The Hijacking of the Brillante Virtuoso
A mysterious assault. An unsolved murder. And a ship that hasn’t given up all its secrets.
The Mad Cheese Scientists Fighting to Save the Dairy Industry
These Truckers Work Alongside the Coders Trying to Eliminate Their Jobs
“We basically have people from two worlds, neither of which has ever talked to each other.” At Starsky Robotics, a driverless trucking startup in San Francisco, truck drivers and software engineers work side by side.
This Lawsuit Goes to 11
This Is Spinal Tap is a comedy classic, but its creators made practically no money from it. Robert Kolker looks at the legal battle over what Hollywood owes Harry Shearer, Rob Reiner, Michael McKean, and Christopher Guest.
What’s the Maker of Post-it Notes Doing in the Ankle Monitor Business? Struggling
When corrections agencies started using electronic ankle monitors to relieve overcrowded prisons, 3M capitalized on the market opportunity. Their products’ failures caused innocent people to suffer and challenged the company’s long-heald philosophy about design and innovation.
ESPN Has Seen the Future of TV and They’re Not Really Into It
No matter how innovative or cutting-edge ESPN makes itself, the cable money is just too lucrative, and the costs of licensing live sports are just too great, to finally cut the cord and offer itself as a standalone internet subscription service the way HBO did with HBO Now.
Inside Alabama’s Auto Jobs Boom: Cheap Wages, Little Training, Crushed Limbs
A powerful in-depth look at the human costs of bringing auto parts factory jobs to Alabama — with inadequate training for employees and unreasonable expectations for output. “American consumers are not going to want to buy cars stained with the blood of American workers.”
Domino’s Atoned for Its Crimes Against Pizza and Built a $9 Billion Empire
The once-flagging pizza chain launched dozens of digital marketing initiatives and made headline-grabbing changes to its delivery trucks, but their rebound can be traced to just one thing — making the pizza better.
Big Tobacco Has Caught Startup Fever
“It’s not smoking. It’s platform-agnostic nicotine delivery solutions.”
How to Become an International Gold Smuggler
Before getting nabbed by the Policía de Investigaciones — the Chilean equivalent of the FBI — 23-year-old Harold Vilches acquired and resold over 4,000 lbs. of gold worth $80 million in under two years. It all started with a Google search for gold dealers in Peru and YouTube videos on how to make your own gold ingots.