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Apple Acknowledges iPhone 4 Reception Issues, Says Don’t Hold It Like That

Here’s Apple’s response to the now officially-acknowledged iPhone 4 antenna reception problems. http://gizmodo.com/5571171/iphone-4-loses-reception-when-you-hold-it-by-the-antenna-band They told Engadget, and our own reader Jason: Gripping any mobile phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for…

Tech News Jason Chen

Russia Searches For Its Own Silicon Valley

When Russian president Dmitry Medvedev visited Silicon Valley last week, it wasn’t a social call. It was a scouting expedition, in preparation for building his country’s own “Innovation City” from the ground up. But can tech supremacy be manufactured? That’s the question asked by Esther Dyson in today’s Moscow Times. And the answer is, surprisingly:…

Tech News Brian Barrett

Switch Applications and Play Games With Scythe’s USB Foot Switch

Unlike Thanko’s USB footswitch, Scythe’s actually looks the business. If the business is a guitar foot pedal. Or a sewing machine foot pedal. Whatever you decide it looks like, it can be configured to perform all sorts of commands. https://gizmodo.com/thanko-usb-boss-switch-underfoot-159116 It’d be particularly useful in gaming, with the footswitch available in one, two or three-button…

Tech News Kat Hannaford

The real Ghost Rider is an Irish punk from the projects

A stark and intense series of photographs taken by Ross McDonnell in the Ballymun flats at the edge of Dublin, Ireland, offer a glimpse of a real-life Ghost Rider. And it ain’t pretty. McDonnell grew up in Ireland and works as a professional photographer and filmographer, mostly dealing with documentary subjects. In these photos from…

io9 Annalee Newitz

I Am T-Pain Autotuner App Adds Video For iOS4

Maybe the best use of the front-facing camera I’ve seen yet comes from Smule’s auto-tunetastic I Am T-Pain app. Because now, you can star in your own autotuned music video. It’s pretty genius. https://gizmodo.com/i-am-t-pain-iphone-app-is-auto-tuning-genius-5352299 You can make your own track, upload it to your social network of choice, record over your iTunes library and, most…

Tech News Brian Barrett

Test Notes: iPhone 4 Call Quality

The iPhone 4 is supposed to have better reception than prior generations. Its additional noise-cancellation microphone should result in better call quality and less distortion during chats. Our somewhat unscientific tests confirmed it—iPhone 4 is go for talk. https://gizmodo.com/roundup-the-iphone-4-re-revealed-5557549 We made a series of calls to a regular landline from an iPhone 3G, an iPhone…

Reviews Rosa Golijan and Jason Chen

Syfy brings us Tiffany vs. Debbie Gibson. How much 80s-nostalgia camp can you handle?

Tiffany and Debbie Gibson were rival pop stars in the 1980s, but they never took it as far as unleashing giant monsters on each other. Until now. Syfy is bringing them together in Mega Python Vs. Gatoroid. No, seriously. Let’s hope it brings a sequence as bizarre as the above clip, where Gibson has a…

io9 Charlie Jane Anders

David Slade on bringing the violence back to Twilight

Twilight-haters, stand aside. We’ve been excited about 30 Days of Night director David Slade’s vision for Eclipse from the beginning. In our exclusive interview, the director explains balancing the werewolf-on-vampire carnage with romance, and exploring the physiology of Twilight’s vampires. We’re all super excited for your take on Eclipse. We think it might be pretty…

Movies Meredith Woerner

Wireless Test Notes: 3g iPhone 4 Uploads Files 5-10x Faster

We sent the intrepid Ryan Salerno across 20 NY blocks armed with an iPhone 3GS and an iPhone 4. He ran speed tests along the way, ferreting out any oddities. Downloads? Exactly the same. Uploads? An order of magnitude faster. Let’s take a quick step back. In terms of downloads, the iPhone 3GS and iPhone…

Tech News Mark Wilson

Naughty personal genomics company makes good

The sometimes-controversial company 23AndMe – which will run a battery of tests on your genome for $500 – has finally offered proof that their methods can help scientists figure out the genetic basis for everything from freckles to disease. A lot of people use the company’s services to find out what their ancestry might be,…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Hoodie With Earbuds Instead of Strings Is Greatest iPod Accessory of All

Hoodies have strings around the neck, right? Have you EVER used those strings? Why you’d want to tighten a noose around your neck, I’ll never know. The HoodieBuddie cleverly replaces the strings with earbuds; the pocket contains a 3.5mm jack. All you need to do is whack your iPod into that 3.5mm jack, hiding in…

Tech News Kat Hannaford

Vlad the Impaler vs. Sun Tzu? Thanks, Deadliest Warrior!

If you’re not watching Spike TV’s military pseudo-science show — which pits combatants from different eras against each other using recreations, weapons experts, and computers — then next Tuesday’s the time to tune in: it’s vamp-daddy against strategy-daddy! The show shouldn’t be as much fun as it is: Basically, it takes two "classes" of combatants…

Television Marc Bernardin

Rick Moody’s tribute to Kurt Vonnegut: confounding and surprisingly moving

Rick Moody’s The Four Fingers Of Death might be the most metafictional science fiction book of all time: a science fiction novel about a science fiction novel, wrapped in a shroud of weirdness. It’s loopy and weird… and surprisingly tender. There are spoilers in this review. Be warned! Four Fingers Of Death starts with a…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Something Seems Out of Place at the Soho Apple Store

These poor AT&T techs, with their Dells and Blackberrys, set up hidden away next to the glass staircase on a folding table, looked so bored and uncomfortable. There’s a metaphor for Apple and AT&T’s relationship in here somewhere, I think.

Tech News Adam Frucci

Trouble in Neo-Tokyo? The Akira Movie Could Be PG-13

The live-action movie adaptation of Katsuhiro Otomo’s apocalyptic classic Akira could be a toned-down PG-13. But what we’re really worried about is the alleged new script details. Spoilers ahead. In an interview with The Kevin McCarthy and Josh Hylton Movie Show director Albert Hughes complained that Warner Brother’s PG-13 restriction was a bit constraining. This…

Movies Meredith Woerner

Buy the Terminator’s scorched cyber-arm from the original movie!

In one of those “life imitates cyber-awesomeness” moments, an art director on the original Terminator movie rescued this cyborg arm from a special-effects explosion – just the way Cyberdyne did in T2. And now it’s for sale! This is the arm from the original T-800 Terminator model that was blown up at the end of…

Movies Annalee Newitz

Official Tumblr iPhone App Now Supports iOS4 and Twitter

After Tumblr acquired Tumblerette and the iPhone app got renamed simply “Tumblr” (catchy, eh?), the hip New Yorkers have updated it to version 1.2, with native reblogging, more photo-posting options, and even support for iOS4 multitasking. Those thoughtful guys. A few bugs have been exterminated here and there, but the main thing is really the…

Tech News Kat Hannaford

Test Notes: FaceTime

Videocalling has been a sci-fi staple for decades. From 2001 to Back to the Future people chatting face-to-face from great distances was a way of saying “Hey, look, it’s the future!” So does Facetime mean we’re in the future? FaceTime is Apple’s stab at making videocalling a reality. They’re certainly not the first: European and…

Tech News Adam Frucci

Everything you need to know about Futurama

Futurama returns tonight on Comedy Central. For those who missed out on this star-spanning animated comedy the first time around, we’ve got everything you need to know to jump into the show’s new season — complete with helpful video. Considering the last new television episode of Futurama broadcast almost seven years ago, it’s certainly understandable…

Television Alasdair Wilkins

Breakthrough: The first functional, vat-grown lungs

In a first for medical science, rats were able to breathe and oxygenate their blood using lungs that had been grown in the lab. This a major step toward being able to grow replacement organs. Led by biomedical engineer Laura Niklason, a team at Yale constructed the tiny lungs for rats using a relatively new…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Apple Acknowledges iPhone 4 Reception Issues, Says Don’t Hold It Like That

Russia Searches For Its Own Silicon Valley

Switch Applications and Play Games With Scythe’s USB Foot Switch

The real Ghost Rider is an Irish punk from the projects

I Am T-Pain Autotuner App Adds Video For iOS4

Test Notes: iPhone 4 Call Quality

Syfy brings us Tiffany vs. Debbie Gibson. How much 80s-nostalgia camp can you handle?

David Slade on bringing the violence back to Twilight

Wireless Test Notes: 3g iPhone 4 Uploads Files 5-10x Faster

Naughty personal genomics company makes good

Hoodie With Earbuds Instead of Strings Is Greatest iPod Accessory of All

Vlad the Impaler vs. Sun Tzu? Thanks, Deadliest Warrior!

Rick Moody’s tribute to Kurt Vonnegut: confounding and surprisingly moving

Something Seems Out of Place at the Soho Apple Store

Trouble in Neo-Tokyo? The Akira Movie Could Be PG-13

Buy the Terminator’s scorched cyber-arm from the original movie!

Official Tumblr iPhone App Now Supports iOS4 and Twitter

Test Notes: FaceTime

Everything you need to know about Futurama

Breakthrough: The first functional, vat-grown lungs

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