OITNB's Subway Hero: "You Must Always Face Evil and Take It Down"

Rich Juzwiak · 11/05/14 05:04PM

Yesterday, videos of Orange Is the New Black's Lea DeLaria handing a prosletyzing subway preacher his ass went viral. For anyone who's been trapped on the subway with some asshole who's tritely thumping his Bible in an attempt to pull you away from the magazine you are reading or the Taylor Swift song you're listening to that's making you feel right at home, the footage of DeLaria shouting over the unsolicited advice on getting to heaven and protecting one's soul was immensely cathartic.

On Top of His Game at 84: A Conversation with Frederick Wiseman

Rich Juzwiak · 11/05/14 04:52PM

Frederick Wiseman has been making his brand of long, implicitly narrative documentaries about institutions for almost 50 years, and I’ll be damned if his most recent, National Gallery, isn’t among his very finest. The movie, which opens today at New York’s Film Forum, examines the London art museum after which it is named from inside out—we see scenes of its patrons looking at art, its guides explaining the art, its administration discussing how to properly share the art with the public, its restorers showing how they preserve the museum’s priceless pieces. It is a calmly brilliant, regularly fascinating three-hour look at what constitutes art and how to best share it.

Jeopardy Made Up Fake Rapper Names and It Was So, So Embarrassing

Jordan Sargent · 11/05/14 04:34PM

The writers of Jeopardy are good at a very certain thing, which is researching and writing a series of questions that tests both the depth and breadth of your knowledge. They are also bad at a very certain thing, which is making up names for fake rappers.

Private Equity Firms Don't Want You to Know How Expensive They Are

Hamilton Nolan · 11/05/14 04:06PM

Public employees have public money in their pension funds to save for retirement. Those pension funds invest that public money in private equity firms. Those private equity firms then refuse to say how much they're charging, and why. Hmmm.

Horny Old Hippo Probably Skipped Her Birth Control, Has Surprise Baby

Allie Jones · 11/05/14 03:53PM

The Los Angeles Zoo has its' first brand new baby hippo in 26 years thanks to sneaky 10-year-old hippo Mara, who totally skipped her birth control pills and did it with a young, hot hippo named Adhama. Mara went in to surprise labor on Halloween. Trick!

Hamilton Nolan · 11/05/14 02:06PM

Between 2000 and 2010, New York City's black middle class declined significantly, while the high income white population grew significantly. Also: the city's single largest population cluster is "low-income Hispanic."

Drake Is the Taylor Swift of Rap

Jordan Sargent · 11/05/14 02:00PM

Yesterday it was announced that Taylor Swift sold 1.3 million copies of her new album 1989, meaning that she moved more records in one week than any other artist has of any new album in the entirety of the past 10 months. This was appropriately being noted as a historic feat before it was even confirmed, but it is not the most impressive capitalist achievement the music industry has seen in 2014. That, instead, would be everything Drake has done this year.

Warning: Twitter Moved the Tweet Box

Tom Scocca · 11/05/14 01:55PM

Uh-oh. What is happening? Twitter moved the tweet box, is what's happening. Out of the sidebar, where you might have had to stop and think for a decisecond. Up near the search box, where you're more likely to broadcast your search results. Right at the top of the column, where the new-tweets-are-here alert used to be. Where are the new tweets? You are the new tweets. Don't think. This design is optimized for not-thinking. Because Twitter was too careful and considered before. This will go well.

Do You Know Another Jian Ghomeshi? Don't Stay Quiet. Tell Us.

Max Read · 11/05/14 12:25PM

After the popular radio host Jian Ghomeshi was fired from CBC last week over allegations that he had attacked several women during sex, it quickly became clear that Ghomeshi's reported penchant for nonconsensual violent sex was already widely known.

​Baby Celebrates First "Crawl" With a Little Dog Kiss on the Mouth

Kelly Conaboy · 11/05/14 12:10PM

Baby lift up baby body. Baby lurch forward. Baby's baby arms collapse under weight of baby body. Baby lift up baby body. Baby lurch forward. Baby's baby arms collapse under weight of baby body. Tired of waiting for Baby, Puppy meet baby halfway. Puppy kiss. :)