If you're a fan of rap or R&B and have a thing for vinyl, chances are you got the gift of wax this holiday season. Did somebody surprise you with an LP copy of, say, Kendrick Lamar's Section.80 , Frank Ocean's Channel Orange , or Kanye West's Yeezus ? Well, whether you know it or not, you're now the…

This past October, just before the leaves changed, I went on a six-day hike through the mountains of Wakayama, in central Japan, tracing the path of an ancient imperial pilgrimage called the Kumano Kodo. I took along a powerful camera, believing, as I always have, that it would be an indispensable…

Hello. My name is Chris Kluwe, and for eight years I was the punter for the Minnesota Vikings. In May 2013, the Vikings released me from the team. At the time, quite a few people asked me if I thought it was because of my recent activism for same-sex marriage rights, and I was very careful in how I…

[Photographs: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt] Get the Recipe The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies More All About Chocolate Everything you want to know about chocolate "Stop making cookies." I'm sorry, what was that dear? "I said, stop making cookies ." That's odd , I thought to myself. Why would she be saying that?…

The chocolate-chip cookie celebrated its seventy-fifth birthday this year. Unlike the anonymous inventors of such American staples as the hot dog, the grilled-cheese sandwich, and the milkshake, the creator of the chocolate-chip cookie has always been known to us. Ruth Wakefield, who ran the popular…

Columbine killers Five years ago today, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murdered their classmates and teachers at Columbine High School. Most Americans have reached one of two wrong conclusions about why they did it. The first conclusion is that the pair of supposed "Trench Coat Mafia outcasts" were…

GREENVILLE, Ill. — A lifer with a pen sat in the 65-square-foot cell he shares. A calendar taunted from a bulletin board. He began to write. Dear President Obama . He acknowledged his criminal past. He expressed remorse. And he pleaded for a second chance, now that he had served 18 years of the…

If you've been to Vegas, you've heard about it or stood in line to get in. Marquee, the superest of the superclubs, sprawls over an astonishing 60,000 square feet. It allows you to party very, very hard. For just thousands of dollars! Would you like bottle service at one of our dance-floor tables?…

With all the talk about "open world," "mayhem," and "power fantasy," it's easy to forget how confining the Grand Theft Auto series now feels, writes Gamasutra's Leigh Alexander. I wanted to do something nice for Michael. He'd been rejected in turn by each member of his family, as it seems he is…

pomeranian99: Why "Model Railroader" -- and other niche glossy magazines -- are thriving: http://t.co/T6eqBI2GWB

Sid Meier is a game design legend. He co-founded MicroProse in 1982 and created Civilization , one of the longest-running and most loved series in gaming. Now the creative director at Firaxis—and overseer for both the Civ and XCOM franchises, Meier can be choosy about what he works on. His choice:…

The Awl Be less stupid. The Awl Be less stupid.

Mirrorless cameras are mid-market saviors for camera companies, but it won't stay that way. Photo via Zhao/Flickr As smartphone cameras get better and better, camera companies that compete on the lower end of the camera market are seeing their share erode away. In fact, so many people are giving up…

A man of humble upbringing decides that he will become a millionaire. For several years, wealth is his only goal, because he desperately wants everything else that comes from being rich. He reinvents himself along the way, transcending his roots, presenting a phony, tony name as his public face to…

pomeranian99: Candy Crush Saga as a meditation on economics and chance: http://t.co/zxdROGjvOn Really terrific @tevisthompson essay.

Learning to walk Back when the Oculus Rift was little more than a prototype and a Kickstarter campaign, it was all but granted that we’d be using it for first-person shooters. Oculus had captured the attention of FPS pioneer John Carmack (who would eventually join the company) and every copy of the…

The Awl Be less stupid. The Awl Be less stupid.

pomeranian99: That @tevisthompson essay proves what @suellentrop argued here: We are in a golden age of game criticism -- http://t.co/chlmSKA5VL

pomeranian99: The Artful Accidents of Google Books: http://t.co/ONkuIfwAIf (The aesthetics and politics of accidentally scanned hands.)

pomeranian99: Who drove teens onto social-networking? Adults, who no longer let them hang out unsupervised F2F: http://t.co/HrIPqn7hZN My column based...

Video games began as a loner’s art. Ralph Baer created a Ping-Pong game, the basis for Atari’s Pong, while working in a one-person room for a Defense Department contractor. Steve Jobs tricked Steve Wozniak into making the prototype for Breakout in four sleepless nights on Atari’s factory floor.…

Does a movie have to be “important” to be great? Does it have to deal with socially resonant themes, or a great national event, or a disintegrating American family? “American Hustle” is the best movie of the year, but is it important? The plot jumps off from real-world corruption and an F.B.I.…

Is it nature or nurture that makes violent people? In the Grand Theft Auto games, it’s always been both. Developer Rockstar Games has always put players in the bloodied shoes of various gangsters and let them loose in expansive cities to wreak all sorts of recreational havoc. Grand Theft Auto V ’s…

George Yao spent six months on top of the virtual world of the online game Clash of Clans. “Looking back, I think I must have been insane,” he said of his immersion in the game. Peter DaSilva for The New York Times Last spring, a few months before his eighth birthday, my son announced that he wanted…

1 “She Used 80 Names” R onald Reagan loved to tell stories. When he ran for president in 1976, many of Reagan’s anecdotes converged on a single point: The welfare state is broken, and I’m the man to fix it. On the trail, the Republican candidate told a tale about a fancy public housing complex with…

America received the ultimate booty call on May 7, 1992, courtesy of Seattle rapper Sir Mix-a-Lot and his song “Baby Got Back.” Since its release through legendary rap-rock producer Rick Rubin’s Def American label, the up-tempo track — which spent five weeks at No. 1 and was the second-best-selling…

The one scene from the original Anchorman that everyone remembers — more than the flute solo, more than the Baxter kick, more than the depressive milk-drinking — is the newscaster battle. Bookended by the immensely quotable Ron Burgundy lines, “Uh-oh, here comes trouble” and “Boy, that escalated…

Sometime in the past few years, the blog died. In 2014, people will finally notice. Sure, blogs still exist, many of them are excellent, and they will go on existing and being excellent for many years to come. But the function of the blog, the nebulous informational task we all agreed the blog was…

When Dave “Davey D” Cook got into hip-hop in the late ’70s, he didn’t see himself as an archivist. A teen growing up in the Bronx, New York City, he was digging through his mom’s records looking for a great funky beat to rap over. At the time, hip-hop was only five years old. Cook was inspired by…

Left, Jacqueline Kennedy in the mid-1960s; right, Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. Bringing the painting to the U.S. became a personal project of Mrs. Kennedy’s. From Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images (Kennedy)., By Lewandowski/LeMage/Gattelet/Réunion des Musées Nationaux/Art Resource, N.Y.…

1 “Bigger Than Picasso” Paul van Hoeydonck poses with a replica of Fallen Astronaut in front of the Empire State Building in New York in 1971. Courtesy Paul van Hoeydonck/Waddell Gallery* O ne crisp March morning in 1969, artist Paul van Hoeydonck was visiting his Manhattan gallery when he stumbled…

I spent the past couple of days in Berkeley, participating in a number of events at the inaugural Berkeley Ideas Festival. The highlight for me was interviewing Donald MacDonald, the architect of the new (and magnificent) Bay Bridge . But I was also asked to present a little “provocation” on the…

Thamsanqa Jantjie, the man accused of using fake sign language at Nelson Mandela's memorial. Photograph: Foto24/Getty Images O ur daily lives are mostly a mixture of drab routine and unpleasant surprises – however, from time to time, something unexpected happens which makes life worth living.…

Scott: On Friday, we ran a piece on the Worst Films Of 2013 , and because we were looking for the absolute bottom of the barrel, the 15 movies selected were all received with varying degrees of toxicity. But there’s another breed of failure we need to discuss, Mike and Nathan: the high-profile…

W hen historians look back on pop music in 2013, I suspect they will gravitate to one word as a summation for the year’s events. Delusion. Before we get to the reason for this delusion, let’s revel for a moment in glorious self-deception. After all, this was the year of the carefully orchestrated…

Photo: Josh Valcarcel/WIRED OK, audiophiles: real talk. Earphone makers seem to be either too polite or scared to say anything. And the people in the industry who should know better are only actively encouraging a ritual. So let me say it for them: Earphone burn-in is a bunch of hokum. For those of…