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474 afleveringen, van nieuw naar oud
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Coming October 1st... MEMES!
23 september 2021 · 3 min
On October 1st, Endless Thread is back. We're kicking things off with a deep exploration into something that has changed lives, politics, and the way we interact online and IRL... memes!
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Snacktime: Why You Should Care About Other People
17 september 2021 · 18 min
Ben tells Amory about a controversial idea for a reality TV show. Amory tells Ben about the thing Dr. Anthony Fauci did NOT say... but everyone thinks he did.
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Snacktime: Mystery Celebs & Fed-Up Mods
28 augustus 2021 · 22 min
Ben tells Amory about a subreddit trying to determine the identity of a mystery celebrity, and Amory tells Ben about an open letter penned by Reddit moderators that's calling on the platform to take stronger action against COVID-19 misinformation and disinformation on the platform. Lees meer
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Suitcases of Cash and Bob Saget's Ghost
19 augustus 2021 · 14 min
Gather round for this week’s Snacktime episode, where Ben tells iLab producer Nora Saks two stories about found money, a gambling ruse in a Belizean casino, and why Bob Saget would block himself on Twitter if he could.
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Geedis
5 augustus 2021 · 44 min
What is Geedis? Endless Thread revisits an episode from 2019 in which the team joined the internet's two-year-long quest to answer this question. The strange, furry character and his buddies in The Land of Ta had been a mystery of 80’s fantastical proportions. Follow us down the rabbit hole for an exciting discovery... Lees meer
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Snacktime: Weird Spotify Playlists
22 juli 2021 · 22 min
Fun fact: Ben wooed his wife with a mix CD, and Amory's husband wooed her with a mix CD. The lesson? Never underestimate the power of a good playlist. But if it's a "Weird Spotify Playlist," the object of your affection better have a sense of humor. In this episode, Amory introduces Ben to the fast-growing "Weird Spotify Playlists" Twitter account and subreddit, where song titles are way more important than the songs themselves. Lees meer
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Encore: The Great Glitter Mystery
8 juli 2021 · 40 min
Much like rewatching a favorite TV show in its entirety, it can be comforting to listen back to something from "the beforetimes." So this week, we're doing just that. We're revisiting an episode from 2019 that solved one of the internet’s most compelling mysteries. Inspired by a 2018 New York Times feature about glitter, people obsessed over identifying the mysterious industry buying huge amounts of glitter – information which glitter-makers have refused to divulge. No one had been able to find any answers … until the ET team took the case and dropped a glitter bomb on the whole mystery. Lees meer
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Snacktime: To Joust Is No Jest
24 juni 2021 · 21 min
Ever heard of horse repossession? How about equine semen fraud? On this week’s Snacktime, Ben tells Amory about the still-very-much-alive sport of jousting and how it relates to a pretty wild story about a Redditor’s ex and a snowy white steed.
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Endless Thread Presents: Twenty Thousand Hertz
17 juni 2021 · 24 min
Is your voice your own? Not anymore. This week on Endless Thread, we present "Deepfake Dallas," courtesy of our friends over at Twenty Thousand Hertz, a podcast revealing the stories behind the world’s most recognizable and interesting sounds. Find out how someone, using artificial intelligence, can make an algorithm that sounds just like you. Lees meer
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Snacktime: Long Orders, Secret Menus
3 juni 2021 · 17 min
One of the things that makes Starbucks so liked by people everywhere is the amount of customization you can do with your drink. But is there such a thing as too much customization? On this week's Snacktime, Amory tells Ben about the viral "Edward" order as well as the recent TikTok trend of ordering a drink from Starbucks' "secret menu." Lees meer
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Snacktime: A Refreshing Trend for Troubled Times
21 mei 2021 · 21 min
From daily walks to sourdough starters, many of us found new ways to have fun and stay sane during the pandemic. For some, a new trend has plenty of... appeal. Lees meer
In this Snacktime episode, Ben tells Amory about an internet trend mixing personal hygiene and your daily dose of Vitamin C. Then, listen to the story of how one Reddit user's overthinking ended up being just the right amount.
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Snacktime: Pizza Is My Life
6 mei 2021 · 30 min
In 2008, college student Kevin Toomey was cruising around Columbus, Ohio, listening to AM radio, when a jingle for Rotolo's Pizza came on. It was love at first listen, and it set him on a 13-year quest to find out who wrote and performed the jingle. In this Snacktime episode, Amory tells Ben about Kevin and his pizza jingle quest, which -- finally -- has a delicious conclusion. Lees meer
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Endless Thread Presents: Cautionary Tales
22 april 2021 · 39 min
Today's episode brings together three of our favorite things: mysteries, cultural deep-dives, and Dungeons & Dragons. It's an episode of Cautionary Tales, a podcast from Pushkin that tells stories of awful human error, tragic catastrophes, daring heists and hilarious fiascos of the past -- pointing out valuable lessons for us from all the dithering, death and destruction. Lees meer
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Snacktime: Passports and Space Trains
9 april 2021 · 21 min
In this Snacktime episode, Ben and Amory talk about vaccine passports in Texas and the out-of-this-world contents of a mysterious box.
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Snacktime: The Cebu Swiper
30 maart 2021 · 23 min
In this Snacktime episode, we explore a post made on r/HobbyDrama about how some local plant-trading Facebook groups have had their wholesome hobby corrupted by an alleged scammer.
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Snacktime: War and Crows
25 februari 2021 · 21 min
We're cooking up a new season of Endless Thread as we speak, dear listeners. But in the meantime, we realized we could probably all use a snack to hold us over. In this episode, we hear about a Redditor who created a fake press pass and found himself in a war zone, and another who accidentally assembled an army of crows. Lees meer
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Stonktime: r/WallStreetBets And GameStop
29 januari 2021 · 41 min
The subreddit r/WallStreetBets has been at the center of a national story this week involving GameStop and a couple of angry hedge funds. To help us understand what’s happening, we call up Planet Money co-host Robert Smith. Then, we speak to Redditor u/Hungry_Freaks-Daddy who hopped on board the GameStop train earlier this week and says he has nothing to lose. Lees meer
Support Endless Thread: wbur.org/socks
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Endless Thread Presents: Anything For Selena
19 januari 2021 · 32 min
Today, we present episode one of Anything for Selena, a new podcast from WBUR and Futuro Studios. Lees meer
Growing up along the US-Mexico border, Maria Garcia felt torn between her two identities as Mexican and American. But then, something changed her life. She discovered Selena — the Mexican-American pop icon who proved she didn’t have to choose. In the premiere episode of “Anything for Selena,” host Maria Garcia explores how Selena helped Maria find her own place in the world.
About The Show:
In "Anything For Selena," Host Maria Garcia takes listeners on a deeply personal journey into the life and legacy of the Mexican-American popstar Selena Quintanilla. She shares how Selena's music and unapologetic sense of identity helped her find her own place in the world. And it explores how Selena's legacy continues to spark important conversations around race, class, and body politics.
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Update: Things Are (Still) Bad
12 januari 2021 · 22 min
In the aftermath of a violent mob storming the U.S. Capitol building, we got back in touch with Indi Samarajiva. Indi's a writer who lived through the end of the Sri Lankan civil war, and he was featured in "Things Are Bad," an episode we released last October in the weeks leading up to the 2020 presidential election. Lees meer
The team caught up with Indi again to ask him about his thoughts on last week's events.
Donate now: wbur.org/socks
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A Special Announcement
8 januari 2021 · 4 min
Endless Thread is currently on break cooking up our next season, but we're getting back in touch with a special announcement. Lees meer
Donate Now: wbur.org/socks
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Endless Thread Presents: Decoder Ring
17 december 2020 · 46 min
While we're on break working on a new season, we recommend checking out Decoder Ring. In each episode, Decoder Ring explores a cultural question, object, or habit; examines its history; and tries to figure out what it means and why it matters. Today we're presenting one of their recent episodes: "Mystery of the Mullet." Lees meer
The mullet, the love-to-hate-it hairstyle is as associated with the 1980s as Ronald Reagan, junk bonds, and break dancing. But in at least one major way, we are suffering from a collective case of false memory syndrome. In this episode, the Decoder Ring team tracks the rise and fall of the mullet, and also the lexical quandary at its heart: who named the mullet?
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Encore: Black Lives Matter IRL And Online
10 december 2020 · 30 min
Endless Thread is on break so we're sharing one of our favorite episodes from the past year. We published it back on Juneteenth 2020 after asking for stories that caught our listeners' attention at the height of the George Floyd and Breonna Taylor police brutality protests around the country. The episode was recently included in a roundup of “100 Outstanding Podcasts From 2020” from The Bello Collective. Lees meer
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A Trip Down Memory Lane
4 december 2020 · 36 min
It's that time of the year again: Endless Thread is going on a winter break. But don't miss us too much. We'll be back in 2021 with a fresh, new, weird, and wonderful version of the show. Before we say goodbye for now, we check in with some of our favorite guests of episodes past. Lees meer
Episodes updated include:
Get Motivated: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2019/01/11/get-motivated
Infectious, Pt 1: Scabs, Pus, and Puritans: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2019/05/03/scabs-pus-puritans
Brain Melt: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2018/11/09/brain-melt
Nick, Jess, and David: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2019/12/20/autistic-redditors-explain-autism
Shipwrecked: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2019/06/14/shipwrecked
Dear Anon: https://www.wbur.org/endlessthread/2018/11/16/dear-anon
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Encore: All You Can Eat... And Then Some (Updates!)
27 november 2020 · 42 min
Chicken patrol. Tiny plates. Purses lined with plastic bags. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, Endless Thread re-releases "All You Can Eat," an episode that peeks behind the curtain of the strange world of all-you-can-eat buffets, from the strategies buffet owners use to protect their profits to the hungry customers who try to game the system. Listen until the end for an update with Jordan, the Redditor and restaurant consultant featured in the original episode, to hear an insider's perspective on how the pandemic is changing the food industry. Lees meer
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Niall Needs A Friend
20 november 2020 · 36 min
A month ago, we received an email that really caught our attention. It was from a listener in Ireland named Niall, who has been feeling isolated during the pandemic. He was wondering if we could help him make some new friends. So... the Endless Thread team got to work. Lees meer
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Today You, Tomorrow Me
13 november 2020 · 22 min
10 years ago, Justin found himself on the side of the road with a blown out tire. Hours went by and no one stopped to help. But just as he was about to give up, something happened that changed Justin forever.
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Low Stakes Hot Takes
6 november 2020 · 25 min
We all have that one opinion — that firmly held, low stakes, non-political belief. You know the one. It's usually met with (low stakes) outrage whenever you dare to say it out loud. Well, we asked you, our listeners, to share your low stakes hot takes with us and, oh boy, did you deliver. Lees meer
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Endless Dread: An Uninvited House Guest And A Fake Doctor
29 oktober 2020 · 19 min
Ben and Amory swap terrifying tales from Reddit, featuring an uninvited house guest and a doctor with an unusual fetish. Happy Halloween!
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Bonus: 'Brainwashed'
28 oktober 2020 · 26 min
This past Spring, Endless Thread released a series called “Madness: The Secret Mission for Mind Control and the People Who Paid the Price.” If you missed it, you should go back and listen! Lees meer
A new series from CBC Podcasts, "Brainwashed," offers fresh perspective on the same topic: a powerful doctor who conducted disturbing, CIA-funded mind-control experiments on patients at a prestigious psychiatric hospital in Montreal.
We recently talked to the host of "Brainwashed," Michelle Shepherd, for this bonus episode. We wanted to compare notes with another reporter who has gone deep on this story and swap takeaways.
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Things Are Bad
23 oktober 2020 · 30 min
With increasing political divide and heightened civil unrest in the United States, many fear that it will culminate in a second civil war. We explore the likelihood of that scenario and hear from someone who thinks America is already in the midst of collapse. Lees meer
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Endless Dread: Backrooms And Ghostly Photos
15 oktober 2020 · 21 min
In the spirit of Halloween, the Endless Thread team shares spooky stories from Reddit, including the origins of a classic horror movie SFX, the creepy world of r/backrooms, and the mystery surrounding three photos found on someone’s phone.
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Girls Trip
9 oktober 2020 · 24 min
Randi-Lynn thought she was going on a relaxing family vacation to the mountains. Just a few days later, she was hiding in a bathroom and frantically posting on Reddit, asking for help. The headline of her post? "I think I was brought on a girls trip to be brainwashed." Lees meer
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QAnon Casualties
2 oktober 2020 · 29 min
For nearly two years, a Redditor named Jitarth Jadeja got deep into QAnon, the Far Right conspiracy theory founded on the idea that President Trump is secretly waging war against a satanic cabal of pedophiles who control the world. “I was kind of an addict… All I could talk about was Q,” Jitarth says. But then, all of a sudden he had a (re)awakening: “That was the moment that I realized it was all garbage.” Lees meer
In this episode, we trace Jitarth’s journey into and, ultimately, out of, QAnon.
Background:
QAnon originated as a fringe online conspiracy theory born in the aftermath of the 2016 election. Since then, it has grown in influence and keeps creeping further into mainstream consciousness. It’s come up in recent White House press briefings and there are current congressional candidates promoting QAnon messages. Q followers have also been linked to murders, armed stand-offs, and kidnappings.
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Snacktime: Spiders Are Bros
24 september 2020 · 14 min
Spiders... even the word is unsettling for some of us. But the r/spiderbro community on Reddit is a place where you just might gain a new appreciation for arachnids -- from the petite and unassuming, to the big and hairy.
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Unsent Letters
18 september 2020 · 29 min
The unsent letter. We all have one, half-composed in our heads or fully-formed as an email draft. If you’re really poetic, it might be on a piece of paper, yellowing in a drawer. Whatever form these letters take, they go unsent because they might be better left unsent... or because we wouldn’t know how to send them even if we wanted to. Lees meer
But there's a place online where these letters find an audience -- a big one. The "Unsent Letters" community on Reddit has over 350,000 members. In this episode, you'll hear from people who wrote letters addressing pet owners, COVID+ patients, bakery workers, bugs killed in the shower, and so much more.
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Snacktime: Odd Jobs
11 september 2020 · 15 min
Do people say, "That's a thing??," when you tell them what you do for a living? Then you probably have an odd job. This week, Endless Thread tips its hat to you as we discuss the odd jobs of Redditors.
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Tight Squeeze
3 september 2020 · 32 min
You might not think about caves in the same breath as you do the deep ocean or outer space, but you probably should. There are approximately 70,000 caves in the United States alone, but the vast majority are inaccessible to the public. That means rare, delicate ecosystems have developed for tens of thousands of years in complete isolation from human contact. That is, until cavers travel deep underground through impossibly small spaces to find them. Join the Endless Thread team as we dive into the claustrophobia-inducing world of caving. Lees meer
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Snacktime: Dad Jokes
28 augustus 2020 · 23 min
The spotlight is on r/DadJokes, which -- you guessed it -- is home to the most pun-derful, cheesy-but-lovable comedic material the internet has to offer. Starring the experts: Ben & Amory's DADS!
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Angel's Glow
21 augustus 2020 · 28 min
In the aftermath of the Civil War's Battle of Shiloh in 1862, something strange happened. Some soldiers' wounds started to glow. Stranger still, those with glowing wounds seemed to have better rates of survival. In 2001, a teenage Civil War buff embarked on a science project to explain this so-called "Angel's Glow." Lees meer
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Snacktime: Zelda And Zebra Plants
14 augustus 2020 · 14 min
Author John Boyne and Jeff the zebra plant take center stage in this edition of snacktime. Also, Ben and Amory realize they share an affinity for... melon ballers?
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Ghost Town
7 augustus 2020 · 30 min
In the summer of 2018, Brent Underwood got a text in the middle of the night from a friend saying, "Look at this ghost town for sale!" Within a month, Brent had purchased Cerro Gordo, California, an abandoned silver mining town, with the help of friends and investors. He wants to revive the town for visitors while preserving its history. He's already faced some major setbacks -- from the lack of running water, to getting snowed in there during a global pandemic. But he calls Cerro Gordo his "life's work." Lees meer
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Snacktime: Harry Potter, Billie Eilish, And 'Soup Tubes'
30 juli 2020 · 15 min
Ben, Amory, and Josh share some of the most memorable Reddit posts of late, from a "magical" parenting decision to a very bizarre business idea.
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Randonauts
23 juli 2020 · 35 min
r/randonauts is a fast-growing community of Redditors who use random, quantum-generated coordinates to go on real-life adventures. But what happens when those random coordinates lead you straight to a grisly crime scene?
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Snacktime: Llama At A Wedding
17 juli 2020 · 18 min
“What are the dimensions of an adult llama?” asked a Redditor called Mrs. Sam Handwich in the "No Stupid Questions" community. "I've been hired to make a tuxedo for a llama and I don't have its measurements," she added. We get to the bottom of this now-famous Reddit post. Lees meer
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Giddyup
9 juli 2020 · 28 min
Images of Black men and women riding horses at protests around the country have been going viral. But the history of Black cowboys goes all the way back to the creation of the American West. The Endless Thread team digs into this history, and looks at how Black riding groups are carrying this legacy forward today. Lees meer
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Encore: We Want Plates + Pile Of Crockery
2 juli 2020 · 1 uur 10 min
Endless Thread is re-releasing a crown jewel from the archives. It's the team's epic adventure to locate a mountain of dishware in the middle of the woods and, truly, it's even more ridiculous than it sounds. Originally released as a two-part story almost exactly one year ago, we've re-edited it into one jumbo "combination platter" for your listening pleasure. So sit back, relax, and dig in! Lees meer
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Shrinkflation
25 juni 2020 · 29 min
From the supermarket to the housing market, products are getting smaller but prices are not. Why is this happening? And can it be stopped before the toilet paper roll disappears right before our very… reaching hands?
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Black Lives Matter IRL And Online
18 juni 2020 · 29 min
Over the last few weeks, Endless Thread has been asking for stories that have caught your attention as millions of people around the country and around the world have come together to protest systemic racism and police brutality. Today, Juneteenth 2020, we present some of those stories. Lees meer
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Bonus: Making 'Madness'
11 juni 2020 · 25 min
"Madness," our 5-part series about the history of CIA-funded mind-control experiments, involved a lot of research and a lot of interviews -- most of which you heard excerpts from in the series, but some of which… you didn’t. Or, at least, not everything we wanted to share. In this bonus episode, we play highlights from the cutting room floor, answer listener questions, and share more about the making of this series. Lees meer
If you haven't heard Parts 1 through 5 of "Madness" you should listen to those episodes first.
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You can make a donation to Endless Thread and WBUR at the link below. All monthly contributors will continue receiving special Endless Thread bonus material:
https://secure.givelively.org/donate/trustees-of-boston-university/endless-thread-madness-fundraiser -
Endless Thread Presents: Truth Be Told
4 juni 2020 · 37 min
The Endless Thread team has been watching as protests and police brutality have broken out in cities around the country, and around the world. We are working on covering these events thoughtfully and carefully. If you have a story or perspective you want to share, reach out to us at endlessthread@wbur.org. Lees meer
In the meantime, instead of our regular programming, we’d like to play you an episode of the KQED podcast, Truth Be Told. It’s hosted by one of our colleagues, Tonya Mosley, the co-host of WBUR and NPR’s Here and Now, and their episode from this week is called “Protesting for the Soul of America: The New Civil Rights Movement.”
Take a listen.