The zidi retweet #5: our favorite stories of 2014

C.E. Alexander counts down our top 25 favorite stories of the year.

#25 ‘Like’ Is, Like, Totally Cool, Linguist Says

First, the case needs to be mostly closed. See our previous remarks about chaos in Ukraine, the Israel-Gaza conflict or the current Ebola outbreak. Otherwise news, essays, studies, videos and graphics were all eligible.

The zidi retweet #2

It’s not like the bad news slowed to a crawl after last month’s retweet. Perhaps this should become a monthly feature: a brief respite from war, war drums, Ebola outbreak and new Apple products. Here were some of our favorite articles we filed under Other News:

1. The interactive, one-billion-pixel view of Mars, as taken by the Curiosity rover.

2. We have mixed feelings about the “Go to Give it Up” lawsuit. We love Pharrell Williams, love Marvin Gaye, do not love Robin Thicke, but–above all else–music plagiarism is a blurred line.

3. Does Saturn repeatedly create and destroy small moons?

4. An unexpected crash in the market for nude celebrity selfies reveals just how deeply the hacker community has cut. Read this one with a stiff drink.

5. Amazon pays $1 billion for Twitch, a social media site for watching others play video games. And here we are in North Texas wringing our hands about a $60 million football stadium.

6. “I’ve met countless news consumers like that woman in Florida, trapped in a luxury high-rise, surrounded by information they refuse to access or consider.”

7. When this hoax-band actually released an album, their Wikipedia hoax-page kept the same URL and bio.

8. “If you choose an answer to this question at random, what is the chance you will be correct? A: 25%? B: 50%? C: 60%? Or D: 25%?”

9. For those of us living in the U.S. border states, there are familiar scenes at Spain’s land border with Morocco.

10. What We See When We Read.

C.E. Alexander is the author of four short stories and a short story anthology. Book of Constants is currently free, here.