What happens when you buy a magic spell on Etsy? Writer Jaya Saxena and her husband Matt Lubchansky recently tested one witch's wares, and they talk to TLDR about being careful what you wish for. Plus, TLDR hires our own spellcaster, a mystic n

#48 -- Art Critics Love Us On Yelp

Mar 5th, 2015 10m 10s

Brian Droitcour is a professional art critic, and a Yelp user. In 2012 he started using the popular review site to post his reactions to galleries and museums, using a distinctly un-art world-y voice. This week, Brian sits down with TLDR to tal

#47 - JebBushforPresident.com

Feb 26th, 2015 12m 24s

CJ Philips and Charlie Rainwater bought JebBushforPresident.com back in 2008 -- but not because they're huge Bush fans or want to sell the address at a markup. With the 2016 election approaching, the pair have launched the site as a place for d

#46 - Episode 45 Redux

Feb 19th, 2015 23m 40s

The last episode of TLDR was titled "Quiet, Wadhwa." It concerned a man named Vivek Wadhwa, but we did not ask him for comment. The episode was later removed.This week we look at the controversy we've become a part of and our role in it.To re

#44 - Prostitute Laundry

Jan 29th, 2015 10m 20s

Charlotte Shane writes a TinyLetter called Prostitute Laundry, writing frankly and lyrically about her feelings, her relationships, her body and her sex lives -- both personal and professional. This week TLDR looks into women writing personal,

#16 - *Win a Million Dollar Mansion From Your HOME COMPUTER* (Rebroadcast)

Jan 22nd, 2015 9m 17s

"Sweepers" are people who spend their free time entering hundreds of online sweepstakes -- the contests most of us skip because we're sure they're all scams. It turns out, we're wrong. Some people win big.Sandra Grauschopf is About.com's Conte

#43 - Hey Ladies

Jan 16th, 2015 14m 20s

If you've ever been a bridesmaid, in a sorority, or just been friends with two or more women, you have probably received an off-the-wall planning email or two. Caroline Moss and Michelle Markowitz have been parodying these chains for The Toast

#42 - GodTube

Jan 8th, 2015 12m 49s

When Will Rogers discovered GodTube.com, he was bothered by the idea of Christians segregating themselves from the larger cultural conversation. So he set out to start a dialogue. Meredith talks to Will about his GodTube.com videos, what he wan

#41 - Tell Me How To Live My Life

Dec 18th, 2014 9m 14s

Susan Miller, proprietor of Astrology Zone, is the biggest name in internet astrology. Her fans are many and devoted, and among them are both Meredith and Laura Mayer (this week's co-investigator). This week marks Miller's 19th year reading the

#40 - Tinder Bros

Dec 11th, 2014 7m 34s

The first message you send to a Tinder match can determine the rest of your relationship. To ease this pressure, some men on the internet have taken to their favorite forums to crowdsource the perfect opening line. Meredith evaluates their resu

#39 - Little Sh*ts

Dec 4th, 2014 6m 29s

For the past three years Alanah Pearce has been reviewing video games on YouTube. Like other women doing just about anything publicly online, she gets harassed, and in the past she just hasn't replied. But recently Alanah got fed up with not re

TLDR #38 - Ask Leah

Oct 15th, 2014 14m 43s

In the late nineties Leah Reich was working for the video game website IGN, which was the most popular website on the internet for 13 to 18 year old boys at the time. She started reading and responding to the site's mailbag, and before she knew

#38 - Ask Leah

Oct 15th, 2014 14m 43s

#37 - Every City Gets the Hero it Deserves

Sep 17th, 2014 7m 16s

On Tuesday, the Philadelphia Police released a video of some unidentified suspects in a brutal attack on a gay couple. Within a few hours, a Philly sports fan and his online friends had identified some of the people in the video without the bli

#36 - The Mystery of Childish Gambino

Sep 15th, 2014 11m 38s

Rapper Childish Gambino (A.K.A actor Donald Glover) famously claims to have received his rap pseudonym, "Childish Gambino," from an online Wu-Tang Name generator. But investigating whether this story is true or not led TLDR host Alex Goldman on

#35 - Stolen Pictures

Sep 3rd, 2014 7m 14s

This week, hackers stole and published naked photos of female celebrities. Forbes reporter Kashmir Hill has covered stories like this before, but she says that this latest example has completely changed her mind about who to blame for these the

#34 - The Accidental Outing of Rwanda's Most Powerful Troll

Aug 18th, 2014 12m 45s

Steve Terrill is a journalist who works in Rwanda. Or at least he worked in Rwanda, until he accidentally got the office of Rwanda's president Paul Kagame to implicate itself in a long-running online harassment campaign. Alex talks to Steve abo

#33 - Unfollow A Man

Aug 7th, 2014 8m 52s

A few weeks ago, writer Katie Notopoulos created a holiday called Unfollow a Man Day, wherein everyone (women and men) was encouraged to Unfollow a Man on social media. Men's rights activists were enraged, cable news was intrigued, and a lot of

#32 - An Imperfect Match

Jul 31st, 2014 14m 21s

This week, dating site OK Cupid put up a blog post describing experiments it conducted on its users. In one experiment, the site told users who were bad matches for one another that they were actually good matches, and vice versa. Alex and PJ t

#31 - Race Swap

Jul 17th, 2014 9m 43s

Whether you think the internet is a great or terrible place is partly a reflection of which parts of the internet you choose to visit. It's also a reflection of who you are, and how people online react to you. Mikki Kendall is a writer who deal

#30 - The Russian Troll Army

Jun 26th, 2014 10m 34s

Last month, documents surfaced that showed a company called the Internet Research Agency was paying people in Russia to go to an office and post pro-Kremlin comments all day. Alex talks to Buzzfeed's Max Seddon about why they do it, and how suc

#29 - Olivia Taters, Robot Teenager

Jun 18th, 2014 10m 9s

Rob Dubbin accidentally built a teenage girl named Olivia Taters who lives on the internet. She may not always communicate in complete sentences, but she's convincing enough that teenagers actually converse with her. Also, she's very, very funn

#28 - No Trail

Jun 5th, 2014 9m 48s

In February of this year, Philip Welsh of Silver Spring, Maryland, was murdered. His murder remains unsolved, largely because he didn't use the internet, and left no digital trail. Alex talks to Philip's family and reporter Dan Morse about the

#27 - How Google is Killing the Best Site On the Internet

Jun 2nd, 2014 10m 55s

A couple weeks ago, Matt Haughey, the founder of TLDR's favorite website, Metafilter, announced that his website is dying. And he says it's because Google algorithmically stopped directing traffic to the site over a year ago. Alex tries to figu

#26 - A Gold Bottle of Champagne The Size of An Adult Human Man

May 23rd, 2014 8m

Most people use social networks to present themselves as happier than they really are - it's hard to get an honest read on anyone. But writer Charlie Warzel believes there's a secret method you can use to find out how someone is actually feelin