Chris Mills

Reddit CEO: Vast Majority of Users Don’t Actually Care About Drama

The last few days have seen Reddit, the internet’s Fort Knox of cat GIFs,tearing itself apartover the dismissal of Reddit’s unofficial liason between staff and the community. The disagreement caused some subreddits to go offline, turning the site’s front page into a barren wasteland — but according to CEO Ellen Pao, the ‘vast majority’ of…

You Can 3-D Print Some Amazing Stuff With This Ultra-Strong Resin

Formlabs, a 3-D printing supplies company, has a new kind of resin it’s calling ‘tough’. It’s still plastic, but plastic you can make real things out of. The company claims that things printed with Tough resin have about the same strength and impact resistance as ABS plastic. That’s not quite the 3-D printed car future…

Reddit’s AMA Sub Is Back Online and Throwing Punches

Following a day-long blackout, Reddit’s Ask Me Anything /r/IAmA subreddit is back online. But in the same post it used to welcome back users, it also stuck two fingers in the general direction of Reddit’s management. In case you haven’t been following the Reddit drama, here’s the short version: Reddit’s Director of Communications and all-round…

Someone Is Finally Suing Samsung Over Its Bloatware

For years, Samsung (and other Android manufacturers) have been crapping all over Google’s simple software design with layers of gratuitous bloatware. So, in the proud American tradition, a Chinese consumer protection group is suing Samsung and Oppo for ruining everyone’s lives. As the Shanghai Daily reports, the Shanghai Consumer Rights Protection Commission has filed two…

Your Best Efforts to Decorate Google’s Self-Driving Car

Last week, Google launched a contest for artists to decorate its self-driving cars, and in a completely unrelated move,we asked you to use Photoshop to decorate Google’s self-driving cars. We’ve tallied up the entries, presented them to an expert panel of judges, and present the results below. To the winners go internet points (a hot…

Flying a Solar Plane Around the World Takes One Hell of a Ground Crew

In about half an hour, the Solar Impulse solar-powered plane is going to touch down in Hawaii, at the end of a record-setting flight across the Pacific. Attention and praise are quite rightly going to be heaped on pilot André Borschberg, who will have been peeing into a funnelfor 120 hours straight. But behind the…

Last Night’s Routine Rocket Launch Was Thankfully Routine

Last night saw the launch of a resupply mission to the ISS atop a Russian Progress rocket — a pretty routine event (as far as firing things into low-earth orbit will ever be routine), but an important one given recent events. Thankfully, it seems like everything went fine and nothing exploded this time around. Carrying…

Photographer Catches the ISS Flying Past the Moon

Using a little bit of math and a lot of patience, anyone can watch the International Space Station go flying past the Moon. And if you’ve got a DSLR and a telescope handy, you can save that moment in a stunning photo. Amateur photographer Dylan O’Donnellcaptured the image above of the ISS transiting the moon…

Playing Bing Pong Is the Best Thing You Can Do With Bing

In its continuing efforts to show how cool and down with the kids it is, Microsoft has just added a video game from 1972 to Bing. Yes, this will consume all your remaining spare time this evening. Sure, this is a shameless copy of the sort of thing Google has been doing for years, adding…

iOS 8.4 Quietly Disables Home Sharing for Music

With one hand Apple giveth, and with the other, it rips a long-standing feature away with no warning. As part of the iOS 8.4 update that brought Apple Music, Home Sharing has been disabled for iOS devices. Home Sharing would let you stream your local iTunes library from your computer to your iDevice on the…

NASA Proves Mars Isn’t Just One Big Desert

If you’ve spent any time looking at the average satellite image of Mars, you’d be forgiven for concluding that our planetary neighbour is actually just one gigantic sandy wasteland. But as this close-up image of the Aureum Chaos proves, Martians don’t just hide in the sand. The Aureum Chaos is a light-toned deposit some 230…

Stay calm, citizens: Apple Maps’ sensor-laden minivans, which have been on the road for months in some regions, are expanding to 15 new states. The full list of locations is available in some detail on Apple’s blog. I’m not saying you should start planning your elaborate prank right now, but it’s certainly a possibility. Contact…

Why Leap Seconds Confuse Computers

Last night, time on Earth had a leap second. The planet’s computer systems survived unscathed, thanks to months of careful preparation by engineers. But here’s a concise explanation of why, left to their own devices, a bunch of very expensive computers could’ve thrown a hissy fit. YouTuber Tom Scott explains the system, called Unix time,…

FBI Investigating Attacks On Physical Internet Infrastructure In SF

Squads of Chinese hackers aren’t the only threat to internet infrastructure in the US, it would seem: the FBI is reportedly investigating “at least 11” physical attacks on high-capacity internet cables in the Bay Area dating back a year. According to a report in USA Today, agents have confirmed that they are looking into a…

Here’s Hillary Clinton Working Out How to Use a Fax Machine

This evening, the State Department released another trove of Hillary Clinton’s emails from her time as secretary of state. Among the gems being uncovered is this terse exchange, a wonderful insight into trying to use a fax machine in the modern age. Anyone who’s tech-supported their parents over email can definitely relate. The full email…

Sprint Instantly Regrets Shady-As-Hell Video Throttling Policy

Early this morning, Sprint announced a new ‘All-In’ wireless plan with unlimited data, throttled to 600kbps for anyone trying to stream videos. The internet’s resounding ‘hell no’ showed Sprint the error of its ways, and it has now changed that explicit throttling policy to a more vaguely-worded (but no less shady) one. Sprint’s All-In plan…

Apple’s Beats 1 Radio Just Started Its Never-Ending Transmission

This morning saw the launch of iOS 8.4, and with it Apple Music. And even if you’re not a Taylor Swift fan, there’s still some joy to be had in the world: the Beats 1 radio station, DJed by Zane Lowe and free for everyone with an Apple ID, started its broadcast at 12PM Eastern.…

AppleCare Now Covers Worn-Out Batteries

Built-in batteries mean a built-in expiry date for gadgets: lithium-ion batteries slowly lose their ability to hold charge over time, eventually dying an ignominious death, and rendering your expensive gizmo useless — unless, that is, you’ve got AppleCare. In a small change to the policy for AppleCare for Mac spotted by MacRumors, Apple will now…

The Key to Longer-Lasting Smartwatches Might Be Stupidly Simple

Smartwatches are not endowed with the greatest battery life, thanks to the limited space available. But for the increasingly large number of circular smartwatches on the market, there’s one simple change that could yield a quarter more power: stop trying to fit rectangular batteries into round bodies. LG Chem, the battery-making division of Korean manufacturer…

Lego Wants to Stop Producing Oil-Based Bricks

Since 1963, Lego toys off all shapes and sizes have been moulded from ABS plastic, a material with a long list of pros; but thanks to the reliance on petroleum to make ABS, sustainability isn’t one of them. That’s why Lego is spending hundreds of millions of dollars finding an alternative. The company will spend…