In 2003, a man robbed a bank with a bomb around his neck. It exploded shortly thereafter, taking his life and leaving authorities to try to figure out who had put it there.

FRANCO: “Straight” and “gay” are fairly recent phenomena. One of the things the great book Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture and the Making of the Gay World, 1890–1940 is about is the way those labels have changed behavior. Between World War I and World War II, straight guys could have sex with other guys and still be perceived as straight as long as they acted masculine. Whether you were considered a “fairy” or a “queer” back then wasn’t based on sexual acts so much as outward behavior. Into the 1950s, 1960s and so on, the straight and gay thing came up based on your sexual partner. Because of those labels, you do it once and you’re gay, so you get fewer guys who are kind of in the middle zone. It sounds as though I’m advocating for an ambiguous zone or something, but I’m just interested in the way perception changes behavior.

“‘If there’s anything I can do to make your trip more enjoyable, let me know.” He walked away, then he strode back to Cree 15 seconds later and whispered, making eye contact, “Anything.’”

Team America voyages to Jordan’s King Abdullah II Special Operations Training Center to compete against top-seeded China and other squads in challenges based on counter-terrorism scenarios.

Getting clean with a three-day trip.

Previously: The Longform Guide to Addiction.

How Leo Sharp got busted.

Can neuroscience take the pain out of painful memories?

He was an early video streaming startup founder who threw parties where celebrities like Bryan Singer had sex with teenage boys. Then, he came to believe that music mogul David Geffen was trying to kill him.

A French soccer star’s rise and fall from sports to cons to the Nazi Party.

On driving (and walking) in the Middle East – from Syria to Lebanon, across Saudi Arabia to Dammam, in a taxi through war-torn Beirut.

On the online mug shot industry, which posts mug shots of anyone arrested (regardless of conviction) and charges $30 to $400 to have the photo removed.

An inteview with the Saturday Night Live producer.

Previously: The Longform Guide to SNL.

In Harpersville, Alabama, a traffic violation can lead to months in jail and a never-ending stint in a work-release program – what some refer to as a modern-day debtors’ prison.

You get steeped in this stuff as a kid, even if some part of you was always skeptical, it's hard to lose the residual sense that everything unfolding in the world—from natural disasters to commerce and geopolitics—signals some approaching doomsday.

The early days of electronic spreadsheets and how the tool transformed business.

Christopher Clayton Hutton hatched a plan to deliver Monopoly boards to British prisoners of war. The games were advertised as a diversion, but really they offered a way out.

Three years ago, Shell spent millions to send a colossal oil rig to drill in the remote seas of the Arctic. But the Arctic had other plans.

How Billy Walters, the world’s most successful gambler, keeps winning.

One day you’re teaching yourself to play the piano in hotel lobbies, the next you’re contributing a song to a David Lynch soundtrack.

Paleram Chauhan, a 52-year-old Indian farmer, was shot dead during the summer of 2013. The reason: his opposition to a gang of criminals stealing his village’s sand to sell on the black market.

The murder of a 34-year-old by a wig-wearing figure traces back to meth, an FBI sting and a former municipal judge who once sent a live copperhead snake to a foe through the U.S. mail.

A man felt wronged by his ex-girlfriend, a video game designer. So he published a 9,425-word online screed with “each component designed to be as damaging to [her] as possible.” It sparked the online fire known as “Gamergate.”

For days I've been slogging through a rain-soaked jungle in Indonesian New Guinea, on a quest to visit members of the Korowai tribe, among the last people on earth to practice cannibalism.

“Amazon has done a great job,” Jobs said. “We’re going to stand on their shoulders and go a little bit farther.” Or they were planning to stand on Amazon’s neck and press down hard.