Endless Thread

Sword influencers abound on YouTube. Those who specialize in the historic European martial arts, or HEMA, have gained legions of fans showcasing the fantastic, bladed techniques of yore.

But talk of parries and pommels has recently given way to bigotry. Endless Thread's Ben Brock Johnson speaks with co-host Amory Sivertson about one valiant influencer fighting back.

Gen Z is over it. The youngest generation of adults is inheriting a climate crisis, the ongoing fallout from a global pandemic, a polarized political landscape, and a tenuous economic reality. And many Gen Z members, a generation more likely to identify as progressive than conservative, are ready for something to give.

Enter: Gen Z for Change — a youth-led non-profit that brands itself as, "the place where the creator economy and progressive politics intersect on social media." The group leverages a hundreds-deep network of social media creators to spread calls to action over TikTok. They've also pulled on the programming expertise within their team to develop a caché of semi-automatic tools that take the guesswork out of engaging with their political agenda.

Their latest tool, "Ceasefire Now!!" takes these efforts one step further — resulting in, by Gen Z for Change's count, two million emails calling for a ceasefire in Gaza hitting the inboxes of elected representatives in Washington every day.

After Taylor Paré was stood up on a date, she turned to TikTok. In a now-viral video, she claimed to have uncovered a new scheme to scam to singles looking for love on the internet. Endless Thread investigates.

The Vision Pro is Apple's new $3,500 virtual reality headset.

Since its debut in February, users have found new ways to use this latest iteration of a decades-old technology: scrolling TikTok at work, driving Tesla's Cybertruck, recording their kid's birth.

But can VR truly integrate into our daily lives? Or will it forever remain a niche technology for geeks and gamers?

Endless Thread dives into the history of VR and its potential for the future.

Our interactions with nature are increasingly mediated by technology. We scroll through wildlife feeds on TikTok. We use Instagram to plan hikes. Even in the wilderness, we religiously bring our phones to document the experience. And then there are animal cams.

Since the 1990s, people have fawned over livestreams of cute pandas and colorful fish. One could argue that animal cams another example of how we’ve jammed a screen between ourselves and the wild. But the story of Jackie the bald eagle presents a different perspective: one in which technology might bring us closer to our fellow creatures.

Producer Dean Russell speaks with Endless Thread co-host Ben Brock Johnson about the potential upsides of technonaturalism.

In 2017, Rhett Barker and his friends needed a way to stay in touch after graduating college. They were ecology majors, and meme groups were in vogue, so they created Wild Green Memes for Ecological Fiends on Facebook.

It began as a place to share silly nature-centered memes. The jokes were comically esoteric: about, say, the scientific name of a rare wild feline or the bites of Brazilian wandering spiders. You needed to know the science to laugh.

In spite of this — or because of it — the group attracted hundreds of thousands of fans from around the world. Now the group is a sprawling ecosystem of memelords with a “relentlessly optimistic” take on the natural world. Rhett decided to put the group’s popularity to good use. The results were overwhelming.

Endless Thread examines the psychology of conservation online and how people are using hope, fear, and humor to repair the planet.

In 2016, followers flocked to an Instagram user purporting to be Miquela Sousa, a 19-year-old Brazilian-American model, singer, and sometimes activist.

For years, no one was quite sure if Miquela was made-up, or to what degree. Was she a model rendered doll-like by filters? An actress? A totally fictional character?

Her ambiguous humanity helped Miquela land lucrative brand partnerships with the likes of BMW and Calvin Klein. But in recent years, interest in her has been slipping. Writer Mercedes Gonzales-Bazan joins Endless Thread to talk about Miquela's mysterious origin story, and what her declining relevance reveals about our current relationship with AI.

The halls of science, known for prim propriety and careful debate, are feuding. A new theory of gravity challenges Einstein's general relativity, our current understanding of that thing that keeps our feet on the ground. Physicists are upset.

"Cotton gravity"—named in honor of mathematician Émile Cotton, not fluffy flora—was first posited by Japanese researcher Junpei Harada in 2021. The idea, which modifies general relativity and discounts the theory of dark matter, spurred a surprisingly catty argument on arXiv.org, an open-access website for scientific preprints.

Things got nerdy. And hilarious. Endless Thread explains.

Shaquille O'Neal has some advice: "If you are going to retire, accept it. Enjoy your family," he recently said on The Big Podcast With Shaq. "I made a lot of dumb mistakes to where I lost my family. I don't have anybody."

His statement, directed at retiring NFL star Jason Kelce, raised concern online. "What happened with Shaq?" asked one Reddit user in a popular thread. "I thought he was [a] super nice guy. Why is he all alone?"

The former four-time NBA champion has developed several personas since the Orlando Magic drafted him in 1992. On the court, he was a giant. Online, he became something different. Endless Thread breaks down the many sides of Shaq to answer the question, Is he OK?

Last week, Endless Thread introduced the spirited pianist behind an online piano academy that's all over Reddit for all the wrong reasons.

In Part 2, we investigate why some people think it's a front to recruit students to the Church of Scientology, and we talk to the man behind the piano himself.

You may have seen this ad: A frenetic, wild-haired concert pianist says he can make any newbie a virtuoso in months. Just take his online course for $3,000.

Too good to be true? Redditors thought so. Posts dating back years cried scam. Some went further and claimed his virtual piano academy is a cover to recruit Scientologists.

In Part 1 of "The Music Man," Endless Thread investigates.

A box shows up on Amory Sivertson’s doorstep. Inside are the details of a murder.

Endless Thread co-host Amory Sivertson spent three years unraveling a cold-case murder. Her reporting eventually became the forthcoming podcast series Beyond All Repair.

Every story has its beginning. Amory's investigation starts here: Endless Thread's second-ever episode, about a man and his folder of documents.

"Getting Home" This episode originally aired on Jan. 19, 2018