to say.

For years, JaMarcus Crews tried to get a new kidney, but corporate healthcare stood in the way. He needed dialysis to stay alive. He couldn’t miss a session, not even during a pandemic.

The writer and his oldest friends reunited to mourn the ones they lost—and honor the time they have left.

A profile of organizational psychologist Adam Grant, who argues that the key to success comes from helping others.

Why hundreds of Buddhist monks moved from Taiwan to Prince Edward Island, buying up thousands of acres of land in the process.

Barack Obama wanted to endorse gay marriage on his own timetable. Joe Biden had other plans.

An interview with Joseph Stalin.

Shirley Dygert had never jumped before. Dave Hartsock jumped for a living. Neither of them knew what to expect when the parachute failed.

On the volunteer “Wikipedians” who devote their free time to editing Wikipedia.

Adventures in acedia, from Aquinas to Bartleby.

One man’s quest to have a healthy leg amputated.

A New York lawyer’s attempt to secure an American aid worker’s release from ISIS.

What happened when Pakistan shut down the vitally important Karachi to Kabul trucking line.

An Iowa dad’s surprisingly short path from commentor to screenwriter.

A former sex worker interviews a longtime John on how it feels to pay for it.

“By the time we got to Woodstock 99 …” In a grim finale, the nineties get their Altamont.

More than 15% of Detroit’s adults have asthma, and 82% of black students go to schools in the most polluted parts of the city.