Note To Self

Manoush visits Etsy's Usability Lab to figure out why she might buy six sweaters she never wears.

Tech entrepreneur Tristan Harris imagines technology without constant notifications - and a funding system that incentivizes techies to build it.

A summer version of our Bored and Brilliant project, designed to get you rethinking your relationship with your smartphone. Works equally well on vacation, or when you just WISH you were on vacation.

"Book of Numbers" author Joshua Cohen answers the question: If we know people are only going to skim, how does that change the way we write?

There's a not-so-crazy chance that we'll have the opportunity to vacation to space in our lifetimes. That said, commercial space travel is a high-stakes proposition — one that has become even riskier and more expensive in recent months. Plus: It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, and you pee in a bag.

Author and introvert advocate extraordinaire Susan Cain answers a listener's question about finding quiet places in a buzzing world.

Silicon Valley thinks Gwyneth Paltrow might be onto something, and they're creating the data sets to prove it.

Daniel Rigmaiden is a criminal. A very hard to capture criminal. It took the use of a secret police weapon that sent beams through the walls of his apartment to track him down. But, despite long odds, he figured out the secret. And his discovery has changed how we understand citizen surveillance. A collaboration with Radiolab.

Reading on screens is changing your brain and making it harder to finish a thick book. Here's why it's happening and some ideas for what to do about it. 

Turnitin and programs like it are used to fight plagiarism in a third of high schools and half of colleges nationwide. The system is pretty much air tight... but it also reveals a pretty fundamental truth: It's tough to say anything new about Romeo and Juliet, especially when you're a teenager responding to the same old prompt.

To introduce Note to Self — we're bringing you an episode that is about exactly that: the self. Meet Crystal Knows, an email-writing service that takes "personalization" up a notch.

New Tech City got a new name! We're now called Note to Self. And we're glad you're here. Listen here for more on our renaming.

Easy to find, but also easy to miss, pro-eating disorder websites are all over the internet. But what should we do about them? 

We talk with a father of four diagnosed with adult-onset ADHD, struggling to function as a tech executive in an increasingly distracting world.

There's something about video games that makes them a magnet for kids questioning their gender identity. Is it a safe space?

Three useful tips for any working woman, or anyone who employs women, from Laszlo Bock, Google’s head of Human Resources.

Could smartwatches make us less addicted to our phones? Listen to this techies's argument for using more tech to beat back a tech obsession. 

IBM's Watson won Jeopardy. Now, it wants to win your trust in the kitchen — and beyond. This week, we test out the premise of cognitive computing. And cook an avocado.

We spent weeks talking with teachers, parents and ed tech experts all over the country. Here's what we've learned about learning today. 

Teachers are using apps in class, raising privacy issues for kids and parents. Classroom management app ClassDojo has been thrust to the front of an conversation about student data and privacy stretching far beyond little monster avatars. On this week's episode, we talk with Sam Chaudhary, co-founder of ClassDojo, Jim Steyer, CEO of Common Sense Media, and a community of parents and teachers about the obligations — legal and otherwise — techies have to today's kids.