The world we live in is built on computer power.From the smartphones that so many of us can't put down to the global banking ...

True confession time: I wasn’t born a bookworm—I was bribed into becoming one. When I was 8, I entered my library’s summer reading contest, not out of any love of literature but because I refused to ...

In 2017, psychologist Ulrike Willinger conducted a study at the Medical University of Vienna on the subject of “gallows humor.” Through the experiment, Willinger’s researchers found that people who ...

Humor has long been seen as a “soft skill,” useful for easing awkward Zoom moments or sharing a laugh with colleagues. But CU Boulder researchers Tony Kong and Peter McGraw argue it’s far more than ...

In 1991, a simple line appeared in Broom, a Lithuanian satire and humor journal. “A shortest joke: Communism,” it said. A one-liner to celebrate the collapse of the Soviet Union. Four years since ...

Create an account to access more content and features on IEEE Spectrum, including the ability to save articles to read later, download Spectrum Collections, and participate in conversations with ...

What happens when the government treats online "play money" like real securities? In this episode of "The Trial Lawyer's Handbook," litigation attorney Dan Small recounts a civil enforcement action ...

What if the tool you rely on every day could do more than just meet your needs, it could transform the way you work? For programmers, a laptop isn’t just a device; it’s the foundation of creativity, ...

Scrolling through our feeds and getting our daily dose of laughs may feel effortless, but the behind-the-scenes work that makes it all possible definitely isn't. All the thinking, coding, and ...

My daughter, Alice, is almost two, and quite funny. Although she can say short sentences—“I need cake!”—her humor isn’t particularly verbal. Instead, she giggles while stumbling around in grownup ...

Over his decades-long career as a late-night comedy TV writer, Joe Toplyn has crafted jokes for the likes of David Letterman and Jay Leno. He has instructed adult-level courses on comedy writing and ...

Perl was once everywhere. Or at least it felt that way. Around the turn of the millennium, it seemed that almost every website was built on the back of this scripting language. It processed massive ...