Rachel Monroe

How a movement toward simple, nomadic life in Volkswagen vans has become commercialized sponsor-fodder in which “vanlifers” trade social media currency for subsidized van repairs and discounts. Is this a new partially barter-style economy or just an outdoors, office-free variation of work pressure to tend ravenous social media accounts? Is it really freedom or just another way to sell your soul, one social media post at a time?

Rachel Monroe investigates a T-shirt quilt empire that went under and the laypeople-turned-detectives who dedicated themselves to recovering their mementos lost in the chaos.

After Taryn Wright exposed an elaborate fake tragedy on Facebook, she became an unlikely leader of an online hoax-busting squad.