Endless Thread
by WBUR
Latest episode
Catfishing, Airbnb fraud, and other Deep Dreams about catching…
Catfishing, Airbnb fraud, and other Deep Dreams about catching…
About this podcast
Untold histories, unsolved mysteries, and other jaw-dropping stories online and IRL. Hosted by Ben Brock Johnson & Amory Sivertson.
Episodes
The newest 50 of 477 episodes
- Catfishing, Airbnb fraud, and other Deep Dreams about catching computer fakes · 28 minWhat do you do when the uncanny valley of detecting deep fakes and other AI-generated imagery becomes harder and harder? As the flood of slop rises towards our collective…
- She was a ChatGPT skeptic. Then her parents died. · 32 minIn 2024, Bridget Todd was facing down the hardest chapter of her life. Her father was rushed to the ICU after having a stroke. Then, a few days later, Bridget's mom died without…
- Gather 'round the campfire: Endless Dread 2026 · 34 minEvery year, the Endless Thread team convenes around a campfire to freak each other out with the scariest stories they can find on the web. This Halloweekend, Ben Brock Johnson…
- Endless Dread: The Mysterious Lagoon · 35 minLagoa Misteriosa, or Mysterious Lagoon, is located near the small Brazilian city of Jardim. Surrounded by lush jungle, the surface of the lagoon looks like azurite — still as…
- ChatGPT's human editors · 25 minUp to a billion people use ChatGPT every week, for everything from the mundane to the weird to the deeply personal. It is commonly assumed that these messages are private –…
- Remembering Brooke Eby · 33 min"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…
- Mixed signals: Nextdoor villains and the holiday you've never heard of · 25 minThe internet is the great connector. Talk with nearly anyone at any time about anything. But that kind of freedom can lead to misunderstandings. Maybe your neighbors discover…
- The Haruhi problem · 16 minGet out your graphing calculators, because today's episode of Endless Thread is about a math problem. Specifically: wt(π1, . . . , πm) = m−1 ∑ i=1 wt(πi , πi+1) Now, pencils…
- Keeping the Lights on at a Video Game Cafe in Southern Yemen · 33 minMo lives in Aden, an ancient city in southern Yemen. Built on a volcanic crater, it has castles and beaches set against mountains. It's beautiful. Like the rest of the country…
- Ear rumblers assemble! · 29 minBen can make a roaring, rumbling sound with his ears that no one else can hear. He never thought much about it — whether only he could do this, or whether everyone could do this…
- Encore: Owl pursuits · 25 minThis episode was originally published on March 10, 2023. In 2022, freshmen at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill got a new neighbor: an owl. What wasn't clear was…
- Emily Kwong takes us to science camp · 26 minGrab your telescopes because this week on Endless Thread Ben and NPR Short Wave host Emily Kwong take us down two science-related internet wormholes. First, Emily introduces us…
- 'Turn Bluetooth off, or we're turning around.' · 28 minThe 190 passengers of a United Airlines flight from Newark, New Jersey to Palma de Mallorca, Spain had settled into their seats for their overnight flight when the captain gave…
- Fruit of the Loom: Horn of Lies · 45 minThe brand Fruit of the Loom is almost ubiquitous in the world of underwear and casual wear. You have likely seen its logo, if not on your own body, on store racks or at least in…
- The internet is a perpetual stew · 29 minThis week on Endless Thread it's a producer takeover with Grace Tatter and Kalyani Saxena serving up some delicious online stories. First, Kalyani digs into why the internet is…
- Teach us how to Dougie · 24 minLong before TikTok dances, there was the Dougie. In 2010, Cali Swag District’s “Teach Me How to Dougie” went worldwide, and for the decade-plus since, people have been trying to…
- The Lost Loophole · 35 minKurt Gödel was a genius mathematician and logician, considered by many scholars to be as influential as Aristotle. He was also buddies with fellow geniuses Albert Einstein and…
- How to Dim the Sun, from Marketplace's How We Survive · 38 minThe climate crisis is escalating. We have to decarbonize our economy, but we’re moving too slowly. So, what’s the backup plan? This season of How We Survive is about engineering…
- Socials for Sale · 31 minMost of us know the internet isn't a particularly private place. Yet there's a certain feeling of anonymity that comes with sharing online — our words and stories mixed in with…
- Encore: Adrián and the Whale · 25 minThis episode was originally published on March 21, 2025. There are moments that define each of our lives. Some we can predict: graduations, marriages, births, deaths. Others?…
- Comfort maxxing on the interwebs · 25 minSit back, relax and get cozy. As a matter of fact, why not put on your baggiest of clothes and burrow down in your snuggiest of blankets? This week on Endless Thread, Ben and…
- Back to the Backrooms! · 23 minOnce upon a dimly lit hallway, Ben and Amory stumbled onto a beloved brainchild of the internet: Backrooms. It began as a "creepypasta"— a horror story or concept that originates…
- Endless Thread on OnlyFans · 37 minJournalist Leon Neyfakh — known for the podcasts Slow Burn, Fiasco, and Backfired — wanted to know more about the massively popular and sprawling online ecosystem of OnlyFans…
- Leave a message after the beep · 25 minJeremy Rellosa used to watch TV shows and movies from the '90s and revel in how the characters walked around untethered to a smartphone, with no expectations of constant…
- The Church of Speedrun! · 26 minTry reading this description as fast as you can: Ben and Amory zoom through two internet stories connected to speed running, including a look at a mysterious object on Reddit and…
- Endless Egg · 24 minSome Internet trends are temporary, but eggs are forever. Today, host Ben Brock Johnson serves up a story about a recipe that, according to the people of r/pickled, can't be…
- Manifesting an online rom-com existence · 27 minOf all the internet communities in all the world, you walked into ours. Hosts Ben and Amory pay homage to the magic of chance encounters with producer Grace Tatter. Together…
- Ben Palmer's Brain · 25 minComedian Ben Palmer set up a fake tip line for reporting immigrants in the United States suspected of not having legal status. He recorded the conversations, and things... got…
- Endless Thread presents "The Midnight Rebellion" · 21 minIntroducing The Midnight Rebellion, a new climate fiction podcast from WBUR — a rollicking adventure to a flooded, robot-infested world where you choose what happens. When Joule…
- Extraordinary vs. Extra Ordinary · 29 minBen and Amory take a hike with producer Grace, following the digital trail of "Ridiculoubs" — a mysterious climber who traverses the world's peaks in striking footwear. Then…
- Close Encounters of the Hexagonal Kind · 33 minEndless Thread goes to space! First, host Ben Brock Johnson goes deep on radio signals of unknown origin, with an assist from real-life radio astronomer and Reddit MVP Yvette…
- A Beige New World · 28 minWhat's your favorite color? If you ask the algorithm, the answer is probably beige. The internet loves neutrals. Aesthetic coffee shop videos feature white walls and minimalist…
- How Afroman turned lemons into lemon pound cake · 21 minWhen you think of rapper Afroman, chances are his early 2000s hit song "Because I Got High" is already playing in your mind. More than two decades later, his music has once again…
- Rewind: Digging Deep with TikTok's "tunnel girl" · 29 minIn this throwback from the Endless Thread archives, hosts Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson revisit an episode from 2024. In 2022, a TikTok creator who identifies herself as…
- Beautiful, Terrible Internet · 29 minWarning: This episode contains multitudes! Hosts Ben and Amory explore how viral clips of DOGE staffers' video depositions found a new life online after a judge temporarily…
- Sexy spines or literary red flags? · 25 minMaybe you can't judge books by their covers. But can you judge people by their books? Reddit's bookshelf detectives say yes. Producer Kalyani Saxena guides hosts Ben and Amory…
- Digging Up Lily's Garden · 31 minA woman sitting blissfully on a vibrating laundromat dryer. A faked pregnancy test to dump a bad boyfriend. In 2019, the internet was abuzz about bizarre ads for a mobile game…
- What it's like to be undressed by Grok without your consent · 31 minNote: This episode describes sexual situations that are non-consensual. Sharing a photo of yourself online has always carried some risk. But things got a lot scarier this year…
- Obscure music is good and nice! · 25 minSome rare folks are born with the perfect music taste. But most of us have to look elsewhere for a tune that sparks a shoulder shimmy or two. Hosts Ben and Amory spend some time…
- Fresh, stale, or politics? The Melania doc's Rotten Tomatoes score, explained · 25 minMelania, a documentary about the first lady, has a 10 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes from critics, but a 90 percent score from audience members, an unusual discrepancy that…
- Rewind: Love In Transition · 33 minIn this OG throwback from the Endless Thread archives, hosts Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson revisit a classic episode from their first year of production in 2018…
- You're Wrong About the Satanic Panic · 24 minIn the 1980s, a moral panic swept across America. Parents, prosecutors, and talk show hosts became convinced that devil worshippers were hiding in plain sight, abusing children…
- Hot (and not) fruit takes · 21 minWhat temperature do you like your fruit? What is the correct way to peel a banana? This week on Endless Thread, Ben and Amory cherry pick a couple of the hottest fruit debates…
- The Alpha Male Myth · 26 minIn 1970, a young biologist named David Mech published what could be the most consequential book on wolves ever written. At the time, The Wolf: The Ecology and Behavior of an…
- The Anvillain · 28 minFast-and-cheap shipping is now foundational to the American way of life, thanks in large part to Amazon Prime. Still, when producer Grace Tatter sees a video of a man claiming…
- Algospeak · 26 minAdam Aleksic's Roman Empire is language, particularly how algorithms are changing the way we all use words. This week, Endless Thread gets algospeak-pilled and learns how…
- Rewind: Today You, Tomorrow Me: Why A Decade-Old Reddit Comment Still Resonates Today · 24 min10 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…
- Encore: Never Gonna Give You Up · 44 minWho gets credit for starting a meme? Usually... nobody — they're made too quickly and organically. In the case of one of the most famous bait-and-switch memes of all time, the…
- Lost Without You · 33 min2025 marks 20 years of Google Maps — a tool that many of us would be, quite literally, lost without. We hear from New Orleanians who used Google Maps/Google Earth in its…
- Ukraine's expanding drone web · 39 minThere's a lot of drone warfare footage on the internet from Ukraine and Russia. But over the last year, a surprising change has emerged, via photos from the battlefront posted…
