Cole Rubin, co-founder of FanFeed, described the startup's AI-powered platform that compiles a user's complete history of concerts and games attended, letting fans access tickets, content and friend activity in one place. Rubin said the product also gives teams, artists and universities first-party data on fan attendance to help them craft more personalized offers. He credited co-founder Jack Phifer with building the proprietary technology that automatically surfaces these insights rather than requiring manual entry.
entrepreneur.com
· 2026-10-21
A video essay from engineering YouTuber Grady (Practical Engineering) traces the rise and decline of the external metal fire escape in American cities, noting many older buildings still retain their original structures. The piece argues that fire escapes, long a fixture of urban skylines and fiction, are gradually disappearing as building codes and safety requirements change over time.
practical.engineering
· 2026-10-21
Researchers analyzed mineral deposits from cave stalagmites to reconstruct monsoon rainfall variability spanning the last 450,000 years. The study compiles data from multiple cave sites worldwide to identify consistent patterns in how monsoon systems have shifted over long geological timescales.
nature.com
· 2026-10-21
Tristan Brown, an MIT history professor, spent a year investigating a Chinese tea chest label held at Old South Meeting House, long believed to be debris from the 1773 Boston Tea Party and donated by descendants of blacksmith Thomas Wells in 1987. By reading the inscription as Cantonese rather than Mandarin, Brown determined the characters phonetically spelled out Smith, Archer & Co., a US tea trading firm active in the 1860s and 1870s, meaning the label postdates the Tea Party by nearly a century.
technologyreview.com
· 2026-10-20
Doubl has unveiled Maxwell, described as a new kind of model that operates between source code and the hardware executing it, aiming to let software adapt during execution rather than run purely as fixed, deterministic instructions. The announcement frames traditional computing as splitting all 'thinking' into the programming stage, with execution remaining mechanical, and positions Maxwell as a way to bring AI-driven adjustment into the execution process itself.
heymaxwell.ai
· 2026-10-19
Researchers and advocates are drawing parallels between AI's potential workforce impact and historical technology shifts, like the automated telephone switch that eliminated the female-dominated operator profession. The International Labour Organization reported in March that nearly one in 10 women in high-income countries work in occupations facing the highest risk of AI displacement. Experts note that clerical and administrative jobs, where women remain overrepresented, are especially exposed because AI excels at routine, pattern-based tasks.
cnbc.com
· 2026-10-19
In the season finale of its Version History podcast, The Verge explores how the overhead projector moved from military use into classrooms and reshaped teaching. Host David Pierce talks with Jake Kastrenakes and Stanford professor Antero Garcia about the device's history and why newer tools like PowerPoint, computer screens, and smart boards eventually replaced it. The episode caps a season covering iconic school technology including Oregon Trail, Chromebooks, One Laptop Per Child, LeapFrog's LeapPad, and TI calculators.
theverge.com
· 2026-10-18
A historical essay revisits the famous Monty Python coconut sketch and points out that coconuts were actually well-documented in medieval England, despite the film's joke suggesting otherwise. The piece cites surviving fifteenth-century coconut cups held by Oxford and Cambridge colleges as physical evidence that the fruit reached Britain centuries before the film's setting.
themarysue.com
· 2026-10-16
A Winterthur Program blog post from students studying British design history explores the historical use of aged urine, known as lant, in industries such as tanning, dyeing, gunpowder-making, and brewing. The post also describes the role of the 'gong farmer,' a Tudor-era term for workers who collected human waste from privies and cesspits, often working only at night due to the stigma attached to the job.
sites.udel.edu
· 2026-10-15
Bonhams sold the working Apple I known as the 'Hatfield' machine for $1,148,200 to an undisclosed buyer, a record for the model. Built in 1976 and originally sold for $666.60, it is one of 74 verified surviving Apple I computers and includes a letter from Steve Jobs, Woz's signature, manuals and period accessories.
engadget.com
· 2026-10-15
Miyazaki has said that in 1980, feeling his work had grown repetitive following the box-office failure of The Castle of Cagliostro, he began questioning his reliance on clear-cut heroes and villains. He discovered the American comic Rowlf and the French magazine Métal Hurlant, including Mœbius's Arzach, describing both as major influences while he searched for his next project.
animationobsessive.substack.com
· 2026-10-12
A project called Phloem renders a git repository's commit history as an organic, slime-mold-style growth animation using WebGL in the browser. The tool requires JavaScript to run and draws the visualization interactively rather than as a static chart.
phloem.stemdeck.app
· 2026-10-12
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