1. Habemus Papam
My Latin is rusty, but Habemus Papam either translates as We have a Pope, or There’s a New Sheriff in Town. And so it was today as the symbolic white smoke rose from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and a new pope was chosen. Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina has become the first South American pope. He has taken the name Francis I.
2. Groupon Therapy
“They wanted this rocket ship to take off and nothing was going to stop them.” Groupon took the web by storm with its half-off specials. But today, the company’s stock price has been discounted more dramatically than any of their local deals. The Verge’s Ben Popper looks at the rise and fall of Groupon and wonders whether anyone can save the company from itself.
3. With Your Own Eyes
One of the most controversial and widely published photos of the past year shows a Palestinian man carrying the body of his 11-month old son. “Palestinian supporters saw the photo, taken by an Associated Press photographer, as evidence of the Israeli military’s aggression against Palestinian civilians; Israel’s supporters viewed it as a carefully orchestrated bit of propaganda designed to engender sympathy for Palestinians during the brief Gaza-Israeli conflict.” It took four months and UN commission to conclude that neither side was quite right. At least one thing is for sure. We’ve seen enough of these photos.
4. Not Quite Hacked
Yesterday, there were reports of several celebrities and politicians who had their social security numbers, mortgages, phone numbers, and more leaked online. Was this a major hack, or this is information easy to obtain by anyone who wants to do a little research? Buzzfeed on the shockingly easy process behind the celebrity credit report “hacks.”
5. Thinking Inside the Box
On of the former “stars” of the show Storage Wars filed a lawsuit against A&E for using phony footage, scripted content, and even stocking the storage units with items to make the show more interesting (as if opening an abandoned storage unit was not already interesting enough). So far, the judge in the case seems to be siding with the network. It turns out that reality TV may have the right to be fake.
+ Pepsi Max sent disguised Nascar driver Jeff Gordon to take a car salesman for the testdrive of his life. Was it real? Was it scripted? Either way, it’s going viral and it’s the future of advertising.
6. Life in the Fast Lane
Slate’s Farhad Manjoo wondered what exactly one would do with the world’s fastest Internet service. So he headed out to Kansas City where Google is piloting a program that gives residents a home Internet connection that is about 150 times faster than the one the average American uses. So far, they’re all using the Internet pretty much the same way the rest of us are (although most of the pilot customers are probably halfway through item seven by now).
7. Watching You, Watching Me
After lobbying Congress for a change to the Video Privacy Protection Act of 1988, Netflix is now finally able to roll out its social options to Facebook users in the U.S. So if you want to know what your friends are watching (or care to have them know what you just saw), this is your moment. In my house, you’d basically just see a TV reflection of my wife and me as we sit and wait for season two of House of Cards.
+ Kristen Bell and Rob Thomas look to make a Veronica Mars movie. Kickstarter style.
