Like. Flirt. Ghost: A Journey Into the Social Media Lives of Teens
A primer on how the smartphone generation is redefining communication.
Social Media
This Webcomic Made It Okay to Be Sad Online. Then Its Artist Vanished.
Finding the author of Pictures for Sad Children.
Ghostwriting
On the invisible labor that makes media work.
The Nature of Tides
When a child vanished in Nova Scotia, online sleuths got involved in the search. Then they lost their way.
How Social Media Became a Deadly Trap for a Minority Group in Pakistan
If you’re one of four million Ahmadis in Pakistan, posting on Facebook can mean exposing yourself to danger.
A People’s History of Black Twitter
An oral history of one of the most influential communities on the internet.
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Part I: Coming Together (2000-2012)
From #UKnowUrBlackWhen to #BlackLivesMatter, how a loose online network became a pop culture juggernaut, an engine of social justice, and a lens into the future.
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Part II: Rising Up (2012–2016)
No longer just an online movement, Black Twitter takes to the streets—and finds its voice.
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Part III: Getting Through (2016-present)
Joy and pain, harmony and discord, organization and chaos—there’s no single way to define Black Twitter’s complex, ongoing legacy.
How Twitter Can Ruin a Life
The writer of a contentious piece of science fiction, “I Sexually Identify as an Attack Helicopter,” drew the internet’s ire. Now she tells her story.
Fact-checking Modi’s India
As the pandemic rages across the country, one team of fact-checkers contends with a post-truth dystopia.
TikTok and the Vibes Revival
Increasingly, what we’re after on social media is not narrative or personality but moments of audiovisual eloquence.
Welcoming Our New Robot Overlords
How warnings of AI doom gave way to primal fear of primates posting.
The Beauty of 78.5 Million Followers
How social media stars like Addison Rae gave the cosmetics industry a makeover.
Vanishing Act
Her life in South Korea seemed perfect: new friends, a burgeoning career, reality-TV fame. But she was about to become notorious—disappearing without a trace, only to reappear pledging allegiance to North Korea. What happened to Lim Ji-hyun?
Your Body, Your Self, Your Surgeon, His Instagram
An internet-famous plastic surgeon faces hard questions, and a lawsuit, after building his brand on his patients’ bodies.
Is Substack the Media Future We Want?
The newsletter service is a software company that, by mimicking some of the functions of newsrooms, has made itself difficult to categorize.
Facebook Is a Doomsday Machine
The architecture of the modern web poses grave threats to humanity.
Living With Karens
A white woman calls the police on her Black neighbors. Six months later, they still share a property line.
A TikTok House Divided
You’re 19 years old. You get famous overnight. You move to LA. Now what?
Going Postal
A psychoanalytic reading of social media and the death drive.
The Conscience of Silicon Valley
Tech oracle Jaron Lanier warned us all about the evils of social media.
Un-Adopted
YouTubers Myka and James Stauffer shared every step of their parenting journey. Except the last.
Motherhood Through The Looking 'Gram
The cost of parents sharing their lives on Instagram.
My Instagram
We all die immediately of a Brazilian butt lift.
The Age of Instagram Face
How social media, FaceTune, and plastic surgery created a single, cyborgian look.
Why Do People Hate Vegans?
“The vegan wars are not really about veganism at all, but about how individual freedom is coming into conflict with a personal and environmental health crisis.”
How to Sell Drugs and Influence Everyone on Instagram
The true tale of a bodybuilder turned social media influencer who built an illicit empire.
