Boing Boing

Boing Boing

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Boing Boing, June 16, 2026
Marching-band mysteries, a wind phone, and CrankGPT
 • Boing Boing
Screw this light bulb in and it serves banned books
Connect to an open WiFi network, and a captive portal opens a shelf of banned ebooks.
 • Ellsworth Toohey
The poster child for psychedelic mushrooms is named after a country that doesn’t use it
In 1906, a U.S.
 • Ellsworth Toohey
It took Reddit four years to identify the sixth face on a set of curtains
In January 2020, a Finnish Reddit user posted a photo of curtains printed with eight celebrity faces and asked for help identifying them.
 • Ellsworth Toohey
In 1980, 300 children collapsed at a marching band competition and no one knows why
On Sunday, July 13, 1980, around 500 children from 11 marching bands gathered at the Hollinwell Showground near Kirkby-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, for…
 • Ellsworth Toohey
The turnspit dog was bred to run on a wheel and roast meat, then went extinct
The Turnspit Dog was a short-legged, long-bodied breed kept in English kitchens to run inside a wooden wheel connected to a roasting spit.
 • Ellsworth Toohey and Boing Boing
In 1810, a prankster sent 4,000 letters to flood one London address with chimney sweeps, coffins, and the Lord Mayor
Theodore Hook is a historical figure whose eccentricity defined his period.
 • Ellsworth Toohey
San Francisco’s wind phone lets visitors talk to lost loved ones
Not every phone is meant to connect two living people.
 • Popkin
Video shows a rain curtain splitting a street into two worlds
A video of this weird-looking phenomenon shows a person standing at the razor-thin boundary between clear skies and a rain shower.
 • Popkin
Ghislaine Maxwell reportedly finds her mean-girls table in prison
Raw Story, citing the Daily Mail, says Maxwell has formed a “highly secretive” group at Federal Prison Camp Bryan in Texas, where she allegedly whispers…
 • Jason Weisberger
Exploring Grand Theft Auto 4’s hidden history
You have to promise to pretend to be a little surprised when I tell you that Grand Theft Auto 4‘s Liberty City was based on real-life New York.
 • Grant St. Clair
Saul Goodman returns to celebrate America’s 250th
It’s a funny world when Breaking Bad‘s comic relief lawyer Saul Goodman has more integrity than the sitting President.
 • Grant St. Clair
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