Endless Thread

Credits:

Reported, written, and produced by: Grace Tatter

Co-hosts: Grace Tatter, Amory Sivertson, Ben Brock Johnson

Editor: Meg Cramer

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Paul Vaitkus, and Frannie Monahan

Mixer and sound designer: Emily Jankowski

At any given time, 110 people can tell you exactly where James Tatter is.

Every single iPhone user has the Find My app on their phone, which allows them to share their location with friends and family. Increasingly, for young people like James, it's also becoming a form of social media.

Endless Thread producer (and James's sister) Grace Tatter wanted to know how something that seems creepy to some people became so commonplace to others — and how it's affecting our relationships off the screen.

Show notes:

On the Grid: Surveillance as a Love Language (The Drift)

Dodgeball Shuttered By Google, Its Co-Creator Promises To Clone It (Business Insider)

Thinking Critically about Social Media (American Sociology Association)

Talking Tech with Apple's Senior Vice President of Services, Eddy Cue (SuperSaf)

The Impact of Location-Tracking Apps on Relationships (Psychology Today)

Endless Thread is thrilled to introduce you to a new podcast from our friends at NHPR’s Document team. That’s the team behind other great narrative shows like Bear Brook and The 13th Step.

For the past six months, NHPR reporter Todd Bookman has been spending a lot of time thinking about… a cat. This cat’s name is Sergeant Tibbs – he’s 19.

Tibbs goes missing… and lands in the center of a lot of human pain, confusion… and internet outrage. And as Todd investigated what happened here, he found a pretty profound story about what we owe our pets – and our neighbors.

This week, we’re bringing you the first episode "Chicken Livers" of The Final Days of Sgt. Tibbs.

We hope you enjoy!

Credits:

Episode producer: Ben Brock Johnson and Grace Tatter

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson

Editor: Meg Cramer

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Emily Jankowski, Frannie Monahan

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

There's a conspiracy theory on Reddit right now suggesting that Reddit is using aggressive tools to hide posts praising or supporting Luigi Mangione's alleged execution-style killing of the CEO of United Healthcare, Brian Thompson. Endless Thread looks at what is going on with Luigi memes on this platform: the Nintendo character memes… and the other ones.

Show notes:

A Reddit moderation tool is flagging ‘Luigi’ as potentially violent content (The Verge)

Reddit will warn users who repeatedly upvote banned content (The Verge)

What's the deal with all of these Luigi themed posts saying "nothing violent going on here"? (r/OutOfTheLoop)

Have you ever been deepfaked? Or maybe this is just a new fear – that photos of you end up online that are you – but not really you? What would you do? For an increasing number of people – especially women – this is becoming a reality.

So much so that a recent bill in Congress called the “Take It Down” Act has found some incredibly rare bipartisan support. The bill is sponsored by republican Senator Ted Cruz and democrat Senator Amy Klobuchar, making it illegal to post explicit deepfakes. First Lady Melania Trump has also been a vocal supporter. But the thing is, it isn't law yet and...it might not be enough.

A new podcast called Levittown, from Bloomberg and Kaleidoscope Podcasts, takes listeners on a sort of cyber thriller for the AI age. It's the story of a bunch of young women in the suburbs of Long Island who find naked fakes of themselves online and when told there’s nothing they can do about it – set out to catch the perpetrator. This ends up connecting them to a web of online vigilantes – and cyber criminals taking advantage of a justice system not ready for the reality of AI.

Endless Thread brings you the first episode in this series. If you like what you hear – find Levittown wherever you like to get your podcasts to listen to the full series.

Credits:

Episode producer: Dean Russell, Ben Brock Johnson

Editor: Meg Cramer

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson, Amory Sivertson,

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Grace Tatter, Frannie Monahan, Emily Jankowski

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

In April of 2024, a group of aid workers were killed by Israeli Defense Forces while bringing food to Central Gaza. The IDF had alleged that its military analysts had identified a gunman on top of one of the trucks carrying supplies, suggesting it was a military vehicle, not an aid vehicle.

In the online debate following the event, a familiar trope popped up: arguing over whether one of the aid trucks a Toyota Hilux. The reason? In military conflict around the globe, the Hilux is a familiar character. Whether you're a U.S. designated terrorist group, a "freedom fighter," or someone else involved in direct armed conflict, you probably know about the Hilux.

Endless Thread wanted to know why, and how, this happened. So we took a journey beyond America's commercial pickup truck identity to understand why beyond our borders, the Hilux is the truck of choice.

Credits:

Episode producer: Katelyn Harrop and Frannie Monahan

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Emily Jankowski

Editor: Meg Cramer

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

Well, the messaging app Signal has been in the news recently, thanks to a snafu in which prominent federal defense officials mistakenly added The Atlantic's editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, to a group chat in which they discussed military strikes in Yemen.

This whole situation reminds us of another conversation we've been having as a team about how to responsibly leak information to the press, and if there is such a thing as a "secure line."

To answer this question, we reached out to our WBUR colleague, investigative and data reporter Todd Wallack.

If you have a story you would like to share with us in a secure way, you can reach us on Signal (yes, Signal) at 646-456-9095 or email us at [email protected]

There are moments that define each of our lives. Some we can predict: graduations, marriages, births, death. Others? Not so much.

And in the year 2025, sometimes, if the stars align just so, you may find that moment explode online.

That's what happened to 23-year-old Adrián Simancas. Last month, he was paddling the Straight of Magellan, with his father Dell, when the unimaginable happened: a humpback whale emerged from the water and engulfed him in its open mouth — and his father captured it all on video. Almost immediately, the video went viral.

Simancas sat down with Endless Thread to discuss his whale tale, the deluge of attention that followed, and what he's learned from his intimate moment with nature.

There are moments that define each of our lives. Some we can predict: graduations, marriages, births, death. Others? Not so much.

And in the year 2025, sometimes, if the stars align just so, you may find that moment explode online.

That's what happened to 23-year-old Adrián Simancas. Last month, he was paddling the Straight of Magellan, with his father Dell, when the unimaginable happened: a humpback whale emerged from the water and engulfed him in its open mouth — and his father captured it all on video. Almost immediately, the video went viral.

Simancas sat down with Endless Thread to discuss his whale tale, the deluge of attention that followed, and what he's learned from his intimate moment with nature.

Credits:

Episode producer: Grace Tatter and Amory Sivertson

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Katelyn Harrop, Frannie Monahan, Emily Jankowski

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

Last week, we introduced you to the wildly popular, albeit controversial, streamer and self-declared socialist Hasan Piker — what he’s all about, how he’s delivering his message to millions of followers, and who he’s reaching and resonating with.

When we talked to him in November, Hasan had a lot to say about the Democratic Party, about the streaming platform Twitch, and about what’s further dividing Americans right now. So here's more of our conversation with him.

Credits:

Episode producer: Grace Tatter

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Katelyn Harrop, Frannie Monahan, Paul Vaitkus

Mixer and sound designer: Emily Jankowski

Every day, seven days a week, for eight hours or more, Hasan Piker is live on the video game streaming platform, Twitch. This is where he shares his political commentary with a dedicated community of viewers — many of whom fall into a particularly sought-after electoral demographic: young men.

One of the dominant theories about the re-election of President Donald Trump in November 2024 was that it was aided by commentators like Piker: brash and bro-y. But Piker is a Socialist, considerably to the left of the mainstream Democratic Party. He gets into streamer beefs, but he also talks a lot about empathy and bringing a spirit of charitability to political discourse. What kind of effect does he have on his community and their political activism? Who's tuning in 50 hours a week to get their news from one guy (spoiler: it's not just twentysomething men), and really — who's that guy?

Endless Thread talks to Hasan Piker and his fans.

Credits:

Episode producer: Grace Tatter

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Katelyn Harrop, Frannie Monahan, Paul Vaitkus

Mixer and sound designer: Emily Jankowski

"Should I be joking at a time like this?"

That's the question then 33-year-old Brooke Eby asked herself when she uploaded her first piece of TikTok comedy in 2022, about being diagnosed with a terminal illness. Brooke's since built an audience of hundreds of thousands of people who are rooting for, and laughing with, her. Sometimes it gets weird. Brooke talks to Endless Thread hosts Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson about how facing death changed her relationship with social media and online community.

Credits:

Episode producer: Amory Sivertson

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Grace Tatter, Paul Vaitkus

Mixer and sound designer: Emily Jankowski

In the early 1990s, Don Buckley was a marketing executive for Warner Brothers by day, and by night? An explorer. "It was just curiosity and the drive towards discovery," Don says.

The source of Don's, and many others' curiosity at this time, was the burgeoning — but not yet mainstream — Internet. "This is a way to communicate with people that we haven't seen before," Don marveled. He started connecting the dots between his evening online exploration and his day job. In 1994, he converted the marketing materials for Warner Brothers' scandal-thriller film "Disclosure" into an interactive digital product. What Don had just built was one of the first movie websites. He showed it to the film's director who responded with, "What the f*** is this?," Don says. "He couldn't care less."

But Don Buckley was onto something. He kept building movie websites and, soon, hired himself a team: senior producer Dara Kubovy-Weiss (then Dara-Lynn Weiss), designer Jen Braun, coder and copywriter Michael Tritter, and design intern Andrew Stachler. They made sites for the movies "Twister," "Mars Attacks," "Eraser," "Joe's Apartment," among others. The approach for all of them, Don says, was to build a "narrative extension of the story being told in the film."

In 1996, that team had an especially big movie to market starring the Looney Tunes and NBA legend Michael Jordan: "Space Jam." What differentiates this site from the rest is something so unlikely that it sparked a viral moment of collective glee among nostalgic "Space Jam" fans and web nerds alike: this 29-year-old website is still up. Not only that, but the site still looks and functions today exactly as it did in 1996.

At the bottom of the website's "Site Map" is a simple yellow star icon with the caption, "Never on the Internet have so few worked so hard to bring you so much in so little time." Endless Thread needed to more. In this episode, Amory and Ben have a hilarious and gloriously chaotic conversation with the five people that brought us the surprisingly-enduring "Space Jam" website.

We’re coming to you with a special offering today. It’s an episode about the internet… from our friends just a few cubicles over here at WBUR: On Point.

Hosted by Meghna Chakrabarti, On Point is a unique, curiosity-driven combination of original reporting, newsmaker interviews, first-person stories, and in-depth analysis, making the world more intelligible and humane. When the world is more complicated than ever, we aim to make sense of it together.

We loved their recent episode about one of our favorite pieces of how the internet gets recorded and remembered — and we thought you might love it too.

So kick back and take a listen. We’ll bring you the usual shenanigans next week.

More than 900 billion web pages are preserved on The Wayback Machine, a history of humanity online. Now, copyright lawsuits could wipe it out. Guests

Brewster Kahle, founder and director of the Internet Archive. Digital librarian and computer engineer. James Grimmelmann, professor of digital and information law at Cornell Tech and Cornell Law School. Studies how laws regulating software affect freedom, wealth, and power.

Wanda Brewer was grieving. After losing her brother, she found comfort in an unexpected place: a soap-opera-esque story on Instagram told in 60-second increments. The story? A mafia boss torn between power, family and love.

Wanda’s not alone. Millions are bingeing these bite-sized, ultra-dramatic vertical shorts, where sexy werewolves, ruthless billionaires, and love triangles unfold one minute at a time — hooking viewers with cliffhangers and high-stakes drama.

From China’s multi-billion-dollar booming industry to your TikTok feed, these soapy, over-the-top dramas are changing the way we watch — and pay for — entertainment. This Valentine’s Day, Endless Thread explores the rise and Americanization of vertical short dramas.

Show notes:

“Werewolf Billionaire CEO Husbands Are Taking Over Hollywood” (Rolling Stone)
“Minute-Long Soap Operas Are Here. Is America Ready?” (The New York Times)
“2024 Short Drama Overseas Marketing White Paper” (TikTok)

Credits:

Episode producer: Cici Yongshi Yu

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson, Amory Sivertson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Grace Tatter, Katelyn Harrop and Frannie Monahan.

Mixer and sound designer: Emily Jankowski, Paul Vaitkus

In 2022, people around the world freaked out at the advent of ChatGPT, OpenAI's chatbot. In under three years, artificial intelligence has been incorporated almost everywhere in our online lives. But training the large language models, or LLMs, that power these AI assistants is hugely expensive. Or is it? Last month, a Chinese startup called DeepSeek released their own AI app for much less money, potentially with huge economic and geopolitical implications. Endless Thread hosts a rap battle to help you understand why these AI companies are beefing.

Show notes:

"Trying to get Deepseek to talk about 'Tank Man'" (Reddit)

"DeepSeek Doesn’t Want to Talk About Tiananmen Square. Here’s What to Know" (Bloomberg)

"DeepSeek is giving the world a window into Chinese censorship and information control" (CNN)

Credits:

Episode producer: Ben Brock Johnson

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Grace Tatter, and Katelyn Harrop.

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

Sometimes, after a long day speaking English, former WBUR podcast fellow Cici Yu just wants to zone out and spend time on the internet where everyone is speaking her native language, Chinese. Her app of choice? Xiaohongshu, or RedNote. So, when Cici logged on recently to find a feed filled with English-speaking Americans, she was surprised.

Show notes:

"The great social media migration: Sudden influx of US users to RedNote connects Chinese and Americans like never before" (CNN)

"More speech and fewer mistakes" (Meta)

"Instagram hides search results for 'Democrats'" (BBC)

"Instagram and Facebook Blocked and Hid Abortion Pill Providers’ Posts" (The New York Times)

Credits:

Episode producer: Grace Tatter

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell and Emily Jankowski

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

There's a burning question that keeps coming up in internet communities, YouTube explainers, and interviews with stunt people from the film industry: does Steven Seagal actually know martial arts?

In our current news environment, where conspiracy theories abound and the truth can feel elusive, this somewhat silly question keeps getting asked. But as we explore the answer, we find that perhaps the confusion about Steven Seagal's own personal story has relevance for how we navigate the year of 2025, whether or not we're talking about Hollywood action heroes.

Episode producer: Ben Brock Johnson

Co-hosts: Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson

Show producers: Samata Joshi, Dean Russell, Emily Jankowski

Mixer and sound designer: Paul Vaitkus

It's 2025. HBO's "Dune: Prophecy" is one of the most popular shows streaming, and the federal government just announced massive spending on artificial intelligence. The inspiration for "Dune: Prophecy" is in part a prophecy, of sorts, from 1872: One about humans becoming subservient to "thinking machines." What can a 150-year-old text teach us about the current AI revolution?

This content was originally created for audio. An auto-generated transcript is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Heads up that some elements (i.e. music, sound effects, tone) are harder to translate to text.

This episode was originally released on November 12, 2021.

If you typed “inauguration” into your web browser anytime between 2017 and 2020, you likely saw an image of a person in a neon green jacket, black winter hat and glasses screaming “Nooooooooooo!” That person was Jess, who was in Washington D.C. on January 20, 2017 to protest the inauguration of President Donald Trump.

This “Nooooooooooo!” flew out of Jess after the oath of office, during what seemed to be a deeply painful and private moment. But what Jess didn’t know at the time was that they were being filmed by a UK media outlet. Within hours, this became the scream heard ‘round the world, the meme seen ‘round the world, and a symbol of “liberal fragility” for Trump supporters. Fearing for their safety, Jess went into a sort of hiding – on social media, and in their personal life. Four years later, Jess told their story to Endless Thread.

We're revisiting this episode in advance of Donald Trump's second inauguration, just as the Internet has been resurfacing this poignant — and, for some, highly relatable — meme.

Credits:

Episode producer: Amory Sivertson

Co-hosts: Amory Sivertson and Ben Brock Johnson

Show producers: Dean Russell and Grace Tatter

Editor: Maureen McMurray

Mixer, sound designer and music creator: Paul Vaitkus

Additional production: Josh Crane, Frank Hernandez, Kristin Torres, Sofie Kodner and Rachel Carlson

Kashif Hoda was getting onto a Southbound train at Harvard Square when a young man approached him, saying he recognized Kashif. The young man seemed to prove it by referencing Kashif's work. But the doors closed before Kashif got a chance to ask the young man how, or who he was. A month later, the answer came in the form of a viral video.

Harvard students AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardefyio modified Meta's smart glasses so that you can search someone's face quickly, almost without them knowing, and read information about them scraped from around the web that they might no longer remember even exists. Think: pictures and articles from decades ago. Addresses. Voting records.

Are we prepared for a future where this tool goes mainstream?

Barry Enderwick got kicked out of college. Then, in the early aughts, he became the first graphic designer for a little start-up media company you may have heard of: Netflix. But today, the Internet knows Barry as the guy behind the beloved and wildly popular "Sandwiches of History" accounts, where he recreates historical sandwich recipes from old cookbooks and rates and reviews them.

He just released his first cookbook, "Sandwiches of History the Cookbook: All the Best (and Most Surprising) Things People Have Put Between Slices of Bread," and he's taking the show on the road, including a stop at WBUR CitySpace later this month.

But first, Barry joined Ben and Amory from his kitchen in the Bay Area to make the triple-decker sandwich that graces the cover of his debut cookbook, and to talk about how Sandwiches of History came to be. To quote Barry's signature phrase, we think you should give this episode "a GO!"

This episode originally aired on July 15, 2022

It all started as a simple question on AskReddit: "What is the weirdest thing you had to do at someone else’s house because of their culture/religion?” When a Redditor replied that he was expected to stay in his Swedish friend's bedroom while the friend ate dinner with his family, the internet exploded with hot takes. Seemingly everyone had an opinion about Sweden's apparent inhospitality in a worldwide uproar, now known as Swedengate. Is the reputation of Sweden forever tarnished? Or could the Scandinavian country use some teasing and meme-ing about a custom which is seemingly at odds with much of the rest of the world?

Or, has the dinner-that-wasn't shone a light on a more important, substantive conversation about what it means to be Swedish and whether that should be doubled-down on or reevaluated entirely.

This week on Endless Thread, we talk to the Redditor who started it all. Other central players of the Swedengate saga also join us, including the first person to use the Swedengate hashtag in connection with the controversy. Lastly, we delve into what Sweden's cultural norms reveal about the country's history, but also its reckoning with racism, nationalism, and xenophobia.

Jimmy Donaldson — AKA "MrBeast" — has taken YouTube by storm, racking up more than 330 million subscribers with his cleverly edited videos of stunts ranging from performative philanthropy to Fear Factor-esque challenges. He's also launched a burger chain, a chocolate and snack brand, and is currently working on a reality competition series with Amazon. At just 26 years old, MrBeast has built a brand valuated at $1.5 billion.

"Should we be outraged by his existence?," asks Ryan Broderick, creator of the newsletter Garbage Day and host of the new podcast Panic World. In this episode, Ryan tells Ben and Amory all about the awkward past, the controversial present, and the uncertain future of MrBeast.

The shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson captured the internet's attention last week. Then, a suspect, 26-year-old Luigi Mangione, was arrested, and social media really went wild. Why, in a week of historic headlines from around the world, did this story captivate so many, so thoroughly?

Anyone who has been a kid before knows that there are few joys in life like finding a really cool stick.

That is the basis of Official Stick Reviews, a viral account on Instagram that has amassed 2.5 million followers in just a year and a half.

But what is it about sticks that inspires this universal enthusiasm? In this episode, Amory and Ben join producer Frannie Monahan for a walk in the woods to look for answers, and some sticks of their own.