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Peter Koechley

I bounce back and forth between the worlds of satire and politics, though the distinction is getting harder and harder to see. For more, check me out on Twitter or Facebook.

This is the story of how O.J. Simpson, one law, and Polaroid pictures helped dramatically reduce domestic violence in the U.S. Oh, and this amazingly dedicated woman.Trigger warning: Domestic violence can be heard (but not seen) in a brief but powerful PSA at 5:39-6:05.

As a father, I think it's important that you see the moment at 8:01. We have to make this a conversation where men no longer feel like they are being blamed for everything, where they feel safe enough and get educated to think more clearly and deeply about knowing what constitutes assault.

Upworthy launched on March 26, 2012, and it's been a crazy year!

1. Bully Calls News Anchor Fat, News Anchor Destroys Him On Live TV

Curated by Kaye Toal
4.19M views

2. Bullies Called Him Pork Chop. He Took That Pain With Him And Then Cooked It Into This.

Curated by Adam Mordecai
3.44M views

3. Mitt Romney Accidentally Confronts A Gay Veteran; Awesomeness Ensues

Curated by Mansur Gidfar
2.87M views

4. A Tea Partier Decided To Pick A Fight With A Foreign President. It Didn't Go So Well.

Curated by Mansur Gidfar
1.97M views

5. Move Over, Barbie — You’re Obsolete

Curated by Edwardo Jackson
1.59M views

6. 9 Out Of 10 Americans Are Completely Wrong About This Mind-Blowing Fact

Curated by Adam Mordecai
1.57M views

7. BOOM, ROASTED: Here's Why You Don't Ask A Feminist To Hawk Your Sexist Product

Curated by Rebecca Eisenberg
1.16M views

8. Some Strange Things Are Happening To Astronauts Returning To Earth

Curated by Adam Albright-Hanna
1.13M views

9. Elizabeth Warren Asks The Most Obvious Question Ever And Stumps A Bunch Of Bank Regulators

Curated by Adam Mordecai
1.13M views

10. If This Video Makes You Uncomfortable, Then You Make Me Uncomfortable

Curated by Rollie Williams
1.01M views

From Your Site Articles

10 happiest things we've seen this week - Upworthy ›

Dear Upworthians,Now that we're officially one year old, we want to say a colossal thank you! Without your interest in the issues that shape our world, Upworthy couldn't function. If we could find a way to shake every one of your hands, we'd do it. (Full disclosure: we'd probably use a lot of Purell afterward because one of you is bound to have a cold.)When Upworthy first started out, we weren't exactly sure what it would look like. Truth be told, we're still shaping the site. But knowing what we know now, here's the advice we would have given our past selves one year ago.Sincerely,The Upworthy Staff

1. Always remember that the Internet is an inherently amazing place...
and that people can recognize quality if they get a chance to see it.

Last November, Upworthy ran a story on "GoldieBlox," bringing a million views in just a few days to a fledgling toy company geared toward encouraging little girls to become engineers. The massive rush of orders that came in after Upworthy's post went viral helped move the company in a few days from vision to viable business.

2. A totally virtual office is going to make your virtual watercooler pretty bizarre...
and sometimes serious business meetings will morph into impromptu costume parties.

Everyone at Upworthy works from home, and the combination of frequent video conferences and solitary confinement makes things get really weird. Here's our editorial team planning out our emergency hat protocol.

3. Keep an eye on your Twitter feed...
because every once in a while, a super-famous person is going to tweet about Upworthy.

4. No matter how badly your day is going...
having people who appreciate you will always feel like a digital shiatsu massage.

5. While the majority of your commenters are intelligent and genuine...
you’re always going to get some people who are as witty and respectful as a typical YouTube commenter.

Seriously, if there's one thing Nazis were known for, it's their choice in font size and their traditional last name of "Eisenberg."

6. Even after sending 100,000 animated GIFs to each other on internal Upworthy email...
you still won't figure out whether it's pronounced "JIF" or "GIF."

Cracking this conundrum has become one of Upworthy's most burning, lingering questions from 2012. If anyone knows the actual answer to this, please contact us immediately!

7. Even though it doesn't seem possible, that animated slam poetry video about pork chops and bullying will be really, really good...
like, for real.

This incredible video, posted in January, got 3.44 million viewers raving about how deeply it moved them. All the attention got its creator a last-minute TED Talk slot.

8. The biggest traffic spike of 2012 WILL come in October right before the election, like you expect...
but it will completely baffle you by having absolutely nothing to do with the election, unlike what you expect.

When Jennifer Livingston received a rude email about body image, she delivered an incredibly heart-felt speech about compassion and love. More than 4 million viewers celebrated her fighting back with respectful dialogue by sharing her story all over the Internet.

9. That pop-up box thingy that's kind of annoying...
will also be ludicrously effective at helping you and your incredible partner organizations become larger forces for good in the world.

Look at the bright side: at least they didn't say THIS.

10. Don't ever be afraid...
to tell people you cried.

Upworthy posted some pretty emotional stories throughout the year because we loved them. We found out pretty quickly that we weren't the only ones. Thanks for being willing to shed a few tears with us this year.

11. According to how many unique visitors you get in your first year...
you can logically expect to have 900 billion unique visitors per month exactly 59,600 years from now.

Our future selves truly can't wait to hit our 900 billion visitor mark!

You know, when we started this thing, a lot of folks we talked to thought there wasn't much of an audience for visual, shareable content about ideas that matter. We're so grateful you proved them wrong. Thanks for making this site what it is, and here's to a great Year 2!

This is the real ad for one of the guns used to kill 20 children and six adults in the recent school massacre in Newtown, CT.We talk a lot about how unrealistically airbrushed models affect the way women and girls see themselves, but with 61 of the past 62 mass shootings having been committed by men, we need to open a dialogue about the idea of masculinity and how it affects the way we men see ourselves. Because if you need a giant gun to compensate for your junk, bro, you've got some shit you need to work out.

Stephen Colbert is leading Jon Stewart 3-to-1 among Republicans, 1 in 5 voters think their vote is worth $100 or less, and a majority of respondents would personally like to suppress someone's vote. Welcome to Upworthy's first-ever real live actual poll of swing-state voters, in partnership with our friends at Public Policy Polling.

1. More than twice as many people think polls are more often skewed when they favor the other candidate or party.

2. 1 in 5 Americans think that if their candidate loses, either human civilization will be doomed or America will cease to be a great nation and they will move to Canada.

Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to think that their guy losing will lead to the end of human civilization (19% to 11%).

3. In a hypothetical head-to-head presidential matchup between Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, Republicans would vote for Colbert 3-to-1 while Democrats would vote for Stewart 3-to-1.

Among all swing-state voters, Jon Stewart would just barely beat out Stephen Colbert, 33% to 31% (with 36% unsure).

4. And avant-garde stage performer Clint Eastwood would beat out erstwhile TV megahost Oprah Winfrey 42% to 38%.

Even after the whole chair thing.

5. Oh, and it looks like Obama and Romney are tied at... wait for it...

...47% to 47%. Seriously.

6. Since money in politics is such a hot topic this election season, we asked voters how much they thought their vote was worth, in U.S. dollars. Two-thirds of respondents think their vote is priceless, but 20% think their vote is worth $100 or less.

7. We asked self-proclaimed undecided voters if they were actually undecided or if they were just saying that because they were actually not planning to vote but didn’t want to be judged for that.

Boldly, 0% admitted that was the case.

8. Since voter suppression is such an important issue this election year, we asked swing-state voters whose vote they personally would most like to suppress, if they could suppress just one person's vote.