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Who Was Lonelygirl15?
In the summer of 2006, a teenage girl began posting video diaries to a then-new site called YouTube under the handle lonelygirl15. Within weeks she w…
11 hours ago
The Johnlock Conspiracy (Encore)
For over a century, fans of Sherlock Holmes have been analyzing, debating, and creating new texts with Arthur Conan Doyle’s characters. But when a fa…
2 weeks ago
Was "Eyes Wide Shut" a Warning?
When Eyes Wide Shut opened in the summer of 1999, it was widely considered a disappointment. This final film from legendary director Stanley Kubrick …
4 weeks ago
A Prune by Any Other Name
The delicious, healthful prune has long had a cross to bear: It’s best known for making people poop. In the late 1990s, the California Prune Board se…
1 month, 2 weeks ago
Making Coal Cute Again
Three weeks ago, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum shared an unusual tweet: a cartoon image of himself with his arm draped around a giant, a…
1 month, 4 weeks ago
Is Culture Stuck?
It’s a weird time for culture. There is more of it than ever before, it’s more accessible than ever before, but so little of it feels original. New m…
2 months, 1 week ago
Decoder Rings Back | Why the Mona Lisa?
We are really lucky to get lots of listener suggestions for the show, more good questions than we can possibly answer in a mailbag episode once or tw…
2 months, 3 weeks ago
A New Year’s Message from Willa
We can’t make this show without you, our listeners. Today, you can help support Decoder Ring – and get a really good deal. To join Slate Plus for jus…
3 months, 1 week ago
A New Year’s Message from Willa
We can’t make this show without you, our listeners. Today, you can help support Decoder Ring – and get a really good deal. To join Slate Plus for jus…
3 months, 1 week ago
Mailbag: Yo-Yos, Sandboxes, and Encores
Decoder Ring listeners write in with some excellent mysteries, and for our last episode of the year we’re solving three of them. Why do children play…
3 months, 3 weeks ago