Sep 2026
How Many People Are in Space Right Now?
A website that answers one question with one number, and the number that hasn't dropped to zero since October 2000.
OpenTools
Handpicked apps, sites, and interactive experiences from the open web — useful, odd, and worth bookmarking.
Sep 2026
Fall Foliage Prediction Map
The autumn map that colours the US county by county, and a hundred-year-old four-day rule found because of a wheat fly.
Open
Jul 2026
A Quiet Place to Learn Mathematics
One man has written about 250 mathematics entries — sets, groups, trigonometry, limits, integrals — drawn every figure himself, and given the whole thing away. No ads, no account, no streak.
Open
May 2026
Walk the International Space Station on Google Street View
Thomas Pesquet brought a Street View camera to the ISS. 420 km above Earth, now navigable from your browser — same corridors, same handrails, same cupola view of the planet below.
Open
May 2026
Pattern Radio: Whale Songs
Google AI and NOAA opened 8,000 hours of underwater recordings to anyone with a browser. Scroll through a year of ocean. Find the whales.
Open
May 2026
The Map of Mathematics
Quanta Magazine mapped the living frontier of mathematical research — 41 nodes, four territories, every connection a link to original reporting.
Open
May 2026
Save Everything. Organize Nothing.
mymind auto-tags every link, image, and note you save — then finds them when you search. No folders, no tags, no system. You throw things at it; it organizes and makes them searchable. A rare app that actually keeps its promise.
Open
May 2026
Every Minute Has a Book
There are 1,440 minutes in a day. Literature Clock matches each one to a passage from world literature. Open the site: find out it's 2:47 because Tolstoy already wrote that minute.
Open
May 2026
What One Fool Can Do, Another Can
Silvanus P. Thompson wrote a calculus book in 1910. Someone converted it to HTML by hand. It's free and it still works.
Open
May 2026
Your Favorite Fry Is a Geometry Problem
A shoestring fry and a steak fry are made from the same ingredient, cooked the same way. The only difference is the cut. Chris Williams built a 3D tool to show you exactly what that difference is.
Open
May 2026
Your Name, Written by Earth
NASA spells out your name using real Landsat satellite images. Every letter is a real place, 700 km below, with coordinates you can look up.
Open
May 2026
Statistics You Can Watch Think
A Brown University student made probability visible — and changed how a generation understands statistics.
Open
Apr 2026
The Color the Forest Already Had
825 colors, 40+ dye mushrooms. Julie Beeler's atlas of natural color that exists only because a specific fungus grew in a specific place.
Open
Apr 2026
299 Products. One Graveyard.
Google has retired 299 products since 2006. Average lifespan: 5.2 years. The pattern behind the shutdowns has run twice — and will run again.
Open
Apr 2026
12,795 Objects, One Life
Barbara Iweins photographed every single thing she owns — all 12,795 of them. The spreadsheet is the easy part to explain.
Open
Apr 2026
Every Raindrop Has a Destination
River Runner lets you click anywhere on a map and watch the exact downstream journey of a raindrop — from where it lands to the ocean.
Open