Jacob Stern

What’s your Elo rating?

America’s favorite robot company has perfected the art of freaking people out.

Sixty years ago, Pauline Kael said that the movies were going to pieces. In a sense, she was right.

Bundles are back.

The anti-government militia leader can’t make sense of his allies’ support for ICE violence.

Prediction markets are turbocharging America’s obsession with sports gambling.

A staple of sci-fi and children’s entertainment is now being deployed by actual militaries in actual combat.

The odds of being struck by lightning in America in a given year are one in 1.2 million. How does the experience reorient a person’s sense of chance, of fate?

Pixar made a classic trilogy about growing up. At that point, the studio should have left its toys behind.

More games are a good thing—up to a point.