Endless Thread

WBUR

Untold histories, unsolved mysteries, and other jaw-dropping stories online and IRL. Hosted by Ben Brock Johnson & Amory Sivertson.

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29 episodes
weekly
Avg 27 min
English

Episodes 29

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Counted on this page — what you have heard stays on this device, so it is not something the list can be paged by.

May 15 · 27 min
Manifesting an online rom-com existence
Hosts Ben and Amory pay homage to the magic of online chance encounters with producer Grace Tatter. Together, they explore the ways in which the internet fuels random yet delightful meetings between strangers online, from a website where you can impersonate ChatGPT to Craigslist's beloved Missed Connections page.
May 8 · 25 min
Ben Palmer's Brain
Ben Palmer set up a fake tip line for people to report immigrants in the United States, and recorded the conversations. Things got uncomfortable and, to some, surprisingly funny. How did Ben Palmer go from being your average stand-up comic, trying out sets after his day job, to creating viral social commentary?
May 5 · 21 min
Endless Thread presents "The Midnight Rebellion"
Lost in a watery wasteland, Joule must find her way home. She needs YOUR help. The Midnight Rebellion, a new podcast from WBUR, Boston’s NPR. Follow to find out when episodes drop.
May 1 · 28 min
Extraordinary vs. Extra Ordinary
Hosts Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson take a hike with producer Grace Tatter, following the digital trail of "Ridiculoubs" — a mysterious climber who traverses the world's peaks in striking footwear. Then, Amory celebrates the beauty of daily life with the Dull Women's Club, a Facebook group with nearly 1.6 million members.
April 24 · 32 min
Close Encounters of the Hexagonal Kind
Endless Thread goes to space! First, host Ben Brock Johnson goes deep on radio signals of unknown origin, with an assist from real-life radio astronomer and Reddit MVP Yvette Cendes, aka, Andromeda321. Then, producer Kalyani Saxena takes Ben down the metaphorical black hole of Saturn's hexagonal storm, a vortex twice the width of the Earth that's inspired internet conspiracy theories.
April 17 · 27 min
A Beige New World
The world is bright and colorful, but online beige reigns supreme. Neutrals have taken over the internet — from minimalist coffee shops, to influencer home aesthetics, to beige kids' clothing. Hosts Ben and Amory ask Hayley DeRoche, a librarian and writer known as SadBeige, where all the color went.
April 10 · 20 min
How Afroman turned lemons into lemon pound cake
Afroman made his name in the early 2000s with the hit song "Because I Got High." More than two decades later, he's having another break out moment. Host Ben Brock Johnson and Producer Grace Tatter dig into how Afroman turned a police raid and defamation trial into internet virality.
April 3 · 28 min
Rewind: Digging Deep with TikTok's "tunnel girl"
A TikTok creator known as "tunnel girl" online excavated and constructed a tunnel system under her suburban home in 2024. Two years later, we have some updates on the story.
March 27 · 29 min
Beautiful, Terrible Internet
Hosts Ben and Amory explore how viral clips of DOGE staffers' video depositions found a new life online after a judge temporarily ordered them removed. They also dabble in a Reddit thought exercise with a potentially dubious origin.

Showing 21–29 of 29 episodes