Longreads

A SEARCH FOR CUSTOMERS Members of a magazine crew trying to sell subscriptions to shoppers at a strip mall in Oceanside, Calif. Such crews become family, many sellers said, with bonds of shared…

  Circling the Bases on Okinawa  ONLINE SPECIAL BY AKEMI JOHNSON    We careened south toward Okinawa’s capital city, Naha, after eleven on a Saturday night. On the left,…

Illustration: Tim Burgard November 4, 1979, began like any other day at the US embassy in Tehran. The staff filtered in under gray skies, the marines manned their posts, and the daily crush of…

In 1995, test pilot Bill Suitor pulled the 120 pound Rocket Belt 2000 onto his back, wiped the sweat off his brow, and depressed the trigger. With 300 pounds of thrust, he shot straight up into the…

The announcement of the Supreme Court’s decision largely upholding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of Thursday, June 28 precipitated a genuine media drama.  Millions tuned…

I recently gave the closing keynote at the 2012 MFA Interaction Design Festival, a full-day event held on Saturday, May 12, 2012, to celebrate the work of the 2012 graduating class of the Interaction…

Jennifer Bogo journeys to Antarctica to report on what it's like to live and work in the frozen continent:

"Penguins are engineers. Each spring, they meticulously build nests of rock—some comically high—then take turns lying atop them for weeks. I didn't fully appreciate this until I stepped out of a zodiac onto Torgersen Island with the Birders—the only group that never changes its name. The three Birders weave among colonies of Adélie penguins, careful to steer clear of the occasional elephant seal.

"Unlike the other scientists, the Birders work outside Palmer's main lab building in a faded red tent stuffed with Clif Bars and yellow weatherproof notebooks. When they arrive at study sites, on islands near Anvers, they strip off their orange Mustang suits to reveal head-to-toe khaki. After stripping off my own Mustang suit to reveal more neon orange, I learn why: Khaki doesn't scare the birds. "

Davyd Betchkal, sound catcher, in Denali National Park and Preserve in Alaska. Setting off in the predawn gloaming of central Alaska, we were the sounds of swishing snow pants, crunching boots…

It was dark when Jesper Olsen fell. Dark and cold. In wintertime in northern Greenland there's not so much as a single ray of sunlight for more than three months. The average temperature is 25°…