A dispatch from the pandemic under Governor Kristi Noem.

What lasting impact will the pandemic have on America’s first responders?

Daniel Hale exposed the machinery of America’s clandestine warfare. Why did no one seem to care?

On Manson bloggers, murder fandom and being a sad, dark teen.

How New York Times is clawing its way into the future:

The main goal is... to transform the Times’ digital subscriptions into the main engine of a billion-dollar business, one that could pay to put reporters on the ground in 174 countries even if (OK, when) the printing presses stop forever. To hit that mark, the Times is embarking on an ambitious plan inspired by the strategies of Netflix, Spotify, and HBO: invest heavily in a core offering... while continuously adding new online services and features... so that a subscription becomes indispensable to the lives of its existing subscribers and more attractive to future ones.

An oral history of the 2002 Western Conference finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and Sacramento Kings.

Previously: Jonathan Abrams on the Longform Podcast.

Chasing the embers of hedonism in Morocco and Tunisia, as Salafi mobs and new regimes wash over the brothels, beaches, and nightclubs of what used to be the Arab world’s most liberal cities.

“Let me say that again: Hedy Lamarr, arguably the most glamorous star of the pre-war period, also helped invent your cell phone and WiFi connection.”

“I am talking here about a time when I began to doubt the premises of all the stories I had ever told myself, a common condition but one I found troubling.”

How conspiracy theory links the internet’s first spam (a series of randomly generated words with the subject line Markovian Parallax Denigrate) with a woman who posed as a CIA agent and was convicted of receiving funds from Saddam Hussein’s government.

An inmate’s protest.

“Fast food and hedge funds. That’s where we’re going.”

The story of the Refugee Olympic team.

"There is a real danger here that this maneuver can harshly backfire, to the great benefit of Trump and to the great detriment of those who want to oppose him."

On Edward Tufte, the  great data visualization (read: charts and graphs) theorist and author of 1983’s The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, one of the most successful self-published books ever produced.

Three interviews with John Gardner, author of Grendel and The Art of Fiction, conducted over the last decade of his life.

On William H. McMasters, who ten days after being hired as Charles Ponzi’s publicist wrote a scathing exposé in The Boston Post that revealed the biggest fraud, at the time, in American history.

The belief that hidden memories can be “recovered” in therapy has been discredited, but the mental health establishment does not always learn from its mistakes—and families are still paying the price.

Michael Brown beat the odds by graduating from high school before his death—odds that remain stacked against black students in St. Louis and the rest of the country.

Life as Beck.

How a 24-year-old nurse discovered Vegas, high-stakes gambling, and serial bank robbery.

A profile of Rebekah Brooks, who started as a secretary at News of the World and became CEO of News International by 41, developing an incredibly close relationship with Rupert Murdoch along the way.

On the French urban exploration group UX—”sort of like an artist’s collective, but far from being avant-garde—confronting audiences by pushing the boundaries of the new—its only audience is itself.”

How a lonely, self-taught hacker found his way into the private emails of movie stars – and into the underworld of the celebrity-skin business.

In the remote wilderness along northern British Columbia’s Highway 16, at least 18 women have gone missing over the past four decades. Is it the work of a serial killer or multiple offenders?