The Ultimate Recap of the Best Stories of 2018

You know that moment in most long running TV shows when they do that recap show filled with all the greatest scenes from past episodes? Reading stories this week was a bit like watching one of those shows, with lots of recaps of the past year. So this week's "holiday edition" of the Non-Obvious newsletter will feature the best of those collections along with my picks for the best stories of the year. Enjoy the stories and happy new year!

10 Most Interesting Non-Obvious Stories Of The Year:

1. Why Icelanders Are So Creative 
2. Tesla Creates The World's Best Car Commercial
3. China Launches Social Credit System
4. Silicon Valley Pioneers Develop Guilt About The Tech They Created
5. Amnesty International Hypnotizes People To Create More Empathy For Refugees
6. Today's Masculinity Is Stifling
7. Could Amazon Replace Libraries?
8. Remembering Brazil's Destroyed National Museum
9. The Hot New Gen-Z Trend Might Be Skipping College
10. Popular YouTuber Takes A Break From Posting, Proving We Can All Do The Same

Ultimate List of Non-Obvious Story Recaps From The Year ... 

• WIRED's Most Read Gear Stories Of The Year Interestingly, the top stories of the year seemed to focus on us taking back control of our lives from technology, either through adjusting your newsfeed or reports of how Apple is throttling iPhones with old batteries. Expect to see more of this theme in 2019 too.
• The Top 11 Space and Astronomy Stories of 2018 This was a big year in space, with a return to Mars, three new NASA missions and the debut of SpaceX’s giant Falcon Heavy rocket. Read the highlights in this story.
• The 50 Best Podcasts of the Year If you enjoy lists of great content you'll probably never have the time to consume, this is a powerful compilation you should read. :-) This is a great list to discover new shows, though ... even if you can't make it through all of them. 
• This Year In Asia's Most Popular Stories of 2018 Hong Kong sugar babies (and Singapore's sugar daddies), the Korean Olympics and the Filipina Miss Universe are all on the list of the most popular stories from Asia over the past year, according to the South China Morning Post. 
• Top Ten Biggest Brand Fails Of 2018 Is there anything more fun than reading about brand failures? Ok, there are probably a lot of things more fun than that, but it's still a guilty pleasure to read about marketing screwups ... which this list compiles for you. And if it's not enough, here's a list of brand naming fails from the year too. 
• Best Science Stories Of The Year There were plenty of stories in this recap that you probably missed throughout the year, from the remarkable naked mole rat that seems immune to cancer and aging to what strawberries might teach us about the world. 
• The Year In Pop Culture - The Economist Great collection of stories from The Guardian about movies, music, TV shows and more than a few stories you probably already forgot from the past year.