In the internet age, plagiarizing has become easier to detect—and harder to resist.
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Longreads Best of 2016: Here Are All of Our No. 1 Story Picks from This Year
All through December, we’ll be featuring Longreads’ Best of 2016. To get you ready, here’s a list of every story that was chosen as No. 1 in our weekly Top 5 email.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
The best stories of the week, as chosen by the editors of Longreads.
A Very Brief History of Americans Playing Softball with Their Co-Workers
Americans have been playing softball with their co-workers since the game grew out of several variants of baseball in the late 19th century. In 1895, Louis Rober, a lieutenant in the Minneapolis fire department, organized games of “kittenball” to entertain firefighters between runs. Blue-collar company teams proliferated over the next half-century. Office workers joined in later, […]
Little Government in the Big Woods
Melissa Gilbert’s lost bid for Congress and the forgotten political history of ‘Little House on the Prairie.’
How Billionaires Do Burning Man
Like all people who hate Burning Man, I enjoy nothing more than reading articles about Burning Man. In February, Felix Gillette chronicled the semi-clad class warfare at last year’s Burning Man for Bloomberg Businessweek. Despite being a festival based on radical self-reliance, Black Rock City is seemingly overrun with tech billionaires setting up their own exclusive festivals-within-a-festival; ultra-luxe camps that […]
The World’s Most Lethal Border Crossing
Europe is “experiencing a maritime refugee crisis of historic proportions,” the United Nations warns. Thousands of refugees escaping conflict in Africa and the Middle East are trying to reach Europe via the Mediterranean Sea.
The Art of Paint-and-Sip Franchising
The paint-and-sip industry is a little more than a decade old. People show up to drink while an instructor slowly guides them, step-by-step, through the creation of a prechosen design. The idea was pioneered by Painting With a Twist, which two women in New Orleans started while looking for a reason to gather after Hurricane […]
Longreads Best of 2016: Under-Recognized Stories
We asked a few writers and editors to choose some of their favorite stories of the year in various categories. Here, the best in under-recognized stories.
Little Government in the Big Woods
Melissa Gilbert’s lost bid for Congress and the forgotten political history of ‘Little House on the Prairie.’

