An orgy of free song-sharing seems to be exactly the kind of thing that the horrified labels would quickly clamp down on. But they appear to be starting to accept that their fortunes rest with the geeks. Or at least they’re trying to talk a good game. “I’m not part of the past—I’m part of the future,” says Lucian Grainge, chair and CEO of the world’s biggest label, Universal Music Group. “There’s a new philosophy, a new way of thinking.”

A trip to a modern African megacity.

He decided to bury a box of treasure in the desert. Why?

A casino failed to save Tunica, Mississippi.

Looking to Nietzsche for self-help.

The plot to erode the key legislative gains of the civil rights era.

Timothy Treadwell liked to say that, “Grizzlies are misunderstood.” Then one killed him.

Talking to Lee Daniels about Empire, Hollywood, and survival.

Almost ten years after his kidnapping, a man writes to the people who threatened his life.

A map of the Queen of Cookbooks’ rise to power.

“We take the bus when we can’t afford to do anything but disappear.”

How solitary confinement can lead to suicide.

What does it take for heroin to grab hold in the small, remote towns of America? Like any business, it starts with one man and an entrepreneurial dream.

A novelist’s memoir of depression, whose “intrinsic malevolence” as a disease brought him close to suicide.

The great director always refused to get liposuction.

A suburban teen attempts to build a reactor, radioactivity ensues.

A steep discount on pharmaceutical drugs leads to a mass-murder case.

A brazen land grab in Zimbabwe and why it’s getting harder to stop multinational corporations.

How the French philosopher earned the means to publish freely by winning the lottery—repeatedly.

Lenny Pozner used to believe in conspiracy theories. Until his son’s death became one.

The 7th grader’s sext was meant to impress him. It nearly destroyed her.

The landlord’s guide to gentrifying New York.

“An idea too good not to believe.”

An ode to the guitarist.

How it feels to lose $30,000 in Bitcoin.