For those hoping to impress others online, there are rent-a-friend services in Japan aimed specifically at social media users.

“Was The Morningside Post website hacked?” a friend asked me. The site, which I once co-edited, seemed to have died, and returned as a zombie version of itself. About five months ago, my successors at TMP—the student-run news publication at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs—accidentally…

Something I like is popular now, and that is bad. Thanks to GIF databases like Giphy, the reaction GIF, once a careful and elaborate art form, is now a bland mass market dominated by a handful of outlet-approved celebrity faces. Today Giphy sped up the medium’s slide into mediocrity by adding view counts to GIFs from…

Sometimes, slow internet is the universe’s way of telling you to go play outside. Other times, it’s the universe’s cruel joke to destroy your productivity. Here are 10 ways to troubleshoot, fix, or just survive a slow internet connection.

Anissa Weier, one of two teenage girls charged with the 2014 stabbing of a classmate, Payton Leutner, on behalf of the “Slenderman,” a mythological monster created on an internet forum, has pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree homicide as a party to a crime, with use of a deadly weapon. The Associated Press …

Certain anime studios—and even certain creators—have signature moves. Hallmarks or calling cards, if you will. Let’s have a look!

For the past week, some people in Japan have been buying McDonald’s hamburgers and piercing them with drinking straws.

Today thousands of websites are protesting the government’s recent threats against net neutrality, a harbinger of the internet apocalypse. Internet behemoths like Google, Amazon (which owns Twitch) and Reddit as well as smaller sites like Ifixit and Plays.TV are participating in today’s day of action against internet…

In the 15 years I worked at Toys “R” Us, I sometimes leaked information about video game sales and posted them on message boards. I even took games home early to try them and then post impressions, which was very much against the rules. I did this because I’ve always been excited about video games and because,…

Ask anyone who’s ever seen an adult movie in Japan. Or, at least, anyone who has ever spent some time on the internet. More than likely, they’ll know this swimming pool.

In Japan, there is an infamous gay porno called A Midsummer Night’s Lewd Dream. The flick has spawned seemingly endless memes online in Japan. It appears like one of its stars is in the Nintendo Switch’s Photo Album set-up screen.

This week, a tag appeared on Twitter for wrestling photos that look so unreal you’d think they had to be Photoshopped.

The Roll Safe meme, in which logically sound but absurd advice is accompanied by someone pointing to their head with a knowing half grin, has slowly been building up steam since late January. But late last week the Internet joke hit critical mass in the gaming world when Nintendo took it to a new plateau of absurdity…

Last fall, “PPAP” singer Pikotaro claimed he hadn’t made any money off his viral sensation. A trademark squatter in Japan certainly isn’t helping things.

If you grew up on the internet, Homestar Runner represents a time when the world wide web felt a little bit smaller. It was hilariously sarcastic, but unlike the rest of the Flash landscape in the early 2000s, Homestar was never hateful or cheap.

It’s called “I Like Orange Juice.” But does the tune answer whether or not Pikotaro likes pineapple juice? Nope!

For the past 11 years, an eternity in internet time, Reddit has touted itself—repeatedly, and loudly—as the place to have “authentic conversations” online. For a variety of reasons, that sentiment has always rang hollow. Now, Reddit, in its goal to be a laissez-faire haven of (relatively) free expression, has been…