The Internet's Most Hated Bird
Endless Thread30 Elo 2024

The Internet's Most Hated Bird

Gulls are not beloved creatures. Consult social media, where they are deemed relentless, dirty pests who steal our food and crowd our beaches. As one TikTok user puts it, "Seagulls are the worst animals to ever exist."

Such hatred overlooks truths about this intelligent, charismatic animal, and it is masking a big problem: While gulls may seem like they are everywhere, many species are dying.

Endless Thread goes on a journey to reconsider the seagull.

You can learn more and see photos of the gulls of Appledore here.

Credits: This episode was written and produced by Dean Russell. Mix and sound design by Emily Jankowski. The hosts are Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson. It was edited by managing producer, Samata Joshi.

Jaksot(437)

Dinner and a (Slide) Show

Dinner and a (Slide) Show

Instead of a typical first date — dinner and light conversation, maybe — he presented 29 slides about one of his favorite movies. The internet loved it. But did his date? Credits: This episode was pr...

16 Helmi 202427min

Recess Therapy's Julian Shapiro-Barnum is skeptical of kids becoming social media stars

Recess Therapy's Julian Shapiro-Barnum is skeptical of kids becoming social media stars

The point of Julian Shapiro-Barnum's Recess Therapy, a video series where he interviews kids about life's bigger questions, was never to make the kids social media superstars. But that's exactly what ...

9 Helmi 202423min

Half a million eyes are on TikTok's "tunnel girl"

Half a million eyes are on TikTok's "tunnel girl"

In 2022, a TikTok creator who identifies herself as "Kala" began digging. What followed was an increasingly viral series of TikToks chronicling the efforts of Kala, who some on the internet dubbed "tu...

2 Helmi 202427min

The schism at the end of the tunnel

The schism at the end of the tunnel

The discovery of a secret tunnel attached to a Brooklyn synagogue earlier this month quickly went viral, fueling antisemitic conspiracy theories that long predate the internet. Endless Thread host Ben...

26 Tammi 202422min

Encore: The Faker

Encore: The Faker

Earlier this week, the New Hampshire Attorney General's office announced that it was investigating some suspicious robocalls urging residents not to vote in the state primary elections. The voice appe...

24 Tammi 202439min

Where's the Beef?

Where's the Beef?

What if vegetables are poison? What if, instead, humans evolved to consume an animal-based diet of steak, liver, brain, testicles, eggs, butter, and milk? Shirtless influencers on TikTok and Instagra...

19 Tammi 202453min

The Minnesota Timberwolves score NBA fandom in Brazil, but there's a kink

The Minnesota Timberwolves score NBA fandom in Brazil, but there's a kink

Rodrigo Barbosa runs social media for the NBA's Minnesota Timberwolves Brazilian fan club. He's fluent in Brazil's particularly zany brand of internet humor. But when one his weirdest tweets went vira...

12 Tammi 202431min

This episode is a sign from the universe

This episode is a sign from the universe

Manifestation, astrology, tarot — during tumultuous times, people are more likely to look for answers from the universe, and social media has caught on. People are manifesting their luck with the mant...

5 Tammi 202423min