Rhett Jones, Author at Gizmodo

How Governing by Tweet Is Going for Your Favorite Quarantined President

Our beautiful president has a viral load and a full diaper. Quarantined at the White House, Donald Trump is living without a full staff, a rally crowd, or a sense of judgment. And you know what that means—he’s tweeting, folks. It’s been a week since the president announced that he’d tested positive for covid-19 and…

Politics Rhett Jones Oct 9

‘Anyone Else Would Suffer Legal Consequences’: New England Journal of Medicine Rebukes Trump

The New England Journal of Medicine has been publishing for a couple of centuries now, and in that time it has never endorsed or condemned a political candidate. That kind of peddling in subjective opinion has been counter to its mission of delivering science-based information. But we live in times when America’s leadership is objectively…

Tech News Rhett Jones Oct 8

GPT-3 Bot Spends a Week Replying on Reddit, Starts Talking About the Illuminati

A Reddit user went on an impressive comment streak last week. The user stuck to the pages of the mega-popular AskReddit subforum, and their responses were relatively elaborate. But the length of the replies was especially unusual in that they were sometimes coming within a minute of the question first being asked. After an impressive…

Artificial Intelligence Rhett Jones Oct 7

The Future of Software Is at Stake in Google’s Latest Trip to the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court will finally hear arguments in a case that could rewrite the rules of software development as we know it. On Wednesday, Google will defend its use of Java code in the development of the Android operating system. Oracle claims that code is protected intellectual property, and if the court agrees, there are…

Tech Policy Rhett Jones Oct 7

Spotify Adds Ability to Search Songs by Lyrics and Launches New App

This week, Spotify is rolling out the ability to find songs by searching for their lyrics. It’s a feature that’s been a long time coming and it will undoubtedly become second-nature for users in no time at all. Spotify designer Lin Wang first shared the news in a tweet on Monday. The new search function…

Tech News Rhett Jones Oct 6

Excel Error Believed to Have Caused UK to Lose 15,841 Covid-19 Tests

On Sunday, one of the United Kingdom’s public health agencies announced that 15,841 covid-19 cases had gone unreported due to a “technical issue” that occurred during “the data load process.” As citizens demand answers, it’s looking increasingly likely that a simple error in Microsoft Excel is to blame for the missing data. Public Health England…

Tech News Rhett Jones Oct 5

Twitter Wants to Replace Its Seemingly Racist Cropping Tool With Users Like You

Last month, Twitter apologized after users noticed that its automated tool for cropping photos appeared to favor subjects with light skin. The social network said that it was investigating bias in its existing machine learning algorithm, and on Thursday it announced that it has seen enough to know it’s time for a change. The issue…

Tech News Rhett Jones Oct 2

GitHub Adds Code Scanning for Automatic Security-Hole Searches

GitHub, the largest host of source code in the world, has added a new feature that most of us will probably never use but could make the world wide web a safer place for everyone. Last year, GitHub’s owner Microsoft purchased Semmle, makers of a semantic code analysis engine that’s been used to hunt down…

Privacy & Security Rhett Jones Oct 1

Teenage Engineering’s ‘Magic Radio’ Is a Boutique Freakshow

Teenage Engineering has been quietly making some of the most exciting niche gadgets for about 15 years. Now, its latest offering is one of the weirdest concepts it’s ever produced. With the OB-4, the boutique electronics studio wants to make radio exciting again. Fans of Teenage Engineering mostly associate the brand with its dirt-cheap Pocket…

Gadgets Rhett Jones Sep 30

Google’s Antitrust Clusterfuck Is Turning Into a Three-Way

An antitrust review of Google’s business practices has been a long time coming, and it looks like the U.S. Justice Department is going to make moves on that front very shortly. But there’s growing concern that the case against the search giant will amount to nothing but a political maneuver. Adding to Google’s headaches, it’s…

Tech Policy Rhett Jones Sep 30

Amazon Sees Palm Readers in Your Retail Shopping Future

Move over Bill Gates, it’s time for Jeff Bezos to get a little more time in the spotlight of conspiracy theorists. On Tuesday, Amazon announced the rollout of its new Amazon One devices that use a customer’s palm for identification and payment at physical retail stores. The devices are already available for use in Seattle…

Commerce Rhett Jones Sep 29

Leaked Database Shows Trump Campaign Targeted Black Americans for Voter Suppression in 2016

With 36 days to go until the next presidential election, we’re being reminded that there are still a lot of unanswered questions about the 2016 campaign. Questions like how did the Trump team use all that data that was taken from Facebook users without their consent? A new investigation from Channel 4 News reveals that,…

Politics Rhett Jones Sep 28

American Could Get Two Years in Thai Prison for TripAdvisor Review

Anyone planning a trip to Thailand should be advised to keep their opinions to themselves. Wesley Barnes, an American living in Thailand, found out this month that the Thai defamation laws can be extreme after a negative online review of a resort landed him behind bars. According to the New York Times, Barnes stayed at…

Tech News Rhett Jones Sep 28

Windows XP Source Code Leaked By Apparent Bill Gates Conspiracist

It’s probably not the biggest security issue that Microsoft is dealing with right now but the software giant probably isn’t happy about it either way: This week, a torrent appeared online that contained the apparent source code for Windows XP, the extremely outdated Microsoft operating system that still runs on millions of computers around the…

Tech News Rhett Jones Sep 25

Attention, People of Illinois: It’s Time to Make Facebook Pay

With every passing day, Facebook gives us more evidence that it’s incapable of running itself responsibly, and every day it faces zero consequences. The profits rise and the what-are-you-gonna-do shrugs get more emphatic. But today is different. Today, some of you out there have a chance to cause the social network a little pain for…

Social Media Rhett Jones Sep 24

Adobe Update Actually Makes PDFs Readable on Your Phone

Adobe has been hyping its Sensei AI for a while now, and it finally has a use case for the tech that might make the average user’s life a little easier. The Adobe Reader app now uses machine learning to reformat PDFs in a way that makes them actually readable on mobile devices. The new…

Tech News Rhett Jones Sep 24

California Bans Sale of New Gas-Powered Cars Beginning in 2035

California has taken a dramatic step forward in its battle to combat its gradual slide into climate change hell. On Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced his signing of an executive order that will prohibit the sale of new cars with an internal combustion engine in the Golden State starting in 2035. In a press release,…

Earther Rhett Jones Sep 23

1Password Brings Virtual Burner Credit Cards to Your Browser

At this point, you probably know that you should use some sort of password manager to juggle all your logins across the web. Even if you don’t actually do it, you know you should. Now, 1Password wants to make virtual credit cards an easy obligation with a unique new program. The popular password manager has…

Privacy & Security Rhett Jones Sep 23

Microsoft Lands Exclusive License for OpenAI’s Astonishing GPT-3 Model

Microsoft is having a hell of a week. On Monday, the company announced a $7.5 billion deal to acquire Zenimax and all of its big video game properties. In one move, the Xbox platform’s future suddenly looked a lot brighter. Today, Microsoft announced another deal that could also have a huge long-term impact in the…

Artificial Intelligence Rhett Jones Sep 22

18 Months of Mysterious Internet Outages Traced to Villager’s Old TV Set

A rural village in Wales has been suffering through internet outages and slowdowns for 18 months. The situation baffled technicians until they realized that turning off one man’s TV solved everything. On Tuesday, U.K.-based broadband provider Openreach explained in a release that every morning, around 7 a.m., residents of the Aberhosan village found themselves experiencing…

Tech News Rhett Jones Sep 22

Rhett Jones

How Governing by Tweet Is Going for Your Favorite Quarantined President

‘Anyone Else Would Suffer Legal Consequences’: New England Journal of Medicine Rebukes Trump

GPT-3 Bot Spends a Week Replying on Reddit, Starts Talking About the Illuminati

The Future of Software Is at Stake in Google’s Latest Trip to the Supreme Court

Spotify Adds Ability to Search Songs by Lyrics and Launches New App

Excel Error Believed to Have Caused UK to Lose 15,841 Covid-19 Tests

Twitter Wants to Replace Its Seemingly Racist Cropping Tool With Users Like You

GitHub Adds Code Scanning for Automatic Security-Hole Searches

Teenage Engineering’s ‘Magic Radio’ Is a Boutique Freakshow

Google’s Antitrust Clusterfuck Is Turning Into a Three-Way

Amazon Sees Palm Readers in Your Retail Shopping Future

Leaked Database Shows Trump Campaign Targeted Black Americans for Voter Suppression in 2016

American Could Get Two Years in Thai Prison for TripAdvisor Review

Windows XP Source Code Leaked By Apparent Bill Gates Conspiracist

Attention, People of Illinois: It’s Time to Make Facebook Pay

Adobe Update Actually Makes PDFs Readable on Your Phone

California Bans Sale of New Gas-Powered Cars Beginning in 2035

1Password Brings Virtual Burner Credit Cards to Your Browser

Microsoft Lands Exclusive License for OpenAI’s Astonishing GPT-3 Model

18 Months of Mysterious Internet Outages Traced to Villager’s Old TV Set

Ozempic Shreds Bones? How a Small Study Turned Into a Big Health Myth

Anker’s Soundcore Translation Earbuds Are Now Nearly 7x Cheaper Than AirPods Pro 3 After a Sudden Price Drop on Amazon

Volkswagen Shuts Down Tennessee Plant’s EV Production at the Worst Possible Time

Using Emojis at Work? You’re Not Going to Like This Study 😮

A Terrifying Invasion Feels Eerily Familiar in This Short Horror Story

Shark AI Ultra Robot Vacuum at 51% Off Quietly Undercuts Dyson’s Stick Cleaner Prices

Tubi Manages to Turn People Against Recommendations With Bad AI Branding

Gizmodo’s Favorite Photos From NASA’s Artemis 2 Mission

Lucasfilm Keeps Telling Authors Not to Bring Back Mara Jade

As Mass Drownings Add Up, Emperor Penguins Officially Join the Endangered List

Asus Zenbook A16 Review: Start Considering Snapdragon on PC, for Real

Aqara Thermostat Hub W200 Review: Almost Better than My Ecobee

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

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

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