Tom Vanderbilt

Denver-based startup Boom already has orders for its commercial supersonic planes. But is supersonic travel really the future, or best left to nostalgia?

First of all, you have to stop thinking and kind of become a robot.

City transportation ecosystems are suddenly getting more diverse, creating an opportunity to (finally) rethink the car.

I picked up the controller to keep tabs on my fifth-grader. What I got was a window into her world—and a lesson in 21st-century fatherhood.

What we talk about when we talk about the science and psychology of flavor.

Photo: Cody Pickens If you liked 1960s Star Trek, the first non-Trek title that Netflix is likely to suggest to you is the original Mission: Impossible series (the one with the cool Lalo Schifrin soundtrack). Streaming the latest Doctor Who is likely to net you the supernatural TV drama Being Human (the UK version). Watch […]

From Game of Thrones to the new Arrested Development, television is better than ever. And it's not just a lucky accident. Turns out that networks and advertisers are using all-new metrics to design hit shows. Under these new rules, Twitter feeds are as important as ratings, fresh ideas beat tired formulas, and niche stars can be as valuable as big names. Case in point: Mad Men and Community’s Alison Brie.

Autonomous vehicles are here now, racking up miles on public roads. We talk to six experts about where we go from here.

Google's self-driving Prius hybrids trace their lineage to an idea that captured the public's imagination in 1939. A look back at autonomous cars through the ages.

Photo: Bruce Gilden Dressed in architect black and sporting dreadlocks, Mitchell Joachim isn’t your average Whole Foods envirogeek. For one thing, he speaks in an intense staccato punctuated with words like peristaltic and epiphetic. And don’t get him started on sustainability. “I don’t like the term,” he says. “It’s not evocative enough. You don’t want your […]