Playboy is going to become a PG-13 magazine, months after making the decision to reorient its website away from nudity. Alyssa Rosenberg noted that this was a good opportunity to examine the magazine’s legacy:

• Saying that people only read the magazine for the articles has become the butt of many jokes. But the magazine has been responsible for many pieces of award winning journalism.
• Playboy provided men a new way to express masculinity. A man didn’t have to go hunting or score the winning touchdown. A man could be indoors, mix cocktails, put on mood music, and invite a woman over for philosophical conversations…and sex.
• Nor did men have to be threatened by gender equality. They didn’t need women to be housewives at home to feel like men. Instead men could support and enjoy the benefits of the sexual liberalization of women.
• The magazine also helped encouraged interracial relationships.
• On issues such as legalizing abortion and expanding access to contraception the magazine’s advocacy provided men with language they could use to side with what were traditionally seen as female causes without feeling insecure.

The magazine was, of course, ultimately one that made money by selling naked images of women. Holly Madison, one of Hugh Hefner’s girlfriend’s, painted a disturbing picture of the founder of the magazine. And Bill Cosby is alleged to have perpetrated sexual assault at one of Playboy’s “mansions”. Read more about these and other criticisms of the magazine, as well as other impacts that the magazine has had on our culture over here.

Source: The Washington Post

Olivia B. Waxman wrote about a dating app for people who know exactly what they want in a relationship: somebody to eat bacon with:

• Users of the app are asked questions such as “what kind of bacon do you love the most” and “how do you like your bacon cooked”.
• Perhaps most importantly users are asked to explain what they would do if they were on a date and only one strip of bacon was left.
• The app is called Sizzl, and just like with Tinder users look at profiles and then indicate which ones they find “smokin'”
• Those that mutually like each other can then message each other.

Read more here.

Source: Time

Deir ez-Zor is a province in eastern Syria that has been controlled by the group formerly known as ISIS since 2014. Recently public accounts figures leaked and Zack Beauchamp took a look at what they showed:

• Surprisingly only a third of ISIS’s revenue comes from oil sales.
• Most of the rest comes from “taxes” and “confiscations” – essentially what is likely extortion by the state government.
• On the one hand this is good news – there is only so much the government can confiscate before there’s nothing left.
• On the other hand it means that bombing campaigns won’t do much good in degrading ISIS’ finances. You can at least destroy oil production facilities.
• Most of ISIS expenditure is on soldier salaries, policing, and military bases.
• There is very little spent on economic development.
• However the group does devote 18% of its budget to what is called a “social services department”.

Read more, and see some fascinating visualizations over here.

Source: Vox

Via: Marginal Revolution

Shaunacy Ferro wrote about a creative litter reduction campaign:

• If the act of throwing trash away can be made fun, rather than seen as a chore, fewer people would litter.
• A UK non-profit is attempting to do this by making the act of throwing away a cigarette butt a way to express one’s true allegiance.
• Smokers can choose between Ronaldo and Messi as the best player in the world, and passerby’s can see whose winning.
• Cigarette butts are specifically targeted because 89% of them are left on the street.
• No word on whether the campaign could inadvertently increase rates of smoking among die hard sports fans.

See another example, and read more here.

Source: Mental Floss

Turn on the television and it seems like the world is spinning out of control with bizarre and unexplainable things, from ISIS, to unlikely Presidential candidates filling the airwaves. Steve Coast looked at the recent spate of weird aircraft incidents to explain why the world seems to be getting weirder:

• Planes used to crash because of cracks in the frame, outward opening doors, and even urine corrosion. All those problems were fixed.
• In fact most problems with airlines were fixed with the introduction of a checklist. Since then we’ve been trying to solve ever smaller and niche problems.
• Thus now when airlines crash it’s for the most bizarre reasons – pilot suicide, anti-aircraft missile, or simple disappearance into the oceans.
• With airplanes we may be at a point where the solutions we’re coming up with are actually creating more problems.
• After 9/11 airplane cockpits had to be locked. This allowed a suicidal German pilot to fly a passenger jet into a mountain.
• Now an air steward has to be in the other pilot’s seat anytime one of the pilots has to leave the cockpit. Perhaps the next crash will happen when a steward makes a mistake while sitting in the pilot’s seat.
• It could also be why America’s houses of government are grid-locked. The US government has arguably come up with fixes for most of the problems that governments face. Now lawmakers are bickering over weirder things like debt ceilings.

Read more about what this could say about the wider economy and the internet, as well as how this all connects to The Joker from The Dark Knight here.

Source: Playboy

An academic paper by Geoffrey Fain Williams looked at the life of a typical thief:

• People seem to engage in thievery for short periods – usually around a year.
• Reported earnings from stealing are low.
• Those who engage in risky behaviours such as smoking are more likely to engage in theft.
• Most thieves have stopped their dastardly heists by their late 20s – those that haven’t don’t earn a lot of money from it.
• It’s possible that there are professional thieves that are so uncommon they aren’t captured in the data, or don’t respond to such surveys.
• Or maybe the average thief is just a risk-taking adolescent who earns little more than they would from a part-time job.

The above summary is taken from the abstract. You can read the full paper here.

Source: Science Direct

Via: Marginal Revolution

Put aside Tinder and get on the dating sites which match you according to your credit score. Luke Kawa reported on a study by the Federal Reserve which showed that a happy credit score is the key to a happy relationship:

• Those who have above average credit scores are 14% more likely to enter into a committed relationship.
• Couples with similarly high credit scores are 37% less likely to breakup in the third and fourth year of a relationship.
• Those that have a big difference in credit scores are 24% more likely to end their relationship between the second and fourth year of the relationship.
• It’s not the low credit score that drives breakups. They just seem to lead to low trustworthiness which drives actions that lead to breakups.
• Luckily while it’s not common for people to ask about credit scores on dates, people usually end up with partners that have similar credit scores.

Read other details from the study here.

Source: Bloomberg

Chris Weller outlined an observation about social etiquette:

• In general people seem to follow a “rule of three” in group conversations. As long as at least three people are listening to a speaker speak, the rest of the group feels comfortable taking out their phone and focusing on that.
• The aim seems to be to make sure that the person talking feels as if they’re being listened to and isn’t being ignored.
• This then makes it more socially acceptable to break away from the conversation and focus on notifications from a phone.

Read more here.

Source: Tech Insider

Charles Shafaieh wrote about the buskers, or street performers, of New York City:

• To maximize profits buskers can’t dress too nice – or else people will think they don’t need money. But they can’t be dirty either – or else the crowd will think of them as beggars.
• Thus buskers go for the simple – a plain clean shirt and perhaps jeans.
• Commuters value work ethic more than individuals. Those who are there at the same place at the same time every day will draw more contributions.
• For about six hours of work during the peak hours between 7 and 10am, and 4 and 7pm, a busker can make anywhere between $50 and $200.
• This could potentially make busking more lucrative than being popular on Spotify.
• Odd things like the level of terror threat, or the performer’s mindset can affect donations in a given day.
• If a crowd see’s one person giving money to a performer more tips will likely follow as the performer’s skill has thus been validated.
• Some of the buskers see what they do as genuine art. This is why they may play in narrow hallways where pedestrian traffic is low but acoustics are ideal.

Read more about the compositions that earn the most money, and other details here.

Source: Hopes & Fears

Where there are thousands of people in close proximity there is an untapped market. Ben Hubbard looked at market infrastructure springing up as refugees continue to make their way to Europe:

• In the coastal towns of North Africa, stores display lifejackets for sale on their mannequins.
• They also offer inflatable rafts and other flotation devices.
• Sadly many of these products are of low quality. Some of the lifejackets, for example, are made of a foam that absorb water rather than float on it.
• But the real money is filling boats. Migrants pay about $1,200 per seat on a boat. Children cost half.
• A raft can hold about 45 passengers, and after paying for commissions, the cost of boat and motor, and bribes, human smugglers can earn about $30,000 per boatload.
• Migrants are terrified of paying their lifesavings to get on a boat, only to have the money stolen from them. This is why the money is held in escrow accounts, and is only transferred once the crossing is complete.
• There are clauses in the contracts that allow agents to collect payment even if those on the boat drown.

Read more about this shadow economy over here.

Source: The New York Times

Via: Marginal Revolution