Leslie Horn

Relive Lady Mary’s Hell With Downton Abbey Season Four on Amazon Prime

Downton Abbey is a great show, especially if you like sadness. Season four, which opens with Lady Mary and the rest of the Crowleys recovering from yet another personal tragedy, is now streaming exclusively on Amazon Prime. Drama! Intrigue! Wealth! Quasi-adultery! Sex! Class warfare! This show has it all, set in the stylized backdrop of…

Halt and Catch Fire Episode Four: Donna Is Here to Solve Everything

Halt and Catch Fire has so far failed at delivering us the TV drama about the rise of the personal computer that we deserve. In episode four last night, we see a small glimmer of hope, as the one character who might be Cardiff Electric’s saving grace has also become the show’s lone redeeming quality.…

Halt and Catch Fire Is a Huge Missed Opportunity

This Sunday, AMC will air the fourth episode of its new series, Halt and Catch Fire. It’s the most comprehensive (fictional) look at the development of the personal computer. Too bad it’s also a huge missed opportunity. Set in big-haired, high plains Dallas in 1983, Halt and Catch Fire is the story of Cardiff Electric,…

Facebook Pokes: Creepy or Funny?

Facebook pokes, LinkedIn romance, and how to deal with someone who doesn’t understand email—that’s what we’re dealing with this week at User Manual, Gizmodo’s weekly internet advice column. We’re here to help! https://gizmodo.com/send-user-manual-your-burning-questions-about-online-et-1586730713 If you are in a relationship, are you required to de-activate your online dating profiles (Hinge, Tinder, OkCupid, etc…)? If you don’t…

BlackBerry’s Potential Canadian Spokespeople, Ranked

Finally BlackBerry (reportedly) called on Canada’s most reputable citizen, Drake, to promote the upcoming BlackBerry Passport. But despite Drizzy’s only cares being money and the city that he’s from, he declined. So who should BlackBerry call? We’ve decided to help, by ranking Canada’s notable citizens and potential BlackBerry spokespersons in order of appeal and Canadianness.…

New Lego Fusion lets you build infinite virtual worlds using real bricks

This is the new Lego Fusion, three new sets designed to let you build Lego worlds inside your tablet or phone by using physical bricks in the real world. Build something, capture it, and it becomes a 3D object inside a virtual universe. And then you can play with it just like in a Lego…

You Can Now Share and View GIFs Directly on Twitter

Twitter just announced support for animated GIFs on Twitter.com, as well as its iPhone and Android apps. *Cue your favorite celebration GIFS.* This means, that yes, you can view and share GIFs as they play on your app or on the full website. No clicking away to anywhere else. That’s more you can say for…

LG G3 Review: Brains That Finally Keep Up With the Brawn

The LG G2 was the worst kind of disappointment, a powerful device held back by lame software. The G3 keeps the strength, and actually manages to get out of its own way. For the most part, that is. https://gizmodo.com/lg-g2-review-a-braindead-hercules-1349343131 What Is It? LG’s follow-up to the painfully flawed LG G2. It’s an LG phone fit…

Bitcoin Has Its Own College Bowl Game Because Life Is a Meaningless Void

College football, you are in for a treat. Thanks to three year sponsorship from payment services provider BitPay, the NCAA is getting a Bitcoin Bowl. That’s right, a Bitcoin Bowl. Per GigaOm, ESPN Events just announced the digital currency-sponsored sporting event earlier today. Important facts: It will be held in St. Petersburg, Florida. It will…

Relive June 17th, 1994: The Craziest Day in Modern Sports History

Twenty years ago today you were glued to your TV watching OJ Simpson lead the LAPD on a low-speed chase in that now-infamous white Bronco. But that wasn’t the only thing happening. 30 for 30: June 17, 1994 is the story of that and several unrelated sports developments that serendipitously happened on the same day.…

Despite rumors that Nike will be killing Fuelband, the company has finally released an Android app. It’s long overdue, but better late than never, sure. Besides, even if the fitness band is on the outs, it still makes sense to support existing devices. [Google Play via Engadget]

Tupac: Changes

Today would have been Tupac’s 43rd birthday, so what better time than tonight to post the classic “Changes”? It’s a great song—not Tupac’s biggest hit, but still significant. The cruel irony of it, however, is despite the message, Tupac himself ultimately fell victim to violence himself. But time certainly did not forget him, and he…

What’s the Best Chef’s Knife?

You can do almost anything with a good kitchen knife. You have plenty of options but which one is the best? We want to hear from you. You often hear people mentioning Wüsthof or Shun as having some of the best cutlery around. But those certainly aren’t the only options. So what’s your kitchen weapon…

What It Was Like To Judge That History-Making Turing Test

Earlier this week, a computer program passed the Turing Test for the first time in a controversial win for chatbots everywhere. Actor Robert Llewellyn was one of the judges for the test, and he gave Gizmodo an inside look at the strange experience of thinking a computer program was a real live boy. https://gizmodo.com/how-big-a-deal-is-that-turing-test-win-1588011992 Llewellyn…

How SoundCloud Changed Music Forever

Some of the best ideas are also the simplest. And there are few things more simple than SoundCloud, which in its seven year existence has sneakily become one of the best things online. How’d it get there? Slowly, surely, and with a cadre of artists as diverse as the internet itself. SoundCloud is to music…

Our Favorite iOS, Android, and Windows Phone Apps of the Week

Whoa there, big guy. You can’t just roll out for the weekend before loading up your smartphone with some new apps. What kind of blog do you think this is? Check out some newness right here: WUT WUT in the… okay, WUT is a really fun app. It lets you blurt out mental vomit to…

We Met on an App Meant for Random Sex: How Do I Explain It to My Mom?

Welcome to User Manual, Gizmodo’s weekly internet advice column. This week we’re answering questions on how to tell your parents you met someone on Tinder, how to deal with an ex on Facebook, and more internet relationships follies. Buckle up, sex in the internet age is complicated. Reader David asks: How do I explain to…

Yep, You Can Pay for College In Bitcoin Now

King’s College, a conservative evangelical college in New York City, is now accepting Bitcoin for tuition, making it the first United States university to do so. Hallelujah! The school—which is located within spitting distance of Wall Street—is also accepting the digital currency for “other expenses and donations.” Per a statement from King’s College: As the…

Priceline is buying restaurant reservation platform OpenTable for $2.6 billion. That’s some delicious added value for the travel-booking site.

Revisit Grease in All Its 1950s Summer Lovin’ Glory Once Again

[Cue up “Summer Nights” for optimal effect]. You’ve almost definitely seen Grease six or seven times. It’s on TV a lot, it’s about 25-years-old, and c’mon, those songs are just about everywhere. But it’s summer, and we’re talking about summer love, so why not revisit the classic campy flick? You know the story: Sandy is…