Adam Pasick

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Global Tel*Link—familiar to listeners of the true-crime podcast Serial, which name-checked the company at the beginning of every episode—is developing a high-tech side business. The company has begun installing and operating “managed access systems” that render contraband mobile phones useless when used inside a prison.

One can only imagine the brainstorm session that resulted in its decision to spin off Yahoo Small Business along with the company’s minority stake in Alibaba: “Guys, we need to find an inconsequential yet functioning small business for tax reasons: Any ideas?”

British Airways is the latest airline to revamp its rewards program to make the rich richer, and the poor poorer: business- and first-class passengers will earn many more frequent flyer miles, and economy-class passengers will earn far fewer.

Apple’s results yesterday were a blockbuster by any measure—the biggest quarterly profit in corporate history, a blatant disregard for the law of large numbers—and yet nowhere were they more impressive than in China.

Chef René Redzepi’s Noma restaurant has become a fixture atop the world’s best restaurant list due in part to its cultivation of unique ingredients that reflect the unforgiving Nordic climate. But for his latest creation at a pop-up restaurant in Tokyo, Redzepi may have outdone himself.

Japan’s government is running out of time. A Friday deadline looms for demands made by the Islamic State, which says it will kill two Japanese hostages if it doesn’t receive a $200 million ransom payment. That’s the same amount of aid that prime minister Shinzo Abe pledged to countries that are battling ISIL during a Middle East tour last week.

How did three men on three different continents discover the irresistible combination of street-side cotton candy sales (also known as candy floss), neon lights, and funky dance moves?

Pope Francis’s visit to the Philippines this week is going to be a tense one for his Swiss Guard security detail: ISIL allegedly issued a threat to kill the pontiff last year, around the same time that the Filipino Islamic guerrilla group Abu Sayyaf pledged its allegiance to the Islamic extremist group’s cause.

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A chronic shortage of portable toilets has prompted Francis Tolentino, chairman of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, to resort to extreme measures during Pope Francis’ visit to the Philippines next week: Recommending adult diapers for traffic police and many of the millions of people expected to attend an open-air mass in the heavily Catholic country.

The price of Brent crude oil briefly dipped below the psychologically important $50-per-barrel mark in early trading today, extending its recent rout. And for any suffering oil-producing countries that are hoping that China’s energy-intensive economy might provide some relief: don’t hold your breath.

The idea that women and children should be evacuated first from a sinking ship—made famous by the Titanic disaster—has held sway for more than 150 years. But looking at the data on actual shipwreck survivors, the supposed code of conduct just doesn’t hold water.

Heavy fog at Abu Dhabi’s airport contributed to a nightmare journey for Etihad Airways passengers flying to San Francisco this weekend, including an incredible 12 hours in which they were stranded on the tarmac and not allowed to leave their plane. A different Etihad flight from Abu Dhabi to Dusseldorf, which had a tarmac delay of more than 13 hours, had an even more tragic ending: The plane was forced to reroute to Vienna after a 73-year-old man died during the flight.

The photograph above, contrary to appearances, does not show US president Barack Obama being beamed into another dimension by a gang of alien robots. Rather, its shows him being intricately scanned by a bank of high-speed cameras and LED lights in preparation for the first-ever 3D presidential portrait.

2015 is just getting started, but Japan’s traditional New Year’s delicacy known as mochi has already killed at least four people and hospitalized another ten—despite annual warnings from health authorities that the gooey rice cakes should be cut into small pieces, and never eaten alone.

The online release of “The Interview” fared surprisingly well for Sony Pictures, as the company announced total revenues of $15 million from approximately 2 million sales and rentals. The company didn’t provide a breakdown between $15 sales and $6 rentals, but as teacher Dan Myer pointed out, it didn’t have to—a bit of simple algebra does the job.

Nearly a year after Hong Kong’s last incident of the H7N9 bird flu, health authorities have raised the city’s alert level to “serious” after a patient was hospitalized for a severe case of the virus. Hong Kong health officials said the 68-year-old woman is in critical condition after returning from a trip to the Longgang district of Shenzhen in mainland China.

Given the saturation coverage of companies like Amazon and Alibaba, you would be forgiven for thinking that the dinosaurs of brick-and-mortar retail are not long for this world. After all, shopping malls are crumbling and big-box chains are going out of business. How can a mom-and-pop store compete with the algorithmic sophistication of the world’s leading online retailers?

The dramatic fall in Russia’s currency this year has squelched the country’s thirst for beer and is expected to send Russians back to their traditional tipple of vodka. The shift is already hurting foreign brewers like Carlsberg; analysts expect the currency swing to cost the company a third of its annual profits (paywall).

TOKYO—A shortage of imported American spuds forced McDonald’s to institute limits on french fry orders at its 3,100 Japanese outlets today—removing medium and large fry orders from its menu, leaving small fries as the only size available.

Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi posted a slim profit of 347.48 million yuan ($56.15 million) on 26.58 billion yuan ($4.30 billion) in revenues in 2013. The new information comes from a Chinese regulatory filing—the first time that the fast-growing, privately-held company’s finances have been made public—and was first reported by Reuters.

Japanese viewers are drinking in a new TV drama that tells the story of the founding family of Japanese whisky, recently recognized as the best in the world, surpassing even the legendary single malts of Scotland.

Ever since Thailand’s military coup in May, the ruling junta has been campaigning to restore Thailand’s “traditional values”—which this weekend included a short film about an overachieving schoolboy, whose talents include painting admiring portraits of Adolph Hitler.