After MIT's four-year reign atop our annual list of the Best Colleges in America, our readers voted Stanford University as the No. 1 college in America. 

To create this list, we asked over 1,500 professionals who have hiring experience in a variety of industries what they consider to be the best colleges in the U.S. based on how well the schools prepare their students for success after graduation. 

Here are the top 25 colleges in the U.S. this year.

Take a more in-depth look at all 50 best colleges in America »

SEE ALSO: Visit our Best Colleges homepage to get the scoop on the schools

Join the conversation about this story »

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. After a four-year reign atop our annual list of the Best Colleges in America, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) slipped to second place.

For the first time in years, Stanford University took the top spot on our list. In fact, schools with strong tech and engineering programs reigned over our list, with Cal Tech rounding out the top 3 schools.

For our sixth annual ranking of the Best Colleges In America, we surveyed over 1,500 people who said they had hiring experience in a variety of fields, from finance to tech. Respondents rated top colleges across the country based on how well they prepare students for success.

Click here to see the colleges »

Click here to go to a one-page list of the top 25 colleges »

Read the full methodology for this list »  

50. University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign

Illinois – Urbana-Champaign scored a 2.95 out of 5 on Business Insider's rating.

Tuition and fees: $30,362

Situated about 140 miles south of Chicago, University of Illinois debuts on this ranking at No. 50. The flagship U of I institution is home to one of the largest public university collections in the world, with more than 10.5 million volumes across 37 departmental libraries. The school ranked high on our list of party schools worth the money.

Business Insider's rating is scored out of 5 and is based on the results of a survey that asked over 1,500 professionals with hiring experience how well colleges prepare their students for success after graduation. Tuition was used as a tiebreaker, with cheaper tuition pushing a school to a higher spot.

49. Colgate University

Colgate scored a 2.96 out of 5 on Business Insider's rating.

Tuition and fees: $50,485

Colgate may cost a lot to attend, but evidence shows that it’s worth the investment, with graduates making an average mid-career salary of $126,600. And for those who can’t afford the cost of tuition, the Central New York college accommodates 100% of admitted students who demonstrated financial need.

Business Insider's rating is scored out of 5 and is based on the results of a survey that asked over 1,500 professionals with hiring experience how well colleges prepare their students for success after graduation. Tuition was used as a tiebreaker, with cheaper tuition pushing a school to a higher spot.

48. Boston University

BU scored a 2.98 out of 5 on Business Insider's rating.

Tuition and fees: $48,984

BU "is no small operation," with more than 33,000 undergrad and graduate students and 10,000 faculty and staff. With over $375 million in research funding last year, each member of the community has a chance to grow and incite change.

Business Insider's rating is scored out of 5 and is based on the results of a survey that asked over 1,500 professionals with hiring experience how well colleges prepare their students for success after graduation. Tuition was used as a tiebreaker, with cheaper tuition pushing a school to a higher spot.

The retail industry is undergoing a dramatic shift: E-commerce is capturing a larger share of sales than ever before. 

We've created a slideshow highlighting the retail categories where e-commerce is having the most impact, and where there is still opportunity for disruption. The shift away from physical retail toward digital retail is happening faster than many observers expected. 

BI Intelligence is a research and analysis service focused on mobile computing, digital media, payments, and e-commerce. Only subscribers can download the individual charts and datasets in Excel, along with the PowerPoint and PDF versions of this deck. Please sign up for a free trial here.

Four centuries ago, a whole country went completely crazy for tulip bulbs.

But why do we still talk about these flower-obsessed Dutch traders.

As you'll read, the story of tulipmania involves many timeless issues like behavioral biases, malfunctioning markets, inequality, and basic economic concepts like supply and demand imbalances.

Dutch tulips were the first speculative asset to see prices shoot through the roof, and then quickly crash.

And of course they weren't the last.

With the help of historian Anne Goldgar's 2007 "Tulipmania," Business Insider brings you this unusual and enlightening story.

Editor's Note: Former Business Insider writer Rob Wile contributed to an earlier version of this feature.

According to lore, Tulipmania had its roots in the Ottoman Empire when Suleiman the Magnificent noticed a flower.

An ambassador working at the court of Suleiman the Magnificent noticed the flower, which is native to Central Asia, was all over Constantinople. In the late 1500s, he decided to send some to a Botanist friend in Leiden, Clusius. 

Source: Anne Goldgar, "Tulipmania"

Collecting stuff in general — from art to sea shells — was already big when Tulips began popping up in Europe.

Clusius told his sea merchant friends to pick up odd fish for him on their travels, and would exchange rare plants for "medals or unusual man-made objects."

Source: Anne Goldgar, "Tulipmania"

And there was also already robust trading platforms in Amsterdam.

The Amsterdam stock exchange opened in 1602. The Baltic grain trade, which had helped lead to the creation of the Dutch East India Company, had been operating as an informal futures exchange for decades.

Source: Anne Goldgar, "Tulipmania"

The NFL season is off to a weird start.

Two consensus playoff teams (New Orleans and Indianapolis) are 0-2, while two regression candidates (Arizona and Carolina) are 2-0.

In Week 2 our 1st, 3rd, and 4th-ranked teams in last week's power rankings all lost. 

These are early days, and the rankings should get more stable as the season goes on. But for now, enjoy the chaos.

1. Seattle Seahawks (previously: 1st)

Record: 1-1

Week 2 result: 30-21 loss to San Diego

One thing to know: Seattle finished 1st in the NFL in yards per pass attempt allowed in 2013. They're 16th this year.

2. Denver Broncos (previously: 2nd)

Record: 2-0

Week 2 result: 24-17 win over Kansas City

One thing to know: Peyton Manning is mad this year. He's out there yelling at teammates and drawing taunting penalties.

3. Cincinnati Bengals (previously: 5th)

Record: 2-0

Week 2 result: 24-10 win over Atlanta

One thing to know: They rank in the top-10 in both yards per play and yards per play allowed.

Back in 2012, photographer Seth Casteel became a sudden, global hit when he published a set of photos of what dogs look like when they're diving under water.

The water pulls on dogs' fur, ears and lips, making them look both ludicrous and vicious at the same time.

Now we have a sequel. Casteel is publishing a new book, Underwater Puppies, which is exactly what you think it is: Amazing shots of what puppies look like when they're scrabbling for a tennis ball in a swimming pool.

Casteel gets his shots by tossing toys into backyard swimming pools, and waiting for the dogs to dive in after them.

This is what an adult dog looks like: Notice that the water has a crazy effect on their lips, ears, eyes and fur.

With puppies, it's a little different. They don't have as much loose flesh, so ...

Decorating becomes a challenge when you live in a tiny home, studio apartment, or dorm room.

You'll want to find ways to maximize space and comfort while keeping clutter to a minimum.

These 15 tips will help you outfit your small place to the best of your advantage.

SEE ALSO: I Spent 3 Days In A 'Tiny House' With My Mom To See What Micro-Living Is All About

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Coca-Cola brought back Surge soda on Monday, more than a decade after it was discontinued. It's now available on Amazon in 12-packs, which have been selling out and then restocked multiple times over the past two days.

Surge was taken off the shelves in 2002 after a new marketing effort failed and sales plummeted. A pushback against highly-caffeinated drinks around this time — a few years shy of the energy drink breakthrough —may have also been a contributing factor.

But Coke now believes there may be a market for the citrus drink, largely due to the efforts of three hardcore Surge fans: Evan Carr, 26; Sean Sheridan, 31; and Matt Winans, 25.

"Just picture your favorite soda, and then imagine how you would feel if one day that favorite soda was no longer available for purchase — it's an empty feeling," Winans says.

The three fans are the heart of the Surge Movement, an online community of Surge fans that pushed the Coca-Cola Company to bring back its favorite drink through incessant calls to the company and even a billboard it purchased a mile away from Coke headquarters in Atlanta.

We reached out to the group's leaders to find out exactly how it got one of the world's biggest companies to start producing a drink that hadn't been in production since the early 2000s, and they sent over a 13-page Q&A.

Click here to read the complete, unedited, and incredibly passionate Q&A >>

It started around Christmas-time in 2011 when Carr began to get nostalgic for his favorite soda and wanted to see if others felt the same way he did. It was shortly after Coke had discontinued Vault, a similar highly caffeinated citrus soda that some Surge fans had reluctantly switched over to.

Carr created a Facebook page for those who wanted to bring back Surge, and it quickly gained a couple thousand fans. This attracted the attention of Winans, who moderated the Surge fan page, and he told Carr that he could help with video production and design.

After Winans spent 50 hours producing a video for Carr's Surge Movement that served as a call to arms to get fans to phone Coke about bringing back the soda, Carr signed him on as a page admin. Sheridan eventually joined, offering his time and effort to do whatever was necessary to recruit more people to their cause.

The Movement has been anything but subtle.

The trio raised $3,837 in January 2013 to put up the billboard in Atlanta, demanding Coke "BRING IT BACK!!!"

They regularly had "SURGE Days" where they blitzed Coke's office hot-lines with requests for the soda. "After awhile, the Consumer Affairs representatives caught on and began expecting our calls on those days," Sheridan writes. "The responses have varied in enthusiasm, from exasperation over fielding thousands of calls to excitement and encouragement."

The group spent $1,000 on an online ad to recruit more fans to their movement. The Facebook page now has over 143,000 "likes."

Earlier this year, the three guys began to feel frustrated that Coke kept giving them the same responses. But then Carr unexpectedly got an email from J.A.M. "Sandy" Douglas, president of Coca-Cola North America. It read:

Evan, thanks for your ongoing interest in Surge. We are working on a plan to make Surge available again by popular demand and we will follow up with you as soon as it's ready. Thanks.

Sandy

In September, Carr, Sheridan, and Winans got an invite to Coke's headquarters. It was the first time the three actually met in person.

"It was an amazing experience. I was SURGING with many feelings," Carr writes.

"Meeting Evan and Matt for the first time was surreal," Sheridan says. "It was almost like we'd known each other forever and like it wasn't the first time. I remember thinking they were both a lot taller than I imagined, and it was a little weird looking up at both of them."

Coke threw the guys a celebration involving a '90s playlist, a Surge cake, Surge decorations, and of course plenty of the soda itself.

So why exactly does the soda inspire such strong feelings? First, there's the taste.

"Props to the chemists at Coca-Cola for creating what many consider The Nectar of the Gods — the citrus tones are exactly what a taste pallet requires to bring the consumer to pure and utter bliss. The taste makes me think of a perfectly crafted masterpiece," Winans says.

But perhaps more than anything is the strong '90s nostalgia it invokes.

Here's a Surge commercial to get an idea:

"Even the iconic logo designed for SURGE was perfect because the splat design somehow epitomized the '90s era lifestyle. In fact, if I think about it, SURGE actually was a lifestyle," Winans writes.

Coke has made Surge exclusively available on Amazon for an undefined trial period to see how well it sells.

"They've inspired us," Coke's associate vice president of sparkling flavors Racquel Mason says in an official announcement. "More than 128,000 people a dozen years after a brand left the market saying, 'Please bring it back!' That's the best compliment any brand could hope for," she says.

Coke will use this experiment as a way to determine the best ways to respond to online communities of fans requesting a product.

"This is the ultimate test… we're leaving it in the hands of SURGE fans," Mason says. "Can 128,000 fans build and sustain a brand? We'll see."

The Surge Movement guys are confident they can build an even bigger following that will compel Coke to put Surge back on shelves.

"The future for SURGE is bright! My hope is for our beloved brand to be enshrined in Coke's permanent line-up, both in the US and all over the world," Sheridan says.

Carr, as founder of the Movement, is dreaming big. What does the future hold for Surge? "The future itself," he writes.

Watch the Surge guys announce their victory:

A gorgeous Cape Cod home belonging to a retired tech executive will be put up for auction on October 18.

The owner is Edward Breslow, who formerly held an executive position at data management and IT storage company EMC Corporation. He retired in 1998, and he and his wife are looking to spend more time in Florida. 

The home was previously listed for $13.9 million, but it failed to find a buyer. According to Platinum Luxury Auctions, the previous listing price has no bearing on what the home will fetch once the bids start. 

It has a home theater, five bedrooms, and a private dock leading to the Atlantic, among other amenities.

The home is situated on a 1.32-acre waterfront property in the East Bay village of Osterville.

The couple bought the land for $3 million in 2000, then spent three years building this 10,300-square-foot home.

Inside, custom woodwork makes a bold statement.

Microsoft announced on Monday that it was purchasing the company behind the game "Minecraft" for $2.5 billion.

"Minecraft" is a huge, open-world sandbox game, which was released for the PC in 2009. (You can learn more about what it is and how to play here.) Since then, it's been released on other platforms, and as of February 2014, it has sold over 14 million copies on the PC, and 35 million across all the other platforms.

Building in "Minecraft" is easy. You get tools, like shovels and axes, to chop down trees and cut through stone. And without a time limit or a place to go, some players have taken their creative freedom to the next level. 

The attention to detail in the Taj Mahal is insane, from the water in the front, to the bushes surrounding the palace.

You can watch a time-lapse video of how they did it here. 

And, if you're feeling crafty, here's a download so you can build it yourself. 

It took this player two weeks to build the beautiful Notre Dame Cathedral. He says that he didn't mine for the items himself — he kind of cheated — because otherwise it would've taken him way longer.

Take a tour through the Minecraft Notre Dame in this video. 

The Golden City isn't based on anything in reality, but it does show just how creative people can get in the game. Note the flying airship!

Foot binding, the practice of crushing young women’s feet into tiny “lotus” feet, was widespread in China for nearly a thousand years.

Long seen as a crucial way for women to elevate their status and wealth, the practice was finally banned in 1912. In recent decades, foot binding has been all but eliminated thanks to strict enforcement by the Communist Party.

Despite the ban, some women continued to bind their feet in secret. These women, mostly hidden or forgotten in tiny Chinese villages, are the last remaining survivors of the practice.

British photographer Jo Farrell has spent the last eight years traveling all over the Chinese countryside searching for these remaining women with bound feet. Despite the stigmas that currently surround foot binding, the women that Farrell met openly showed their "lotus" feet to her and revealed their stories.

Farrell has shared some of her work with us here, but you can see more on her website, Living History. Farrell recently raised nearly $15,000 on Kickstarter to create a book of the project. You can contribute to the project or purchase a preorder of the book here.

WARNING: These photos may be upsetting to some.

Foot binding began in China in the 10th century among the royal court of the Emperor. Over the course of centuries, the practice became widespread among women in the countryside who wanted to marry above their class.

Perfectly formed, tiny feet were seen as the height of beauty in turn-of-the-century China. "Lotus" feet were especially alluring because they limited a woman's mobility and therefore rendered her dependent on her family and her husband.

Chinese women used bandages to bind their daughters' feet in two directions. The first crushed the small toes underneath the ball of the foot. The other pushed the heel towards the toes to create a steep arch. The ideal length for a bound foot was three inches long.

The state of a country’s well-being says a lot about its prosperity and progress.

That’s why Gallup and Healthways team up to produce the annual “State of Global Well-Being Index,” which this year analyzed 135 world countries in five elements, including financial stability, social relationships, community safety, physical well-being, and sense of purpose (i.e. contributing to society).

The researchers culled results from over 133,000 surveys taken in 2013 and ranked the countries with the highest and lowest well-being in each element, as well as those who thrived in three or more categories.

Here are the countries with the highest and lowest well-being, with darker countries doing better:

Panama had by far the best well-being ranking in the world, with 61% of its population thriving in four of the five well-being elements. Gallup and Healthways researchers claimed that Panama's cultural positivity, relative political stability, and growing economy contributed to its high ranking.

But the Central American country was not thriving in terms of financial well-being, and struggled with a high poverty rate. Researchers noted this was especially prevalent for women and that ample work was needed to help women achieve financial stability on par with men.

Costa Rica followed Panama in a distant second place, with 44% of its population thriving in three or more elements, followed by Denmark, Austria, and Brazil rounding out the top five.

The U.S. came in #12 in the overall ranking, with high marks in social well-being and purpose.

Gallup noted that the Americas have the highest overall well-being among the world's regions: a full 33% of people surveyed were thriving in three or more of the five well-being areas.

Meanwhile, Syria and Afghanistan fell to the bottom of the ranking, with only about 1% of each of their populations thriving in at least three areas. Respondents in both of these countries were described as war-weary, with little certainty about their country's future.

Haiti (3%), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (5%), and Chad (5%) also made the bottom five.

For more details on the results and countries, you can read the full Gallup and Healthways survey results here.

The above map was made using an underlying file from thematicmapping.org.

SEE ALSO: The Most Affluent Town In Every State

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Although millions of dollars in marketing is meant to convince you otherwise, store-brand products are often just as good as name-brand products and cheaper, too.

That's why more informed shoppers are more likely to buy store-brand, according to a 2014 study from the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, which found that chefs tended to buy store-brand foods and medical professionals tended to buy store-brand drugs.

If this surprises you, it may be because store-brand products, sometimes called generics, used to be a class below name-brand, according to Tod Marks, senior projects editor at Consumer Reports.

"'Generics' is derogatory," Marks says. "It harkens back to the 1970s when the economy was struggling and a lot of stores came out with generic products. They were canned or packaged goods in nondescript, simple containers that said 'green beans,' or 'peaches.' They weren't very good, but they were cheap, and when the economy wasn't very strong they appealed to a lot of people."

The price-over-quality model has gone out of style, however, and today we have store brands like Whole Foods' 365 brand, Costco's Kirkland Signature, or Target's Archer Farms, all of which tend to get high ratings from consumers. 

Store brands, also known as private label products, "are made to high-level specifications put forth by the manufacturer," Marks say. They aren't necessarily meant to be exact copies of national brand products — often, they stand on their own (consider Trader Joe's, where the only products available are from the store).

One reason they're cheaper than their national brand counterparts is that they don't have the research, development, and advertising costs, so they're able to skim that off the price. By and large, Marks estimates, store brand grocery store products cost about 25% less than national brands.

Of course, some name-brand products are still worth it — but finding out when is tricky.

Looking back at that Booth study, it seems that store-brands make more sense for some products and less for others. Here's a chart of how likely chefs were to buy store-brands in different categories (most likely on top):

You'll see that professional chefs are more likely to buy the store-brand versions of a few products in particular:

• Pantry staples, like salt, sugar, and baking soda
• Dried, frozen, and canned fruit
• Baking mixes
• Frozen and canned vegetables
• Spreads, like jams, jellies, and "dairy spreads" (not including butter)
• Breads and baked goods
• Cheese

Keep in mind that while chefs' choices might indicate categories with the most wiggle room, quality-wise, it's also a matter of personal preference. The cheese snobs among us may never be inclined to part from their brand-name favorites.

Another noteworthy category of grocery store purchases is paper products. Many shoppers find that store-brand paper products like toilet paper and paper towels aren't as effective, and therefore require more paper to accomplish the same job.

According to Marks, however, this has changed in recent years. "There was a time when store brands tended to maybe not be as good as national brands in things like liquid detergent, toilet paper, and paper towels," he says. "Now when we do toilet paper tests, like with White Cloud, sold by Walmart, the quality, strength, and softness was top-rated. It was every bit as good as Charmin Ultra Soft."

Where else might you choose to buy store-brand at the grocery store? Consumer Reports taste tests have come up with the following products:

• Nuts. A 2013 Consumer Reports experiment found that cashews in particular hold up well when produced by stores. The year before, they found similar results for walnuts.
• Condiments, like ketchup, mayo, and maple syrup. Consumer Reports also found that these store-brand products performed strong, and you'll notice the chefs surveyed have a similar opinion.
• Whole-grain pasta. Whole Foods and Trader Joe's produce particularly strong versions.
• Spices. Particularly if you're baking with spices or using a recipe with many ingredients, store-brand spices hold up just as well.

Even in these categories, however, not every store brand is going to be good, and in some cases you're better off with a brand name.

"Store brands are as different as sunrise and sunset," Marks says.

Savvy shoppers should be prepared to do systematic product testing at the grocery store. No matter how well-reviewed a store-brand product, if you don't like it, it's a waste of money.

SEE ALSO: 5 ways retailers trick you into spending money

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Apple will release iOS 8 on Wednesday, and there’s a lot to look forward to.

The new software update for iPhones, iPods, and iPads looks just like iOS 7, but there’s much more going on under the hood. There are some new applications like Health, new features like the ability to send audio messages in iMessage, and some huge foundational improvements to allow for seamless interplay among all devices.

Apple also has plenty of developer goodies that will make iOS more powerful, including 4,000 new APIs for home electronics, Touch ID, iCloud, cameras, games, and more.

Here, we’ve picked out some of the standout improvements and features in iOS 8 so that you can get an idea of what to expect when the update goes live on Wednesday.

Continuity

Each year, Apple has been tying its mobile and desktop operating systems closer together. But thanks to Continuity in iOS 8, you’ll finally be able to pick up precisely where you left off on another device — whether you’re writing an email, creating a presentation, or reading a webpage. You’ll also be able to answer calls to your iPhone directly on your Mac or iPad, as long as those devices are all using the same Wi-Fi network.

But even if you don’t have Wi-Fi, your iPad or Mac can now leverage your phone’s personal hotspot when it’s nearby. There are plenty of other improvements to this idea of seamless handoff, including Apple’s decision to make its peer-to-peer file-sharing protocol, AirDrop, now functional between both Mac and iOS devices. For these reasons, Continuity will likely be the standout feature of iOS 8.

Health

This new fitness app is designed to measure your fitness and sleeping habits. And thanks to the HealthKit tool for developers, third-party apps and hardware will be able to sync with the Health platform so that it can learn more about your health and fitness, and be able to share that accurate data — like your resting heart rate, cholesterol, and blood sugar — with your physician.

When the Apple Watch arrives next year, it will track and deliver most of these health statistics. But as a whole, the Health app marks the beginning of Apple’s campaign to help us all get healthy, while also making it easier for physicians to analyze one’s biometrics for an accurate evaluation and/or diagnosis.

Keyboards

For a long time, iPhone and iPad users could only use one keyboard: the one Apple provided. But even though Apple has improved its own keyboard for iOS 8, offering predictive contextual suggestions based on previous messages and the message you’re writing, the company is finally opening up the keyboard API to allow for third-party keyboards from the likes of Swype and Fleksy. Expect plenty of interesting keyboards to soon become available for iPhone and iPad users.

France was recently named the most-visited country in the world with over 84 million visitors in 2013 — and for good reason. 

Millions of people go to France each year to stroll along the quays of Paris, lie on the gorgeous beaches of the French Riviera, and sip wine in Bordeaux.

Here are 35 places all travelers should go in France.

See the waterlilies that inspired Claude Monet at his home in Giverny.

Ride a white horse with a French cowboy (called a gardian) in the Camargue, Europe's largest river delta.

Slurp up a bowl of bouillabaisse (fish stew) in its birthplace, Marseille.

As New York subways continue to become more crowded, one company is looking to the sky.

Real estate firm CityRealty has unveiled a proposal for an urban gondola system, known as the East River Skyway, that would connect Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens.

The design was presented at the Massey Knakal Brooklyn Real Estate Summit by Daniel Levy, president of CityRealty, and was inspired by the efficiency of high-speed gondolas in London, Rio de Janeiro, and Germany.

According to CityRealty, the proposed gondolas would span the East River, be safer than buses and subways, and reduce travel time by an estimated 20-30 minutes for Brooklyn residents commuting into Manhattan.

The gondolas would travel 12-17 miles per hour over New York and be able to carry more than 5,000 people per hour in each direction. According to CityRealty, the gondolas would also have zero emissions and be eco-friendly.

The first phase of the project would connect Williamsburg to downtown Manhattan, South Williamsburg, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Later phases would possibly extend the system to Greenpoint, Long Island City, Midtown East, DUMBO, and South Street Seaport stations, among others.

“New York City is a natural fit for cable transit systems given its severe topographical challenges,” Steven Dale, president of Creative Urban Projects and Cable Car Consultants, said in the press release. “New gondola technology would be an effective means to address the ever-increasing traffic in Manhattan, Brooklyn and perhaps even farther afield.”

The initial plan would cost around $100 million to implement, according to The New York Daily News. That's small potatoes compared to the Second Avenue subway, which could eventually cost $20 billion when all is said and done. And with the MTA reporting subway ridership is at its highest since 1949 with over 1.7 billion rides in 2013, the city could use a transportation revamp.

SEE ALSO: New York City's Subway System Is Facing An Unprecedented Bedbug Problem

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Being a war photographer is dangerous, grueling, and emotionally taxing work. It puts you on the front line with the soldiers, witnessing pain and violence while documenting it all, making the horror of war that much more difficult to shake off. But many war photographers hope that their work will help people to confront and understand the gravity of conflict.

After covering the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars for years, Ashley Gilbertson, one of journalism's most respected war photographers, started to think that maybe that understanding wasn't happening as he'd hoped. "I realized people in the United States weren’t really engaging with what was taking place there," he tells Slate. After returning to the United States, Gilbertson began looking for a new, potentially more effective way to depict the losses sustained during war.It was Gilbertson's wife who came up with the idea to photograph fallen soldier's bedrooms, many of which had been preserved by the soldiers' grieving families. "I felt I was in some historic memorial. I would never touch anything. I would rarely even touch the light switch. I felt bad putting my tripod on the carpet because I felt I was disturbing something," Gilbertson says.

Gilbertson photographed 40 rooms — the same number of soldiers in a platoon —  in the US, Canada, and Europe, creating a body of work which later became the book "Bedrooms of the Fallen," published this year.The soldiers whose rooms Gilbertson photographed ranged in age from 18 to 27. Many Gilbertson had never met, though some he did. He dedicated the book to Marine Lance Corporal Billy Miller, a soldier who was escorting Gilbertson in Fallujah when he was shot at close range by an enemy. "I came home…Billy Miller didn’t. I needed to photograph his absence,” Gilbertson said to Time.

Gilbertson decided to document the rooms in black and white to minimize distraction created by color, allowing the viewer to notice all the details, like the posters and teddy bears, signs of the soldier's age at the time of deployment. "That is who we send to fight our wars for us, our children," says Gilbertson.All photos courtesy of Ashley Gilbertson, all rights reserved, from "Bedrooms of the Fallen", published 2014 by the University of Chicago Press.

SEE ALSO: Awesome Interactive Panoramas Give A Glimpse At Everyday Life In North Korea

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Some of the most influential business books are available for next to nothing (or even nothing) in the Amazon Kindle store.

For less than $5, you can gather timeless wisdom from classics like Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People," build your economic background with world-changing texts like John Maynard Keynes' "The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money," and get insight from ancient texts like Marcus Aurelius's "Meditations."

A few modern classics, like Susan Cain's "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking" are also available.

If you've got a Kindle and a few bucks to spare, it's time to get reading.

"The Art of War" (c. 6th century BC)

Price: $0.99

Sun Tzu's ancient Chinese military classic has become required reading for executives around the world.

Rick Wartzman, executive director of the Drucker Institute, writes in Forbes that the book's influence outside the battlefield is due to the focus on the fundamentals of management and competition. It explains how you can outlast an enemy that is more powerful through patience and a focus of energy.

Buy it here >>

"Meditations" (c. 170 - 180)

Price: $0.99

Marcus Aurelius was the great Roman emperor known as the "Philosopher King." His personal writings from the end of his life have been collected as "Meditations," and have remained relevant for almost two millennia.

Marcus' reflections offer timeless wisdom into the nature of human beings, as well as advice on how to maintain self-control and determination in the face of adversity.

Buy it here >>

"The Prince" (1532)

Price: $0.99

The Italian political theorist Machiavelli's most well-known work has inspired a wildly diverse group that includes Thomas Jefferson, Napoleon, and mobster John Gotti.

Machiavelli's outline for being a ruthless and manipulative leader has been interpreted in many different ways and remains controversial.

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A 23,000-square-foot mansion in Beverly Hills with views of Malibu Beach and downtown Los Angeles has been listed for a staggering $85 million.

The real estate listing warns: “be prepared for an overwhelming sensory experience unlike any you've felt before." It’s not exaggerating.

The two-level home, which was completed by the firm’s creative team this month, has eight bedrooms, 15 bathrooms, an underground garage, wine cellar, and even a movie theater.

Located in the elite neighborhood of Trousdale Estates, the home looks like a showroom with two fully stocked bars, a gym, game room, and infinity edge pool.

The property last sold in August of 2012 for $12.65 million, according to Zillow. The over-the-top house is listed by Ben Bacal Realty as well as Branden Williams and Rayni Romito Williams of Williams & Williams.

Welcome to 1181 North Hillcrest. The home was listed this month for $85 million.

It's located in the elite Beverly Hills neighborhood of Trousdale Estates.

The home received a complete overhaul after being purchased back in 2012. The new design is stunning.

New Zealand scientists at Te Papa museum dissected an almost 800-pound colossal squid on Sept. 16. This was the second of these giants ever to be found intact. Both were dragged out of the Ross Sea, off the freezing coast of Antarctica.

Colossal squid, with their eight arms and two tentacles, both covered in fearsome rotating hooks, are the largest tentacled creatures in the ocean as measured by weight. The first one ever found, in 2007, weighed in at almost 1,100 pounds.

Giant squid are frequently cited as being longer — an 1887 scientific paper claimed they measured one at 55 feet long — but it's unclear if those measurements are accurate. And with so few colossal specimens ever examined and the variations and changes in body size that occur after death, researchers say they would need to examine many more colossal squid to really understand how large they can grow.

Fishermen hauled the first intact colossal squid into the San Aspiring fishing boat on February 22, 2007, off the coast of Antarctica. At the time, they measured it at about 33 feet and just over 1000 pounds.

This monster had been eating a Patagonian toothfish on the line it was pulled in on. Like the giant squid, these cephalapods battle sperm whales deep in the ocean. The first colossal squid tentacles ever seen were pulled from the belly of whale in 1925.

Though this one is the largest colossal specimen ever found, it is a male — female squid are generally bigger.