Welcome to The Verge: Weekender edition. Every Saturday, we'll bring you some of the best and most important reads of the past seven days, from original reports, to in-depth features, to reviews and interviews. Think of it as a collection of some of our favorite pieces that you may have missed — or that you may just want to read again. You can follow along below, or keep up to date on Flipboard.
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Feature
Fecal finders: how poop-sniffing dogs are helping killer whales
Some killer whale populations are on a dangerous decline, and researchers are hoping to figure out why by measuring toxins in their poop. So how do they find samples? An excitable dog named Tucker.
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Detours
How Disney is helping plants find their voice
Verge Detours has made it to Pittsburgh. This week, we drop by the office of Dr. Ivan Poupyrev, a computer science professor and Disney researcher who just happens to have made a plant sing.
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Report
How the sound masters of 'Gravity' broke the rules to make noise in a vacuum
How do you create sound effects for a movie taking place in the silence of space? We caught up with two members of Gravity's audio team to learn about how they recorded the film's careful sound and score.
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Review
Amazon Kindle Paperwhite review (2013)
Amazon's Kindle Paperwhite is already the ebook reader to beat. So how can Amazon make it even better? It's starting to put the best parts of a real library right inside the Kindle.
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Feature
Is it real, or is it 'GTA V'? A trippy travelogue on the streets of Los Santos
Grand Theft Auto V isn't just earning acclaim for its traditional gameplay: it's the title's breathtaking scenery, nuanced characters, and attention to detail that makes all the difference.
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Report
Lavabit vs. the FBI: the fight for the soul of American software
Lavabit founder Ladar Levison shut down his secure email service over the summer after the FBI demanded unfettered and secret backend access. He sat down with us to explain what exactly that would have made the government capable of.
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Report
Dropping bombs: Funkmaster Flex and the end of the radio DJ
Funkmaster Flex has the top-rated radio show out there, and even today he can still turn the debut of a three-minute-long song into a 20-minute-long, must-listen event. But even Flex knows the radio DJ is a dying breed, and he's doing what he can to move online.
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Review
HP Chromebook 11 review
Chromebooks are getting better and better as Chrome OS and its built-in apps grow up. HP is trying to make the new go-to Chromebook with the Chromebook 11, a stylish machine with an even more attractive price. But with last year's specs on the inside, is it worth using?
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Report
The $1 billion weather app: why Monsanto is betting the farm on smarter forecasts
Monsanto doesn't have the best reputation in some circles, but with its latest acquisition, it may be hoping to change that: it's getting into detailed farm management services which could turn around the prospects of a harvest by mixing agriculture and tech — and not just what's inside of seeds.
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Feature
Fire drill: can Tony Fadell and Nest build a better smoke detector?
Nest blew up our perception of the thermostat two years ago by turning it into a smart, stylish, and fun device. Now it's trying to tackle smoke detectors in the same way — and it may well be just as successful.