You might have seen that video of a bear cub last week, trying to follow its mother up a steep, snow-covered slope. At the end, after many struggles, it manages to climb up. It’s a cute video, with an inspirational message: never stop trying, never give up.

It is also a video of a frightened mother bear and her cub. The video appears to be shot with a drone, and bears do not react well to drones. So instead of an inspirational message, it is rather a video of a mother and her terrified baby, trying to flee from an apparent threat, and taking risks they otherwise wouldn’t have.

It is also a reminder for us that even when a video is not doctored, its message might be completely different from what we want it to be.

Viral Nature

Once consequence of the age of GPS-enabled smartphones was people posting pictures of them being in beautiful spots in nature. The other is that those photos were geo-tagged with the location, allowing others to trek there as well, turning what was once a local secret into a global destination. What happens when nature goes viral? (YouTube)

‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens

On Thursday, a gunman shot up a bar in California. And as always, satire website The Onion re-ran this article:  ‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens. They only change the date, where the shooting happened, how many people were killed, and the photo. Jason Kottke keeps track of how often The Onion has had to post this mass shooting article.

Plant Meat

There have long been vegetarian and vegan stand-ins for various meat products, but these were never real replacements that managed to get taste and texture right. In recent years, companies like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat have introduced products that claim to taste just like actual meat. And these are only the first advancements that could end animal farming as we know it.

True Advertising?

Companies like to claim all kinds of upsides to their products in ads. Buy this or that, and become younger, stronger, faster, richer, and more attractive. Now Nike claims their Zoom Vaporfly 4% will make you run faster by, well, 4%. That is not a lot, and won’t turn a couch potato into a marathon runner over night, but it would be enough to give professional athletes a serious edge over their competition. So what if that claim were actually true?

Technology: The solution to, and source of, most of our modern problems

Silicon Valley’s ethos is that technology is good, and can be used to solve humanity’s problems, ushering us into a utopian future. So it’s no surprise when the first things Silicon Valley’s companies turn to is more technology when faced with a problem, and the current hot trend there is artificial intelligence. The trouble is when more technology not only doesn’t solve the problem, but exacerbates it: No, A.I. Won’t Solve the Fake News Problem

📖 Weekly Longread 📚

Words like ‘jaw-dropping’ are way overused these days. But this story deserves it: The jaw-dropping story behind an NFL coach’s search for his family.

🦄 Unicorn Chaser 🦄

Winners of the 2018 Wildlife Photographer of the Year Awards. Bonus: Smiling Stars.