Архитектура

The strange design history and modern resurgence of pinball

Best-selling author John Green and Roman Mars answer questions and give dubious advice

From scratchers to the Powerball, the lottery is the most popular form of gambling in the United States, even though the...

Today the Netherlands has a reputation as a kind of bicycling paradise, but that was far from inevitable

The “panopticon” might be the best known prison concept in the world. It’s become the metaphor for the surveillance sta...

The rise, fall, and unexpected second life of the crosscut saw is also the story of how America created the very concept...

Two stories about the transformative power of silence from our friends at Twenty Thousand Hertz

Friction, tribology, and the complex art and science of lubrication

When online worlds end

The surprisingly long history of trying to use robots to call balls and strikes in baseball

The importance of humor and art in protesting (and ousting!) oppressive regimes

When LA punks were looking for a place to play in the late 1970s, Chinatown welcomed the unruly scene. But it was an une...

On Aug. 1, 1942, the nation’s recording studios went silent. Musicians were fed up with the new technologies threatening...

In the 20th century, Iowa high school girls basketball was HUGE but it was not the game we know today

How an ultra-marathon called The Comrades became a national obsession in South Africa and a model for inclusion during s...

The shifting symbolism of Brazil's iconic yellow soccer jersey

We’re kicking off the new year at 99pi with a fresh installment of mini-stories, including: what lies at the intersectio...

A Balikbayan box is a huge cardboard box (often weighing over 100 pounds) that Filipinos living all over the world send ...

It's Mini-Story Season! You’ll hear about a very, very long escalator! Beavers dropping from the sky!  We’ll hear from J...

If you’ve ever flipped through the radio dial — not satellite, not podcasts, but good old-fashioned AM and FM radio — yo...

The epic tale of the Hollywood celebrity mountain lion known as P-22

There is a subset of real life superheroes who are more focused on things like picking up trash and taking on civic issu...

The incredible story of the black men who became America's first paramedics

Roman and Kurt are back with another series of railroad tales. All aboard!

Avery Trufelman's Articles of Interest is back!

Jody Rosen joins us to talk about the evolution of the bicycle, how it became a cultural phenomenon in the late 1800s, t...

Reporter/producer Gillian Jacobs (Community, Winning Time) takes us on a stroll on the Walk of Fame, a 1.3 mile monument...

The history and significance and of the much maligned vuvuzela

Jamaica is famous around the world for its music, including genres like ska, dub, and reggae. It’s tempting to think tha...

The jackalope is a mythical mascot of the American West – inspiring an absolute river of trinkets and songs and whiskies...

On this special feature episode, President Bill Clinton interviews 99% Invisible host and creator Roman Mars.

How did we get to a point where "search" is failing us?

North Korea's state-run design studio has long been a prolific maker of statues around the world, particularly in Africa

The infrastructure, zoning, and cultural factors that make the hit Japanese TV program Old Enough, where toddlers go on ...

There's a particular one-kilohertz tone that is universally understood to be covering up inappropriate words on radio an...

We're sharing the latest episode of Roman's other show What Roman Mars Can Learn About Con Law, your guide to the US Con...

For the love of peat

In the final episode of our vernacular spectacular anniversary series, 99pi producers and friends of the show will be sh...

The utilitarian and "ugly" architecture that is beautiful to us

We often tell stories about how people shape the built world, but on this milestone 500th episode, we're telling stories...