Drought, overuse, tourism, climate change? No: here, the problems are different. There is a place, where the road narrows for a few dozen choked meters, and runs right alongside the rajakalu...

Newton was an alchemist. Mary Poppins may have been a witch. What are scientists today?

Ordovician life, the importance of dirt, and tips for being a lazy gardener

Criminals usually pay for their misdeeds. But who is really to blame for crime? Adrian Raine is a renowned criminologist. He teaches psychology in the University of Pennsylvania and has writ...

Dear Snipette readers, This 11th of June, we are celebrating our second anniversary. (!!!) That is not a sentence we ever expected to be able to write. Neither are the ones that follow. We...

Hello, Snipette readers! Change is afoot, and we wanted to let you all know. Social Media Good news first: we’re glad to welcome a new member to the Snipette editorial team. Trisha Sam [htt...

We’ve been catching it since time immemorial — so why does the cure still elude us? Have you ever had a cold? I certainly have. In fact, I have one right now, even though you (obviously) can...

Hello, Snipette readers! This is to inform you of some upcoming changes in content and scheduling. A lot of you sent in responses to our Year-End Survey, and after taking a careful look at ...

Are we basically two people at once? We like to think that each one of us is only one kind of person, a whole comprised of various facets and feelings. And as an extension of that, we like t...

Taking a closer look at the inside cover of a book. What do you own?A house, maybe? A car? Some land? Or, if you’re a teenager like me, basically nothing? Or, should I say, basically nothin...

Hello, Snipette readers! It’s time once again, for a new year to come round — and with it, more new things that we’re planning at Snipette! In this email, we’ll take a brief look back, and...

It’s not just about turning text to thoughts: how you read, and what you read it on, can literally change your brain. This piece began in my quest to try and find an answer to the age-old de...

We asked you when you read Snipette. Thanks for letting us know the answer! Your answer will help us decide the best time to publish Snipette articles. We’ll let you know when the change is...

How Diwali celebrations make for prettier sunsets The sky is a picturesque watercolour blend of grey and orange, the tangerine evening sun bleeding colour into the bleak grey dusk. There are...

You can’t always trust people to pay you — but what if you could trust the money itself? Money: what is it? We all use it. We all want it. We all think about how to make more. Money can be ...

Nobody’s found signs of alien life yet. So why do they keep on looking? Extra-terrestrial life. What images just popped into your mind? Little green men? ET, the gnarly but ultimately friend...

You go to sleep. What happens next?

No jaywalking allowed? Actually, roads were for people. Here’s how the cars took over. The city centre of Bogotá is quiet. Well, quieter than you might expect. The low purr of engines and th...

How can water make such musical sounds? And, how does anything make sound at all?

Hello, Snipette readers. We are now officially one year old! While we published our first article in February of 2017, the magazine in its current iteration of Understandability, Perspecti...

Thought climate-change would warm the world forever? Think again. Today, humans are damaging the environment at an unprecedented rate. By the time you are done reading this article, we will ...

One year ago, when we sent out our first letter, Snipette was a small publication with seven followers and a handful of stories under its belt. We’ve come a long way since then. A hundred an...

Some organisms never quite worked out how to live with it. This is the story of where they went. Off the coast of Japan, for four months a year, the deep blue sea is transformed into a stunn...

When cars get self-conscious: a brief look at the Volkswagen scandal Diesel is cheap — cheaper than petrol. That’s why car companies have been investing heavily in developing diesel engines ...

Hello, Snipette readers. We hope you’ve been enjoying our articles so far. We’ve covered several new topics these past three months — but before we look at them, we’d like to ask you a ques...

Childhood memories of a Carbon atom Actually, come to think of it, “life” may not be the most fitting term. To be considered alive, I’d have to meet several criteria —being able to breathe, ...

Ever wondered where all those letters to Santa go? Christmas. ’Tis the season to be jolly and deck the halls with boughs of holly and everything else detailed in that carol that I can never ...

Dam It: Part 2 When what was river becomes land Last time [https://medium.com/snipette/drowning-valleys-d280af3635c7], I outlined the effects of dams on the areas immediately surrounding the...

Dam It: Part 1 When what was land becomes river Dams. The only man-made constructions that can block the flow of the mighty river. They stop the water from flowing where it is, and help the ...

Hello, everyone! Right from the beginning, we had planned to send a letter when we reached fifty followers — but over the last few weeks, you people helped us cross fifty so fast that we di...

A rambling review of This Is Not Your Story by Savi Sharma Savi Sharma’s This Is Not Your Story came highly recommended by a friend over email. A few weeks later, I discovered a signed copy ...

Have you ever played a video game where an obstacle showed up on your screen out of the blue? What happened after that? Nothing too troublesome, I’m guessing. You probably just restarted th...

If planet earth was a company, it would be doing very badly. Every businessman understands the concept of capital — the amount of money and resources necessary to start a business. For insta...

Welcome to Snipette, where we write about everything — from Google to Garbage to Greenhouse Gases. The range of articles we publish is diverse: science, environment, programming, social issu...

If you’ve ever clicked the first search result you received, then the answer is yes. Have you ever heard of the search bubble? It’s the term for what happens when you use too much personaliz...

It might not seem something as constant as length would have a history, but it does. In fact, it goes back to the times of ancient civilizations. To begin with, you can’t really specify the...