This is the story of Tollund Man, found in a peat bog in Denmark in 1950. He was in remarkable condition given that he had died 2,300 years previously – his face wearing a cryptic half-smile, much of the rest of his body intact, and a noose tied tight around his neck.
A profile of Jane Jacobs, a writer and urban planning activist, that lauds her “clear-eyed vision of humanity”.
An account of the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian spy killed in London ten years ago – a story of incompetence, intrigue, criminality and authoritarianism. It’s worth listening to the audio too.
A longform look at machine learning and where Google have taken it since their acquisition of the British artificial intelligence company Deep Mind.
An article that looks at how deep the special effects industry’s abilities run in changing the way that film and TV stars appear. Beyond simply documenting how this industry works, the piece raises some questions about what viewers actually want – reality or artifice?
A piece tracing Bashar al-Assad’s journey towards ever-greater tyranny.
Looking at mushroom foraging around the world, and the extraordinary lengths people go to secure valuable or rare varieties.
A poacher turned gamekeeper hacker acts as a guide to the clandestine world of the dark net, a home for all sorts of illegal trade.
An article asserting that a religious organisation counting Japanese premier Shinzo Abe amongst its members is asserting its influence and may be looking to take Japan in a radically different direction.
A issue with the internet’s mechanism for identifying device locations led to millions of devices being incorrectly located in an American couple’s front garden. A funny glitch surely? Perhaps, until the FBI show up.