Avery Ellis, Author at Gizmodo

Google Recalls Physical Security Keys After Discovery of Bluetooth Vulnerability

Titan—the physical security Google rolled out last summer—was built to “protect high-value users.” Now those users who bought in on Titan are all eligible for free replacements of this $50 device suite after the company discovered a vulnerability in the way it operates. Titan, and competitor products that preceded it like the YubiKey or Feitian…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 15

So Long, YTMND

Before sharable internet jokes were even called memes, they lived on YTMND—which appears to have met its end. You’re The Man Now Dog (better know as YTMND) launched back in 2004, and allowed users the ability to upload an image or GIF and a short audio clip, where they’d loop on their own custom page…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 15

Uber, Down $14 Billion Since Friday, May Drop Even Further

Outpacing the New York Stock Exchange’s losses on another rocky day of trading, Uber’s disappointing IPO is becoming disastrous, falling an additional 10.8 percent in its second day as a public company. Uber, which controls the lion’s share of the ride-hailing market in the U.S., rattled investors with a 7.6 percent dip from its $45-per-share…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 13

Facebook Caves, Increases Salaries and Benefits for Contractors

After years of critical coverage citing the emotional distress experienced by Facebook’s contractors, particularly those who review often upsetting and violent content on the platform day in and day out, the Menlo Park on Monday firm announced a number of deal-sweeteners for this vulnerable workforce. Facebook previously ascribed to a $15-an-hour minimum wage across its…

Social Media Avery Ellis May 13

Palantir’s Github Page Is the New Battleground in the Fight Against ICE

Tech activists continue to organize and win across many of the industry’s biggest firms—and increasingly the online spaces tech workers gather are becoming battlegrounds in their own right. Take Palantir’s Github page this morning, for example: Starting around 10am ET, concerned users plan to mass flag “issues” with the most popular repositories the company maintains.…

Politics Avery Ellis May 11

Congratulations to Uber, the Worst Performing IPO in U.S. Stock Market History

Rideshare unicorn Uber doesn’t do anything small. When it was in the game of raising money, it raised close to $25 billion. When it loses that money—and it does every single quarter—it loses it at astronomical burn rates. It finally debuted on the New York Stock Exchange today, in the middle of international trade uncertainty…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 10

New York’s Rideshare Organizers Clash Amid Unprecedented Uber Strike

Long Island City—Just days before Uber’s expected debut on the stock market at a conservative but still-astronomical $80 to $90 billion valuation, the anger among rideshare drivers boiled over into an international day of action. In at least 20 cities around the world, Uber drivers with few employment protections and no real way to contact…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 8

New Research Confirms That Ride-Hailing Companies Are Causing a Ton of Traffic Congestion

A study published today in Science Advances comparing pre- and post-rideshare boom traffic in San Fransisco found that the presence of Uber, Lyft, and similar companies has been an overall detriment for people who like getting where they’re going quickly. That businesses which pay people to have their vehicles on the road would, well, increase…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 8

Lyft Synks

Look at them up there in the pic—Lyft CEO Logan Green, President John Zimmer, and a whole bunch of other employees that Getty wasn’t interested in naming—on the day their company officially debuted on the Nasdaq, with an oversubscribed IPO and a share price well above initial estimates. That was a month ago! And in…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 7

Amazon’s Cashless, Cashierless Store Now Accepts Cash, Has Cashiers

Amazon’s passel of automated convenience stores took some well-deserved criticism for failing to serve cash-carrying customers. The company’s solution was essentially to abandon the Amazon Go concept entirely. To recap: Amazon Go was supposed to be a frictionless, app-based 711 of sorts. Customers come in, grab what they want, and the store itself automatically tabulates…

Commerce Avery Ellis May 7

ɐpu∩ uʍop sǝoפ ǝʞᴉɹʇS ɹǝq∩

A broad coalition planning action against ridesharing giant Uber in over a dozen cities just received some international reinforcements: Australian drivers have announced their intention to join this Wednesday’s mass strike. The Rideshare Driver Cooperative and Transport Workers Union have decided that, like workers elsewhere taking to the streets and demanding changes to the platforms…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 6

Have You Seen This Cat?

Before any of you wiseacres say, “Technically yes, now I have,” just take a sec and think, because there’s a very distressed man in Portland, Oregon who would like to be reunited with this handsome feline. The cat in question came to our attention via a lawsuit, which, if you’re familiar with legal filings, tend…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 6

Apple to Face Antitrust Probe in Europe, Courtesy of Spotify

Less than a month after Spotify filed a formal complaint against Apple for its app store practices, a European Commission probe is moving forward, potentially threatening one of the Cupertino giant’s cash cows. Spotify went on a publicity tear last month, coordinated with its antitrust complaint, that included a statement from CEO Daniel Ek and…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 6

Boeing, Accused of Union-Busting, Really Going for Some Sort of ‘Worst Company’ Award

With an entire line of its planes grounded following several, likely preventable air disasters that cost hundreds of passengers their lives, Boeing has decided to kick itself while it’s down by engaging in what three ex-workers are calling retaliatory firings. Last May, a group of Boeing workers at a South Carolina facility successfully voted in…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 3

UK Drivers to Stage Massive Strike Coinciding With Uber’s IPO

Rideshare drivers across the Atlantic have plans to sign off the Uber app and spend their time protesting in four major metro areas. The message, coordinated around Uber’s plans to go public, is a clear rebuke of the company’s IPO plan, which will make many employees wealthy overnight, but leave drivers in the same deteriorating…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 3

For Sale: Massive Blogging Platform, Lightly Used

Six years after being acquired for an astonishing $1.1 billion, blogging platform Tumblr and its 550 million monthly users are reportedly on the auction block with no indication of who might be in market to buy it. Yahoo—which was folded into Oath, and now Verizon Media Group—purchased the scrappy start-up for a billion and change…

Tech News Avery Ellis May 2

Did Twitter Keep Tabs on Journalists’ Political Leanings?

The question is not at all hypothetical. Much of the coverage of Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s ongoing press tour has focused on splashier news, like him appearing on the podcast of antivaxxer Ben Greenfield to recount his alarming personal health practices. But in guest spots on the podcasts of atheist philosopher Sam Harris and standup-turned-MMA-commentator…

Tech News Avery Ellis Apr 29

I Wouldn’t Even Make My Worst Enemy, Who Happens to Be Mark Zuckerberg, Listen to 90 Minutes of Mark Zuckerberg Bloviating About, Uh, People, or Technology, or Something

First off, Mark, I’m sorry you had to find out this way but in fact, you are my professional nemesis. Of all the tech titans living rent-free in my brain, some are arguably more evil than you, but none soar to the same disruptive heights of molar-grinding tediousness. Unsurprisingly, the dry, positionless-ness of your overlong…

Tech News Avery Ellis Apr 26

New York AG’s Report Untethers Bizarre Cryptocurrency Scheme

The wildly fluctuating prices of cryptocurrencies are a feature not a bug, where speculators are concerned. That’s always made the proposition of the alleged “stablecoin” Tether an odd one. According to New York’s attorney general, the entire operation may have been operating on a lie. Underpinning Tether’s sales pitch is the proposition that its coins…

Tech News Avery Ellis Apr 26

Canada May Drag Facebook to Court Over Its ‘Disregard’ for User Security

Wikipedia can go ahead and add all of Canada to the ever-expanding List Of Parties Who Have A Bone to Pick With Facebook page—a joint investigation by the privacy commissioners of Canada and British Columbia found the company “committed serious contraventions of Canadian privacy laws.” Several data breaches have roiled the platform’s estimated 2 billion…

Social Media Avery Ellis Apr 25

Avery Ellis

Google Recalls Physical Security Keys After Discovery of Bluetooth Vulnerability

So Long, YTMND

Uber, Down $14 Billion Since Friday, May Drop Even Further

Facebook Caves, Increases Salaries and Benefits for Contractors

Palantir’s Github Page Is the New Battleground in the Fight Against ICE

Congratulations to Uber, the Worst Performing IPO in U.S. Stock Market History

New York’s Rideshare Organizers Clash Amid Unprecedented Uber Strike

New Research Confirms That Ride-Hailing Companies Are Causing a Ton of Traffic Congestion

Lyft Synks

Amazon’s Cashless, Cashierless Store Now Accepts Cash, Has Cashiers

ɐpu∩ uʍop sǝoפ ǝʞᴉɹʇS ɹǝq∩

Have You Seen This Cat?

Apple to Face Antitrust Probe in Europe, Courtesy of Spotify

Boeing, Accused of Union-Busting, Really Going for Some Sort of ‘Worst Company’ Award

UK Drivers to Stage Massive Strike Coinciding With Uber’s IPO

For Sale: Massive Blogging Platform, Lightly Used

Did Twitter Keep Tabs on Journalists’ Political Leanings?

I Wouldn’t Even Make My Worst Enemy, Who Happens to Be Mark Zuckerberg, Listen to 90 Minutes of Mark Zuckerberg Bloviating About, Uh, People, or Technology, or Something

New York AG’s Report Untethers Bizarre Cryptocurrency Scheme

Canada May Drag Facebook to Court Over Its ‘Disregard’ for User Security

Twitter Just Can’t Stop Leaking Movies

The ‘Mass Effect’ Show is Getting Rewritten to Get Greenlit

See the Early Stages of How ‘Project Hail Mary’ Brought Rocky to Life

‘Cognitive Surrender’ Is a New and Useful Term for How AI Melts Brains

HP Omen Max 45L Review: 4K60 Gaming Has Never Been So Easy

Marshall Acton III Home Speaker Drops to a Record Low, the Deal Countdown Has Already Started

Ecovacs Winbot W3 Omni Review: Window Cleaning Robots Have a Long Way to Go

I’m Worried About the Helpless AI Disruptors of the Future

Russia Allegedly Swung at VPNs but Accidentally Hit Its Own Banking Sector Instead

Ryan Coogler Is Shifting ‘Animorphs’ Into a Disney+ Show

AirPods Max 2 vs. Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen): Which ANC Headphones Win?

The Best Gadgets of March 2026

AirPods Max 2 Review: Still Ridiculously Expensive and Ridiculously Nice

DJI Osmo 360 Review: The Best 360 Camera for the DJI-Pilled

Aqara Smart Lock U400 Review: Hands-free Unlocking at Its Best

MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ Review: A Solid 2-in-1 Laptop With Some Glaring Flaws

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life