99% Invisible

The massive consequence of parking minimums

Seven small inventions that changed the world in a big way

The scourge of bad closed captioning

The strange design history and modern resurgence of pinball

Best-selling author John Green and Roman Mars answer questions and give dubious advice

From scratchers to the Powerball, the lottery is the most popular form of gambling in the United States, even though the odds of winning a big jackpot is infinitesimally small.

Today the Netherlands has a reputation as a kind of bicycling paradise, but that was far from inevitable

The “panopticon” might be the best known prison concept in the world. It’s become the metaphor for the surveillance state, but very few actual prisons were built around this idea. Breda Dome is one of them.

The rise, fall, and unexpected second life of the crosscut saw is also the story of how America created the very concept of wilderness.

Two stories about the transformative power of silence from our friends at Twenty Thousand Hertz

Friction, tribology, and the complex art and science of lubrication

When online worlds end

The surprisingly long history of trying to use robots to call balls and strikes in baseball

The importance of humor and art in protesting (and ousting!) oppressive regimes

When LA punks were looking for a place to play in the late 1970s, Chinatown welcomed the unruly scene. But it was an uneasy alliance that led to fierce rivalries, hurt feelings, blatant racism, and broken toilets. At the center of it all was Esther Wong.

On Aug. 1, 1942, the nation’s recording studios went silent. Musicians were fed up with the new technologies threatening their livelihoods, so they refused to record until they got their fair share.

In the 20th century, Iowa high school girls basketball was HUGE but it was not the game we know today

How an ultra-marathon called The Comrades became a national obsession in South Africa and a model for inclusion during some of the most divided moments in the country's history

The shifting symbolism of Brazil's iconic yellow soccer jersey

We’re kicking off the new year at 99pi with a fresh installment of mini-stories, including: what lies at the intersection of a street and a road; the most unlikely of theme parks; and the evolution of ancient alleyways in Beijing, China.

A Balikbayan box is a huge cardboard box (often weighing over 100 pounds) that Filipinos living all over the world send to family members who are still living in the Philippines

It's Mini-Story Season! You’ll hear about a very, very long escalator! Beavers dropping from the sky!  We’ll hear from Janet, Miss Jackson, if you’re nasty! And a visit from the queen!

If you’ve ever flipped through the radio dial — not satellite, not podcasts, but good old-fashioned AM and FM radio — you may have noticed something. Right wing radio talk is everywhere.

The epic tale of the Hollywood celebrity mountain lion known as P-22

There is a subset of real life superheroes who are more focused on things like picking up trash and taking on civic issues than catching criminals in alleys

The incredible story of the black men who became America's first paramedics

Roman and Kurt are back with another series of railroad tales. All aboard!

Avery Trufelman's Articles of Interest is back!

Jody Rosen joins us to talk about the evolution of the bicycle, how it became a cultural phenomenon in the late 1800s, then a symbol of protest, and a lightning rod for political controversy. And we’ll find out what’s next for the bike, in a world built for cars.

Reporter/producer Gillian Jacobs (Community, Winning Time) takes us on a stroll on the Walk of Fame, a 1.3 mile monument which chronicles Hollywood history and the vicissitudes of fame itself

The history and significance and of the much maligned vuvuzela

Jamaica is famous around the world for its music, including genres like ska, dub, and reggae. It’s tempting to think that the powerful amplifiers and giant speakers at the dance parties were designed to perfectly capture Jamaica’s indigenous sounds. But it’s actually the other way around. Those speakers and amps came first.

The jackalope is a mythical mascot of the American West – inspiring an absolute river of trinkets and songs and whiskies and postcards and tall tales.

On this special feature episode, President Bill Clinton interviews 99% Invisible host and creator Roman Mars.

How did we get to a point where "search" is failing us?

North Korea's state-run design studio has long been a prolific maker of statues around the world, particularly in Africa

The infrastructure, zoning, and cultural factors that make the hit Japanese TV program Old Enough, where toddlers go on errands by themselves, possible

There's a particular one-kilohertz tone that is universally understood to be covering up inappropriate words on radio and TV. But there are other options, too, like silence -- so why did this particular *bleep* sound become ubiquitous?

We're sharing the latest episode of Roman's other show What Roman Mars Can Learn About Con Law, your guide to the US Constitution and the Supreme Court.

For the love of peat

In the final episode of our vernacular spectacular anniversary series, 99pi producers and friends of the show will be sharing more stories of regional architecture–some close to home, some on remote islands– that capture our imagination and inspire us to look deeper.

The utilitarian and "ugly" architecture that is beautiful to us

We often tell stories about how people shape the built world, but on this milestone 500th episode, we're telling stories about how the built world has shaped us (with good history and facts thrown in, because we're us).

The history of taking plants that grow naturally in one place, and moving them halfway around the world to an entirely different place with a different, often inhospitable, climate-- and then keeping them alive by growing them in potting soil that we bought at Home Depot.

The Octagonal House fad and self-improvement in the 1800s

The story of a long, skinny island east of Russia's mainland and the ethnic Koreans who have had no choice but to call it home for decades.

Wild Rice has long played an important role in Ojibwe cultures, but last year, it took on a new role: plaintiff in a court case.

No teenager in America in the 1980s could avoid the gravitational pull of the mall, not even author Alexandra Lange. In her new book, Meet Me by the Fountain, Lange writes about how malls were conceptually born out of a lack of space for people to convene in American suburbs

Betsy Ross sewed the first American flag. At least, that's what we were taught in school. But when historians go searching…there’s no proof to be found.

Priceless cultural artifacts have been plundered and sold for hundreds of years. You can find these relics in museums and in private collections. In recent years, with the advent of online marketplaces, researchers have begun to find a lot of artifacts for sale on the web. And it turns out, ISIS profits from much of it.

The educational toys that changed the world

What zoning out middle-sized housing options does to a city

Some of the most ambitious, fascinating, and downright crazy trains that the world has ever seen.

Bonus episode: Roman Mars on Blank Check with Griffin and David talking about The Quick and The Dead (Sam Raimi, 1995)

Data is the lifeblood of public health, and has been since the beginning of the field. We take a look at data gathering in regards to public health from the 1600s to today and how it might change in the future.

The evolution of the "international" section of the grocery store and how some products stay there forever and some break out to blend in with similar products throughout the market

We visit the site of one of the most infamous lost expeditions and the home of all the lost luggage.

Every year in the spring, small towns throughout New England host their annual town meeting. Town meetings take place in high school gyms or town halls, and anyone can come.

While urban parks are safe havens for birds, parks are often surrounded by condos and hotels and office buildings with floor-to-ceiling windows. And these all-glass building facades are the absolute worst for migrating birds. Because unlike people, birds don’t really understand glass.

So why don't we have mouth Roombas? Is the universe full of chickens? What scientific advances are happening? What was the first internet purchase? How do I convince my parents to let me check a bag? What is Twitter? What's the difference between a telescope and a camera? Are sea monkeys natural? Hank Green and Roman Mars have answers!

In February 2021, Texas suffered an intense winter storm and the state power grid had a catastrophic failure that lasted many freezing cold days. To understand the situation, one has to look at the history of the grid, and how Texas came to be what we call an “energy island.”

Natalie de Blois contributed to some of the most iconic Modernist works created for corporate America, all while raising four children.

We are two decades into the 21st century, yet when it comes to life online, large segments of America are still living in the 1900s.

How eminent domain was used to enforce segregation in a suburb in St. Louis and beyond

The Columbia Journalism School recently announced the 16 winners of the 2022 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards, including According to Need, a project of 99% Invisible produced by Katie Mingle.

There's a small neighborhood within Shenzhen, China that is known for mass-producing copies of the most celebrated works of Western art, all painted quickly and by hand. The place is called Dafen Village.

How an airport in a small town on the west coast of Ireland changed the world economy

People have been going back and forth about what makes a healthy and productive office since there have been offices. The 20th century was full of misbegotten fads and productivity innovations that continue to this day, even when the whole notion of what it means to be in an office has shifted during the pandemic.

The most high stakes game of roshambo ever, plus a SF Muni bus driver breaks down the runaway bus fight scene in Shang-Chi.

Origin story and symbolism are two of the most important ingredients of any superhero universe. But what happens when both of those pieces of a universe get flipped on their head?

This is the third and final episode of this batch of mini-stories and the 14th volume overall and it’s a good one- we have surprisingly architectural sport commentary, Ben Franklin’s role in Daylight Saving Time, and the origin story of the fire pole.

We're kicking off the new year at 99pi with a fresh installment of mini-stories, including: a strange collision of mundane infrastructure and political insurrection; a graphic design history mystery dating back to the 1980s; what may be the most hated architectural design of 2021; and a record-breaking album cover design so cutting edge it cost more money to make than to buy.

It's that time of year again! When 99pi producers and friends of the show join Roman to tell shorter stories, many of which have been sitting on our idea shelves, just waiting for this moment. Our first set of minis delves into the surprisingly controversial logo of a major sports league; a wild goose chase into erroneous statistics; the largely forgotten arts competitions of the Olympic Games; and a Modernist penguin pool that is beloved by preservationists but not so adored by actual penguins. And this is the first batch of our turn-of-the-year mini-stories. Tune back in for more minis at the beginning of 2022!

Slovenia has just over 2 million people and is visited by, not one, not two, but three different "santas" every festive season. But it hasn't always been this way. Each Santa has had his moment in the spotlight—each in a different period of Slovenia’s complicated history. And in order to have a Christmas season that reflects that history and speaks to all Slovenians, you need three magical men.

How a team of community leaders used cold, sharp strategy, flipping the logic of Jim Crow housing segregation on its head to build a suburban Black mecca

In much of the western world, alphabetical order is simply a default we take for granted. It’s often the one we try first -- or the one we use as a last resort when all the other ordering methods fail. It’s boring, but it works, and it’s so ingrained that it’s hard to imagine not using it.

The French bulldog is now the second most popular breed in America. Their cute features, portable size, and physical features make for a dog that can easily travel and doesn't require a lot of exercise. But these characteristics sometimes have a detrimental effect on the dog's health.

How lifting weights became a core component to home fitness

Even if we think of the camera as a neutral technology, it is not. In the vast spectrum of human colors, photographic tools and practices tend to prioritize the lighter end of that range.

Born in 1872, American architect and engineer Julia Morgan designed hundreds of buildings over her prolific career, famous for her work on incredible structures like the Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California.

At a glance, the border between the United States and Canada would seem to be at the friendlier end of the international boundary spectrum. But even though the US-Canada border is now pretty tame, when two countries touch each other over a stretch of 5500 miles, it can result in some surprisingly weird disputes, misunderstandings, geographical quirks and ...really good stories.

Margarine is yellow, like butter, but it hasn't always been. At times and in places, it has been a bland white, or even a dull pink. These strange variations were a byproduct of 150-year war to destroy margarine, and everything that it stands for. During this epic fight for survival, margarine has had to reinvent itself, over and over again.

Rioters carried many familiar flags during the January 6th insurrection at the United States Capitol -- Confederate, MAGA, as well as some custom-made ones like a flag of Trump looking like Rambo. Except for onlookers who were already familiar with the design, it would have been easy to overlook one particular bright yellow flag with three red horizontal stripes across the center. This was the flag of South Vietnam.

When Sears sold mail order houses that you assembled yourself

When it comes to English spelling and pronunciation, there is plenty of rhyme and very little reason. But what is the reason for that? Why among all European languages is English so uniquely chaotic today?

The weirdness of Presidential libraries

The great Jacob Goldstein, author of Money: The True Story of a Made Up Thing, stops by to tell us two stories about the design of paper currency around the world. First, the story of the making of the Euro banknotes, the design of which was supposed to unify Europe and not rely on any one country's national heroes or monuments. Then we learn about China's early pioneering experiments in paper currency, hundreds of years before it caught on in the rest of the world.

Axolotls are nature’s great regenerators. They are able to grow back not just their tails, but also legs, arms, even parts of vital organs, including their hearts. This remarkable ability is one of several traits that turned the axolotl into a scientific superstar. The axolotl is one of the most abundant laboratory animals in biology. They can be found swimming in tanks at universities all around the world. But in the wild they’ve only ever been found in one place: Mexico City.

How the science of color made us modern

What does water mean to you? In this feature, author Bonnie Tsui (Why We Swim), actress Joy Bryant, submarine pilot Erika Bergman, figure skater Elladj Baldé, 85-year-old synchronized swimmer Barbara Eison-White, professional mermaid Olivia Gonzales, and others share stories about the many ways water influences our lives.

When Roman Mars and Kurt Kohlstedt were promoting The 99% Invisible City in late 2020, one question came up over and over again in conversations and interviews about our built environment: in what ways will the COVID pandemic change cities long term? Realistically, it's hard to answer a question about the future while in the midst of a crisis, but we can look to and extrapolate from precedents, like: designs born out of past disasters.

Officially titled The Book of Tasty and Healthy Food, it was often known simply as “Kniga” (translated: "book") because it was one of the only cookbooks to exist in the Soviet Union. The volume is peppered with glossy photographs of really lavish spreads and packed with text as well. There are recipes for lentils and crab salad and how to cook buckwheat nine different ways. But this book was meant to do so much more than show people how to make certain dishes — it's a Stalinist document aimed at addressing hunger itself in the USSR.

Britt Young, the author of the article "I have one of the most advanced prosthetic arms in the world — and I hate it" guides us through the highs and lows of high tech prosthetics.

Hanko are the carved stamp seals that people in Japan often use in place of signatures. Hanko seals are made from materials ranging from plastic to jade and are about the size of a tube of lipstick

Throughout its reign, the British Empire stole a lot of stuff. Today those objects are housed in genteel institutions across the UK and the world. They usually come with polite plaques. The Australian podcast Stuff the British Stole is a six episode series about the not-so-polite history behind a few of those objects.

Every year, fights break out on airplanes. Jim Salzman and Michael Heller are law professors and the authors of a new book called Mine! How the Hidden Rules of Ownership Control Our Lives. According to Salzman and Heller, confusing ownership rules are often the result of poor ownership design. This is true not just for airplane seats, but also for battles over digital privacy, climate change, and wealth inequality.

In the United Kingdom, the freedom to walk through private land is known as “the right to roam.” The movement to win this right was started in the 1930s by a rebellious group of young people who called themselves “ramblers” and spent their days working in the factories of Manchester, England.

The Red, Black, and Green flag was invented to unite Black people all over the world living under racial repression.

Good Luck Flags and the search for the perfect flag for Antarctica