554- Devil in the Details

From99% Invisible

Start listening View podcast show

554- Devil in the Details

From99% Invisible

ratings:

Length:

34 minutes

Released:

Sep 26, 2023

Format:

Podcast episode

Description

This week we have two stories featuring the devil.An infamous "training video" teaching cops how to spot and stop "satanic crimes." And a stretch of highway with the misfortune of being officially named US Route 666.Devil in the Details

Released:

Sep 26, 2023

Format:

Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

Design is everywhere in our lives, perhaps most importantly in the places where we've just stopped noticing. 99% Invisible is a weekly exploration of the process and power of design and architecture. From award winning producer Roman Mars. Learn more at 99percentinvisible.org.

Skip carousel

99% Invisible-19- Liberation Squares plus NY Dick: In a recent piece from Urban Omnibus, Vishaan Chakrabarti (Professor at the Graduate School for Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University), wrote about how urban open spaces contribute to political change, by 99% Invisible
11 min listen
99% Invisible-10- 99% Sound and Feel: Chris Downey explains it like this, “Beethoven continued to write music, even some of his best music, after he lost his hearing…What’s more preposterous, composing music you can’t hear, or designing architecture you can’t see? by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-06- 99% Symbolic: Before I moved to Chicago in 2005, I didn’t even know cities had their own flags. In Chicago, the city flag is everywhere. It’s incorporated into all different aspects of city life and the design elements are used on businesses, … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-02- 99% 180: In the beginning, former AIA-SF president Henrik Bull and the Transamerica Pyramid did not get along. The building was an affront to late 1960’s modernist ideals. It was silly. It looked like a dunce cap. Its large scale had no … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-08- 99% Free Parking: It’s weird how much anxiety comes from parking in a city. Beyond the stress of looking for parking, you must contend with the frequently unreliable meters. The signage can be indecipherable. As a point of interaction with your municipality, by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-09- 99% Private: Privately Owned Public Open Spaces, or POPOS, are these little gardens, terraces, plazas, and seating areas that are private property, but are mandated for public use. City planners require developers to add these little “parks” to their buildings to m... by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-22- Free Speech Monument: In 1989, a group called the Berkeley Art Project decided to hold a national public art competition to create a monument that would commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Free Speech Movement, which began on the University of California Berkeley … Cont... by 99% Invisible
8 min listen
99% Invisible-20- Nikko Concrete Commando: In 2001, Delfin Vigil was walking the streets of San Francisco and ran across the name “Nikko” carved into the concrete sidewalk. After seeing Nikko once, Delfin began to see the name everywhere. One block after another, there he was … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
7 min listen
99% Invisible-05- 99% Forgotten: At the top of Mt. Olympus in San Francisco, on what was once thought to be the geographic center of the city, is a pedestal for a statue that isn’t there. There’s no marker. You can just make out the … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-09X-99% Doomed: 99% Invisible Extra! NASA is figuring out how to take the next great leap into space. The difficulty is, if we leap to Mars, we might not make it back. This is a story I produced last year (Summer 2009) … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
12 min listen
99% Invisible-15- Sounds of the Artificial World: Without all the beeps and chimes, without sonic feedback, all of your modern conveniences would be very hard to use. If a device and its sounds are designed correctly, it creates a special “theater of the mind” that users completely … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-07- 99% Alien: Humans need a few basic things to survive- air, water, food, heat, shelter- but just surviving isn’t really enough. We also need familiarity, a little comfort, interaction, a small place of our own. When it comes to designing space habitat … Continue r... by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-17- Concrete Furniture: The New City Hall, designed by Finnish architect Viljo Revell, was the first modern, concrete, civic building in Toronto. When it opened in 1965, it stood out very prominently in the traditional Victorian fabric of the city. by 99% Invisible
7 min listen
99% Invisible-01- 99% Noise: This episode of 99% Invisible is all about acoustic design, the city soundscape, and how to make listening in shared spaces pleasant (or at the very least, possible). It features an interview with Dennis Paoletti from Shen Milsom & Wilke. by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-11- 99% Undesigned: Almost everything in modern life is designed to waste energy. The whole system evolved on a false premise that petroleum is cheap and plentiful and will be that way forever. The awesome Lisa Margonelli, author of Oil on The Brain … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-18- Check Cashing Stores: A few years ago, journalist Douglas McGray learned that the largest chain of check cashing stores in Southern California, Nix Check Cashing, was being bought by the nation’s largest credit union, Kinecta. The credit union thought it had something to … ... by 99% Invisible
6 min listen
99% Invisible-40- Billy Possum: It’s totally unfair. Hydrox cookies came out four years before the introduction of Oreos, but Hydrox could never shake the image that it was a cheap knock-off, an also-ran. As a consumer product, it’s completely out of your hands if … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
13 min listen
99% Invisible-13- Maps: I’m sorry, but if you don’t love maps, I don’t think we can be friends anymore. Maps are amazing. They are art and story. A representation of where we are and where we wish we could be. They’ve always had … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-12- 99% Guilt Free: “Sustainable Design is a design philosophy that seeks to maximize the quality of the built environment, while minimizing or eliminating the negative impact to the natural environment.” -Jason F. McLennan, The Philosophy of Sustainable Design I like McL... by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-14- Periodic Table: Everyone knows it when they see it. The classic “castle with turrets” periodic table is a beautiful and concise icon that contains a great deal of amazing information, if you only know how to read it. And even if you … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
6 min listen
99% Invisible-03- 99% Reality (only): There’s not much that we can do about all the physical matter that’s been designed and built by someone else. It is the way it is. But with the advent of portable devices with GPS, a compass, and a network, … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-31- Feltron Annual Report: Nicholas Felton is an information designer. Since 2005, he has tabulated thousands upon thousands of tiny measurements in his life and designed stunning graphs and maps and created concise infographics that detail that year’s activities. by 99% Invisible
10 min listen
99% Invisible-13x-Game Over (Snap Judgment): 99% Invisible Extra! The tape rolls as we witness the tearful end of a perfect online world. This is a piece I did for Snap Judgment, based on a story from Robert Ashley’s brilliant A Life Well Wasted internet radio … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
12 min listen
99% Invisible-27- Bridge to the Sky: There are rules that dicate what you can build and how. Rules of physics and rules of men who sit on various bureaucratic boards and bodies. These rules dictated that if silk magnate John Noble Stearns wanted to build one … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-43- Accidental Music of Imperfect Escalators: “There’s a secret jazz seeping from Washington’s aging Metro escalators – those anemic metal walkways that fill our transit system…they honk and bleat and squawk…why are you still wearing those earbuds?” -Chris Richards, by 99% Invisible
8 min listen
99% Invisible-28- Movie Title Sequences: More and more I’m finding that the first 2-3 minutes of a movie are my favorite part of the film. My life is devoted to the beautiful expression of information, which is why film title sequences hold a special place … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
10 min listen
99% Invisible-04- 99% Details: It’s a stick with bristles poking out of it. It doesn’t even qualify as a simple machine, but the careful thought and design that went into the creation of the modern, angled bristle, fat handled toothbrush shows just how much … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
5 min listen
99% Invisible-19X- RJDJ Reactive Music: This week, the radio audience heard episode #10, but for you web and podcast listeners, I have a story I did about a year and a half ago, about the reactive music app called RJDJ. I did this piece for … Continue reading → by 99% Invisible
10 min listen
99% Invisible-16- A Designed Language: The idea is simple and quite beautiful: if we all shared a second, politically neutral language, people of all different nations and cultures could communicate freely and easily, and it would foster international understanding and peace. by 99% Invisible
6 min listen
99% Invisible-24- The Capitol Columns: If you were present for any of the presidential inaugurations, from Andrew Jackson to Dwight D. Eisenhower, you saw the solemn oath of office taken between twenty-two smooth, sandstone columns at the East Portico of the U.S. Capitol Building. by 99% Invisible
7 min listen

More Episodes from 99% Invisible

Skip carousel

579- Towers of Silence: How the loss of vultures in India has put an ancient burial tradition in crisis by 99% Invisible
71 min listen
The Power Broker #04: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: Featuring the U.S. representative for New York's 14th congressional district, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and covering the second section of Part 4, chapters 16-20. by 99% Invisible
160 min listen
578- Anything's Pastable: Eat Sauté Love: Dan Pashman embarks on an epic trip across Italy in search of lesser-known pasta dishes — and to learn about the evolution of pasta more broadly. by 99% Invisible
45 min listen
577- The Society of Ambiance Makers and Elegant Persons: Bright, flamboyant central African fashion by 99% Invisible
35 min listen
576- Chambre de Bonne: The history of the chambre de bonne, the tiny French apartment type that may be, finally, on the way out. by 99% Invisible
33 min listen
Roman Mars Describes Athens GA As It Is: A 99pi guide to some of our favorite design features of Athens, Georgia. by 99% Invisible
37 min listen
575- Autism Plesantville: How to accommodate autism in the built world by 99% Invisible
33 min listen
574- The Monster Under the Sink: The garbage disposer and the dream of a garbage-free city by 99% Invisible
27 min listen
The Power Broker #03: David Sims: Featuring Blank Check co-host and The Atlantic movie critic David Sims covering the first section of Part 4, chapters 11-15 by 99% Invisible
127 min listen
573- Toyetic: The constant and sometimes fraught back and forth between cartoons and toys, as exemplified by Transformers and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by 99% Invisible
39 min listen
572- WARNING: This Podcast Contains Chemicals Known to the State of California to Cause Cancer or Other Reproductive Harm: Understanding the clunky Prop 65 warnings on products by 99% Invisible
43 min listen
Roman Mars Describes Santa Fe As It Is: A 99pi guide to some of our favorite design features of Santa Fe. by 99% Invisible
33 min listen
438- The Real Book [rebroadcast]: Since the mid-1970s, almost every jazz musician has owned a copy of the same book and originally it was a totally unlicensed publication by 99% Invisible
42 min listen
Significant Others: A Sneak Peek at the Woman Behind Benedict Arnold’s Betrayal: It’s been said that history is written by the person at the typewriter. But who did the person who made history depend on? by 99% Invisible
7 min listen
571- You Are What You Watch: How much film and television shapes us as individuals and as a society, far beyond what we give it credit for by 99% Invisible
31 min listen
The Power Broker #2: Jamelle Bouie: Featuring New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie covering Part 3. by 99% Invisible
105 min listen
570- The White Castle System of Eating Houses: How White Castle invented fast food by 99% Invisible
43 min listen
569- Between the Blocks: The interblock parks of Sofia, Bulgaria that are caught between old failed communism and new hyper capitalism by 99% Invisible
34 min listen
568- Don't Forget to Remember: There are memorials to lost fishermen, lost astronauts, even lost members of Lynyrd Skynyrd. What should a COVID pandemic memorial look like? by 99% Invisible
40 min listen
Roman Mars Describes Chicago As It Is: A 99pi guide to some of our favorite design features of Chicago by 99% Invisible
37 min listen
567- The Double Kick: The design evolution of the seemingly simple, but not all that simple, skateboard by 99% Invisible
52 min listen
Power Broker #01: Robert Caro: Featuring author Robert Caro covering The Introduction, Part 1, and Part 2. by 99% Invisible
93 min listen
566- Imitation Nation: The fake villages and role players used to train US soldiers by 99% Invisible
35 min listen
565- Mini-Stories: Volume 18: Upside-down construction, the linguistics of filler, and a fire that has been burning...and will burn... for decades. by 99% Invisible
35 min listen
470- Another Visit from the Three Santas of Slovenia: Mapping the long history of Slovenia onto the three "Santas' that visit each year by 99% Invisible
39 min listen
564- Mini-Stories: Volume 17: We have a year-end mix of short stories about a rogue architect, spooky kitchens, a hundred year old music streaming service, and the crazy way the French tried to make telling time less crazy by 99% Invisible
48 min listen
563- Empire of the Sum: The storied evolution of pocket calculation by 99% Invisible
34 min listen
562- Breaking Down The Power Broker: Roman Mars and Elliott Kalan are starting The Power Broker book club that will run through all of 2024 as bonus episodes. This introductory episode features Conan O'Brien. by 99% Invisible
44 min listen
344- The Known Unknown [rebroadcast]: The tradition of the Tomb of the Unknown goes back only about a century, but it has become one of the most solemn and reverential monuments. by 99% Invisible
45 min listen
561- Long Strange Tape: A band that was never meant to be recorded and a personal recorder that was never designed to capture music came together and were somehow perfect for each other by 99% Invisible
34 min listen

Related podcast episodes

Skip carousel

495- Meet Us by the Fountain: 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 by 99% Invisible
36 min listen
566. Why Is It So Hard (and Expensive) to Build Anything in America?: Most industries have become more productive over time. But not construction! We identify the causes — and possible solutions. (Can you say ... “prefab”?) by Freakonomics Radio
55 min listen
571- You Are What You Watch: How much film and television shapes us as individuals and as a society, far beyond what we give it credit for by 99% Invisible
31 min listen
491- The Missing Middle: What zoning out middle-sized housing options does to a city by 99% Invisible
37 min listen
492- Inheriting Froebel's Gifts: The educational toys that changed the world by 99% Invisible
32 min listen
513- The Safety Bicycle: 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. by 99% Invisible
33 min listen
568- Don't Forget to Remember: There are memorials to lost fishermen, lost astronauts, even lost members of Lynyrd Skynyrd. What should a COVID pandemic memorial look like? by 99% Invisible
40 min listen
SVB: The End of Banking as We Know It?: We had initially prepared an entirely different episode for today, but last week's Silicon Valley Bank collapse, the largest in U.S. history since 2008, meant a quick change of plans. What happened? What is unique about this bank run, and what isn't? How much should regulators be blamed, and how much should bank management be? Do social media and today's frantic digital environment mean this is the end of banking as we know it? Luigi and Bethany talk to two experts with unique insights into the crisis: Chicago Booth Professor Douglas Diamond, who won the 2022 Nobel Prize for his decades-long work on bank runs, and Eric Rosengren, former Boston Fed President, for his view as a regulator. They discuss the factors that led to the collapse, including risky lending practices, lack of oversight, and the challenges of regulating the rapidly evolving world of banking. They also explore the broader implications of the collapse, including the impact on by Capitalisn't
54 min listen
Remembering George Floyd and Reimagining Abortion and Community Care: This week, Farai is joined by Washington Post investigative journalists and co-authors, Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa to talk about their new biography His Name is George Floyd and why they chose to document George Floyd’s life, legacy, aspirations and the systematic marginalization that derailed him from the American dream. Then Farai interviews writer and visual artist, K. Ibura about her debut youth novel, When the World Turned Upside Down, that explores overcoming adversity with the help of community during racial reckonings and COVID. And on the weekly segment Sippin’ the Political Tea, Breya Johnson of the Black Women’s Health Imperative joins Farai to discuss the fallout of the Supreme Court decision on abortion rights and what it means for all women and birthing people. by Our Body Politic
50 min listen
CHP-206-Robert van Gulik and Judge Dee: In this episode Laszlo introduced the great Nederlander Robert van Gulik. In his relatively short life van Gulik made a name for himself as a scholar, diplomat and writer. His sixteen novels featuring the "stern but fair-minded" Judge Dee offered his... by The China History Podcast
47 min listen
How Bad Is It? with Ezra Klein by Why Is This Happening? The Chris Hayes Podcast
46 min listen
Israel Is Giving Hamas What It Wants: Oct. 7 was Israel’s Sept. 11. That’s been the refrain. I fear that analogy carries so much more truth than the people making it intend. Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com. You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs. This audio essay for “The Ezra Klein Show” was fact-checked by Michelle Harris, with Mary-Marge Locker. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld. The show’s production team also includes Emefa Agawu, Rollin Hu and Kristin Lin. Original music by Isaac Jones and Carole Sabouraud. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski and Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. by The Ezra Klein Show
16 min listen
#133 - The Unfinished Presidency of Jimmy Carter: A Dialogue with Kai Bird: In this episode, Xavier Bonilla has a dialogue with Kai Bird about Jimmy Carter. They discuss the context and environment of rural Georgia in the 1920s in which Carter was born. They talk about the impact of racism in his upbringing, importance of his Ch... by Converging Dialogues
63 min listen
558- The Fever Tree Hunt: The hunt to cultivate the cure for malaria by 99% Invisible
41 min listen
Episode 157: Margo Jefferson: Margo Jefferson, a Pulitzer Prize winner, has written for The New York Times, Newsweek, and Harper's. Her latest book is Negroland: A Memoir. “One of the problems with—burdens of—‘race conversations’ in this country is certain ideological, political, soc by Longform
71 min listen
Episode 1333 - Marc Goes To Washington w/ Dr. Dwandalyn Reese and Lance Mion by WTF with Marc Maron Podcast
71 min listen
86: How Do I Pay For College Without Going Broke? Special Guest: Author Ron Lieber by Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting
49 min listen
Episode 508: Erika Hayasaki by Longform
41 min listen
D-Day Memorial by WW2 Pod: We Have Ways of Making You Talk
78 min listen
America’s Top Librarian on the Rise of Book Bans: Public libraries around the country have become major battlegrounds for today’s culture wars. In 2022, the American Library Association noted a record 1,269 attempts at censorship — almost double the number recorded in 2021. Library events like drag story times and other children’s programming have also attracted protest. How should we understand these efforts to control what stories children can freely access? Emily Drabinski is the president of the American Library Association and an associate professor at the Queens College Graduate School of Library and Information Studies. She is steering an embattled organization at a moment when libraries — and librarians themselves — are increasingly under fire. [You can listen to this episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” on the NYT Audio App, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google or wherever you get your podcasts.] This conversation unpacks the political and cultural anxieties fueling the attacks by The Ezra Klein Show
47 min listen
David Tavárez, "Rethinking Zapotec Time: Cosmology, Ritual, and Resistance in Colonial Mexico" (U Texas Press, 2022): An interview with David Tavárez by New Books in Religion
76 min listen
Democracy’s existential crisis: A case for connecting democracy and the human condition. by The Gray Area with Sean Illing
51 min listen
Fresno Nightcrawler: One night in Fresno, California, Mateo's security camera caught strange, pale, billowy, disembodied legs walking across his front lawn. But when he looked out the window, there was nothing there... by Camp Monsters
33 min listen
487- Atlas Obscura: We visit the site of one of the most infamous lost expeditions and the home of all the lost luggage. by 99% Invisible
46 min listen
How to think critically about history — and why it matters | How to Be a Better Human: How to think critically about history — and why it matters | How to Be a Better Human by TED Talks Daily
29 min listen
124: Too Much News by #SistersInLaw
69 min listen
Jeremy Friedman, "Ripe for Revolution: Building Socialism in the Third World" (Harvard UP, 2022): An interview with Jeremy Friedman by New Books in Economics
79 min listen
The Mujina: Leilani was just trying to catch a movie at the local Honolulu drive-in when she walked into the bathroom and found a redheaded woman peering suspiciously into the mirror. by Camp Monsters
30 min listen
480. How Much Does Discrimination Hurt the Economy? (Replay): Evidence from Nazi Germany and 1940’s America (and pretty much everywhere else) shows that discrimination is incredibly costly — to the victims, of course, but also the perpetrators. One modern solution is to invoke a diversity mandate. But new research shows that’s not necessarily the answer. by Freakonomics Radio
58 min listen
Tommyknockers: Lara just moved into a new house in an old coal-mining town in West Virginia. One night, she begins to hear sounds behind the walls of her basement bedroom. Knocking, knocking… by Camp Monsters
34 min listen

Discover this podcast and so much more

554- Devil in the Details

554- Devil in the Details

Description

Titles in the series (100)

More Episodes from 99% Invisible

Related podcast episodes