My Affair With the Intellectual Dark Web
“This is the story of the past three years of my life. It’s romance in a way, but it’s also a breakup story.”
Media
What Will the Miss America Pageant Look Like in a Post-#MeToo World?
The event evolves.
Dick Cavett in the Digital Age
Dick Cavett, the “last great intellectual talk-show host,” at 81.
Les Moonves and CBS Face Allegations of Sexual Misconduct
He is one of the most powerful people in media and has become a prominent voice in the #MeToo movement. Now six women accuse Moonves of harassment and intimidation, and dozens more describe abuse at his company.
Who is Anna March?
A story of literary ambition, fabulous parties and a hidden past.
Photojournalism’s Moment of Reckoning
“Why are we protecting these guys?”
The Extraordinary Life of Martha Gellhorn, the Woman Ernest Hemingway Tried to Erase
A maverick war correspondent, Hemingway’s third wife was the only woman at D-Day and saw the liberation of Dachau. Her husband wanted her home in his bed.
The Endless Reign of Rupert Murdoch
After decades of influence, the media mogul isn’t so much a person as an epoch.
Ice Poseidon’s Lucrative, Stressful Life as a Live Streamer
When your job is to constantly share your life, even your worst moments are an opportunity to please your audience.
How I Broke, and Botched, the Brandon Teena Story
The original writer of the Village Voice story that inspired “Boys Don’t Cry” looks back on her reporting—and the huge error she still regrets.
Stephen A. Smith Won’t Stop Talking
“The job is to be enough of a personality that they want to know what you think.”
How ‘Desus & Mero’ Conquered Late Night
“In a landscape in which black people dominate the culture but have few recognized channels to respond to it, the show, which stars two American black men, provides a venue for black authority in the mainstream.”
The Reputation-Laundering Firm That Ruined Its Own Reputation
A PR company that worked with dictators and oligarchs deliberately inflamed racial tensions in South Africa—and destroyed itself in the process.
Inside the Binge Factory
Netflix has hired everyone and they already know what you’re going to like.
The Reporter Who Exposed New York Times Star Glenn Thrush's Sexual Misconduct Says She Was the Victim of a Smear Campaign
An investigation into the aftermath of an allegation.
A Company Built on a Bluff
How Shane Smith built Vice.
A Journey Into the Righteous, Risk-Averse World of Faith-Based Films
How the Christian film industry works.
From Taylor Swift to the World's Largest T-shirt Cannon: An Internet Reader
A working theory about what makes internet writing uniquely “internetty.”
Tom Wolfe (1931-2018)
I Drove Myself Nuts Trying to Unravel the Mystery of Seemingly Unparented 9-Year-Old Instagram Shit-Talker Lil Tay
Who is this person?
Univision Is A Fucking Mess
A deep dive into what ails the media company.
This Is What It Was Like Learning to Report Before Fake News Was the Biggest Problem in the World
“As a young reporter in Eastern Europe in 2001, I expected to witness the ‘end of history’ and the flowering of democracy. That was just one of the mistakes I made.”
How Joan Didion Became Joan Didion
“Didion was one of the boys, clearly, in the sense that men had noticed her writing and wanted to publish her. But she also couldn’t quite fit into their regime.”
Porambo
How a journalist who wrote a seminal account of police brutality during the 1967 race riots in Newark wound up on the wrong side of the law.
War of Words
In 2014, Russell Bonner Bentley was a middle-aged arborist living in Austin. Now he’s a local celebrity in a war-torn region of Ukraine—and a foot soldier in Russia’s information war.
