Shoelaces 101

The mathematically correct way to tie your shoes

Tying shoelaces involves three important decisions that determine whether a good knot (reef knot) or a bad knot (granny knot) is formed. The first decision is to criss-cross and tuck the laces, either with the left lace over the right or the right...

Watch Bill Nye discuss biomechanics and sustainability while shopping for sneakers

While exploring sneaker history and technology, Nye covers the science of structural design, air bubbles and materials, including algae foam. He once voiced a 20-minute guided run on the Nike Run Club app.

Why Men's Legs Were Everything

From codpieces to cotton hose, here's the surprisingly loaded history of men's legs, and why 18th-century Europe couldn't stop staring at them.

Many startups now have shoes-off policies

This website keeps track of startups with "no-shoes" offices so you can browse a list of barefoot companies—plus, see which of them are hiring.

Wind energy 101

Learn more about the wind industry, from how a wind turbine works, to the new and exciting research in the field of wind energy.

The science of springtime, 101

Dive into the basics on springtime including the astronomy that brings it about, natural signs of spring's arrival, and some of the cultural approaches to the season.

40 key stock market terms, explained

Liquidity. Forex. Capitalization. Blue chip stocks. These are just a few pieces of stock market vocabulary most people who don't spend all day on a trading floor might not know. Thankfully, we found a fun infographic that makes it easier to learn what 40 key stock market terms mean and why each of them matters.

A historical tree of technological advancement

Starting from stone tools millions of years ago and culminating in today's cutting-edge tech, this thorough genealogy lays out how humanity has progressed in its use of tools over thousands of years. See descriptions, links to further info, and how each tech fits in the larger tree.

Drugs 101: An interactive guide

What's the difference between opioids and psychedelics? This guide details specific drugs and their various associated effects. Drugs in this wheel fall into seven categories: stimulants, depressants, empathogens, psychedelics, dissociatives, cannabinoids, and opioids.

The internet explained at five levels of difficulty, from protocols to internet flattening

Resembling a roadway with traffic laws that all cars must follow, the internet is the hardware that connects a source to a destination, and these connections must follow specific software rules. Although data had to travel through about 10 networks to reach a destination in the past, data centers increasingly consolidate traffic, just as a highway does for cars, to improve data speeds.

A list of one guy's hundreds of fortune cookie fortunes

Simple idea: Eat lots of Chinese food, collect wisdom in the form of fortunes. Josh Madison held onto hundreds of these and lists them here, noting the ones he received more than once with a number.

An encyclopedia of anthropology

This online database offers articles and additional resources for all things anthropology. This free resource is filled with peer-reviewed entries that cover topics ranging from addiction to writing, and offers anthropological insight into more...

The original basketball was hand-sewn

When the first basketball landed in a peach basket in 1891, it didn't look like the leather Wilson ball you see on today's NBA courts. The basketball evolved from the nondribbling days, when a hand-sewn ball with stitching like a football was used.

Election 101 podcast

What’s actually at stake when someone casts their vote in a US election? CNN’s “Election 101” podcast series provides ten episodes summarizing some of the basics of democratic elections. The ins and outs of voting are highlighted in 15-minute episodes on voter registration and voting by mail. Additional segments highlight how the electoral system works, how ballots are counted, the Electoral College, why it takes so long to get election results, and more.

A world-famous barista's primer on coffee appreciation

If you think you can tell good coffee from bad but don’t know how to put the distinction into words, world-famous barista Nicole Battefeld-Montgomery is here to help. Her instructions for breaking down a cup of coffee rivals any sommelier’s wine-tasting guide.

1440: The National Football League

Explore the best resources we found on the NFL

How the Inca used threads to communicate

One of the great mysteries of ancient Peru is that the Inca did not have a system of writing, but communicated with a system of strings tied with knots. This 4-minute video explores its possible uses.

Explore features to customize your Facebook viewing experience

From prioritizing best friends and filtering what appears in the News Feed to viewing the digital history between you and anyone you're friends with, check out this list of shortcuts, features, tips, and tricks.

Lighting the menorah is viewed as the most important Hanukkah ritual

This short video guides viewers through the process, from the supplies required to the order in which the candles are lit. It also covers the prayers that are recited nightly and associated blessings for each individual night.

How do genetics work?

Perhaps you have your mother’s hair or your grandfather’s eyes. How did you get these traits and not others? Learn how genetics work in this online video game.

Learn about 12 basic yoga postures

A typical yoga class runs students through a sequence of basic postures, also known as asanas. This illustrated guide outlines 12 poses—including the “plough,” “fish,” and “crow”—and breaks down the specific benefits.

Watch how algorithms can be designed to train themselves and self-improve without human input, to the point where the optimized code is too complex for programmers to understand.

Wikipedia edit wars often reflect a strong commitment to accuracy between editors

Battles over grammar and capitalization, names and nationalities, and British versus American spellings of words have taken place due to the collaborative editing nature of the site. The most seemingly trivial debates are catalogued on the site's "Lamest edit wars" page.

Conditioners can help unshrink garments by lubricating fibers

Textile fibers relax and shrink due to heat and moisture, disrupting hydrogen bonds. While loosely knitted fabrics are more prone to shrinkage than tightly woven ones, synthetic fibres like polyester resist shrinkage due to their crystalline structure.

Practice encrypting and decrypting text using an online library of ciphers

This tool provides users with customizable protocols, including Caesar, Affine, and Vigenère ciphers, to hide messages in transformed text and convert them back into legible formats. Mechanisms are also available to convert text into other communication languages, such as Morse code and URL encoding.

OSINT: How hackers find their marks

What is OSINT? How do hackers gather intel about targets? Just how much can they learn about you? Learn more as we dig in to the world of OSINT.

See how each of the more than two million known species relates to each other—and to common ancestors—in this zoomable tree of life.

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

See how fireworks are made and learn how metals like magnesium and copper are responsible for different colors.

How Amazon operates a 'flywheel' business model, a self-reinforcing cycle that drives continuous growth

Hear 50 years of iconic hip-hop samples, the genre's foundational looped tracks

Hear about the 250-year history of the United States Postal Service, complete with some of its strangest deliveries, important innovations, and the figures that made it an American institution.

Learn how to read a prospectus, the juicy document that any company must file with the SEC before going public.

Read a deep dive on the 'all-purpose healing' peptide BPC-157.

About 2,000 US babies are born annually without some portion of their limbs, potentially leading to a lifetime of pricey prosthetics.

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

'Shogun,' a 1980s TV series, helped popularize sushi in the US by stimulating an American interest in Japanese culture.

To reduce wrinkles in clothing, research recommends gentle wash cycles with more water and tumble drying with smaller loads and longer times.

Use this tool to calculate the dollar value of your parental mental load, from meal planning to coordinating after-school care, then see resources that help generate solutions.

The American cockroach is actually from Africa, an apparent hitchhiker aboard ships carrying enslaved people, with evidence suggesting the bug may have arrived in the New World as early as the 1600s.

Explore chaos in this simulation of two double pendulums, where small differences in the release angles produce wildly different outcomes.

Urushiol, the oily toxin in poison ivy, can remain allergenic on clothing for years.

Budweiser stores yeast derived from the original 1800s strain in a secret bunker, which only the Head of Yeast Management can access—not even the CEO

The first steps to rebuilding your credit score include getting to know exactly what's on your credit report and figuring out how far you are from the '700 club,' or 'good score' range.

Search a massive database of over 4 decades of clues from the TV quiz show 'Jeopardy!'

For centuries, it was common to sleep in two shifts: a few hours at the beginning of the night, and a longer period beginning around midnight

Some coin denominations have ridges etched on their sides, partly to prevent counterfeiting, in a practice called 'reeding.'

Waves off the coast of Nazaré, Portugal, can reach over 100 feet and are caused by the area's deep underwater canyon geography

Some researchers have labeled nomophobia, the fear of being without your phone, as 'the phobia of the 21st century.'

Take a 3D tour of the Hajj, Islam's annual pilgrimage to Mecca, undertaken by over 1.5 million Muslims.