Episodes
The first three. More every few days.
-
Why a bank pays the airline for your miles
American Express paid Delta 8.2 billion dollars last year, and not for flights. Where miles come from, who buys them, and who sets the price of the seat.
Coming soon -
How a steel box made shipping almost free
In 1956 lifting one ton of cargo onto a ship cost 5.83 dollars. Standard corners and a twist-lock cut it to sixteen cents by making touching the cargo unnecessary.
Coming soon -
How an elevator decides which car to send
Three cars in the shaft, one button pressed. A group controller scores every call, and the door-close button is not allowed to win.
Coming soon
What Underhood is
Every day runs on systems nobody explains: how an airline sells a seat it has not flown yet, why one steel box made the ocean cheap, how a lobby decides which elevator comes for you. Underhood takes one of them at a time and draws the machine under the hood, in black ink on paper, in about ninety seconds.
Each episode opens with one surprising number, says where it came from, and ends on the one idea worth keeping.
- Hand-drawnBlack ink on off-white paper, simple figures, gentle motion. Every word is on screen, so it works with the sound off.
- Under two minutesOne system, one number, one idea. Vertical, made for the phone in your hand.
- SourcedFigures come from company filings, standards bodies and published research. When a number is a rule of thumb, the episode says so.