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A Chinese Consortium Plans to Buy Opera—for $1.2 Billion

How much would you pay for an unpopular browser? If you were a group of Chinese companies you’d probably think somewhere in the region of, oooh, $1.2 billion ought to do it. The Financial Times reports that the Norwegian browser company has received an offer of $1.2 billion for its takeover. The potential deal is…

Tech News Jamie Condliffe

Scientists Can Make Aerogel From Waste Paper

Aerogel is usually the preserve of expensive laboratory experiments—but what if you could make it from trash? Now, a team of researchers has developed a technique to turn scrap paper into an incredibly light, highly insulating super material. Most aerogels in the past have been made from silica, though versions made from materials like graphene…

Physics & Chemistry Jamie Condliffe

Google’s Banned Flash From Display Ads

Another nail in Flash’s coffin: Google has announced that it’s going to stop supporting the plugin in its pervasive AdWords and DoubleClick advertizing services. Instead, companies will have to use HTML5. The ban comes into effect for ad uploads in June this year, and existing Flash ads will refuse to run from next January. For…

Tech News Jamie Condliffe

The Tron-Like Machine Visualizes Atoms on the International Space Station

This impressive-looking piece of equipment lives up to its appearance. The Plasma Kristall-4, to give the device its full name, recreates how atoms interact so we can understand the intricacies of basic physics and chemistry in space. The machine, a joint venture between the European Space Agency and Roscosmos, creates a stew of microparticles—a surrogate…

Space & Spaceflight Jamie Condliffe

You Can Finally Use Apple Music With Sonos

Sonos is billed as being the ultimate in-home music system, promising seamless streaming throughout your entire house. So it must’ve sucked to spend thousands of dollars and not be able to use Apple Music with it, which was the case until today. Apple Music and Sonos compatibility has been in beta for months now, but…

Tech News Chris Mills

Once Again, You Can Read Politicians’ Deleted Tweets

Politiwoops used to be the go-to place to read tweets that politicians thought were clever, before quickly deleting. Twitter cut off the service last year over alleged misuse of its developer platform, but now it’s back, and saving more deleted tweets than ever. In a blog post, the Sunlight Foundation has announced the return, “just…

Tech News Chris Mills

We’re Entering a Golden Age of Space Tourism Propaganda [Updated]

Whether they’re selling tickets to orbit or making sure the science funding keeps flowing, rocket companies and space agencies alike have a vested interest in getting the public jazzed about the cosmic beyond. So it’s no surprise that we’re now entering a golden age of space tourism propaganda—one that’s bringing back the beloved, classic design…

Tech News Maddie Stone

9 Blatant Lies About Pop Culture That Everybody Instantly Saw Straight Through

These days, creators struggle to keep the details of their upcoming movies and TV shows from leaking on the internet, so they can preserve their big surprises. And this leads to some pretty feeble attempts at misdirection, with cast and crew vehemently denying what everybody already knows. Sometimes, it works. Sometimes, though… it just looks…

Movies James Whitbrook

How Star Wars: The Force Awakens Really Should Have Ended

Everyone had a good time watching the new Star Wars so let’s not get angry and accuse each other of not enjoying the very idea of fun. But still, as with every other movie, there were a few problems and mid-sized logic gaps that were ignored in the name of entertainment. HISHE fixes all those…

Sploid Casey Chan

Universal Just Cast Johnny Depp in The Invisible Man

Last month, Universal confirmed that it had cast Tom Cruise in 2017’s The Mummy. And the studio’s monster madness continues with similarly massive star power, with the news that Johnny Depp has signed on to play the title role in The Invisible Man. In 1933, James Whale’s adaptation of the 1897 H.G. Wells novel—about a…

io9 Cheryl Eddy

You Could Win All 6 Mind-Blowing Finalists for the Philip K. Dick Award

The Philip K. Dick Award celebrates the best science fiction books released first in paperback form. That combination of excellence and skipping the fancy hardcover edition tends to favor books that are unusual, edgy, or published by smaller houses. And you can win all six of this year’s finalists. The six finalists for the Dick…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Supreme Court Slams the Brakes on Obama’s Clean Energy Plan

Today appeared to be a good day for President Obama and the environment, what with the unveiling of a moonshot budget, complete with billions to improve the environment (and humanity!). The Supreme Court, however, is not joining in on the fun. Earlier today, the Supreme Court put a temporary block on the Clean Power Plan,…

Tech News Chris Mills

This Stop Motion Short About Robots Packs in a Surprising Amount of Action

“Battery Life” is about a family of robots living in a sandy dystopia, while a nearby robot citadel is run by a robot zealot. For an 11-minute short, writer/director/animator Justin Nixon manages to do a lot of world-building, character development, and action. This thing is dense. [via Director’s Notes] Contact the author at [email protected].

io9 Katharine Trendacosta

Chopping Open a Giant Rubber Band Ball Basically Reveals a Hidden Monster Inside

A giant rubber band ball? So much fun. Just slice the thing open and you’ll see it quickly grow and explode up and basically find the monster that wants to unleash itself from its rubber ball prison. Once its cut open, the sound is also interesting to listen to. You can hear the slow movement…

Sploid Casey Chan

You Can Get 2GB of Free Google Drive Storage Today

Want some more space for your documents? Of course you do. Well, you can grab 2GB of extra capacity on Google Drive for free today. Here’s how. All you need to to is head to Google and run through a very brief security update—checking that your backup email address is correct, renewing account permissions, that…

Privacy & Security Jamie Condliffe

The Sequel To Deadpool Is Already Being Written, Because Of Course

Deadpool is still a few days from being unleashed on the public and a new report suggests it won’t be the last time. The Hollywood Reporter says the film’s writers are already hard at work on a greenlit sequel. Those writers are Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, whose original script for Deadpool leaked online about…

Movies Germain Lussier

Michigan Will Use Biopesticides to Wipe Out Lampreys En Masse

Lampreys are tough, hungry, and invasive. Michigan and Canada have been fighting them for over half a century. Now, with the aide of pheromones, they may have found a new way to eradicate the lot of them. Since the 1950s, some companies have been doing good business in “lampricide.” This specially-targeted poison is meant to…

Biology Esther Inglis-Arkell

This Essay on Being the Only Black Person at a Science Fiction Event is Essential Reading

Now that Lightspeed Magazine has published its ultra-successful issues featuring stories by women and queers (who “destroyed” genres like fantasy and science fiction), it’s the turn of people of color. And the latest update in the Kickstarter for People of Colo(u)r Destroy Science Fiction is a must-read. [Full disclosure: I was featured in Women Destroy…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Kazuo Ishiguro Has a Brilliant Response to People Who Think Genre Fiction Doesn’t Matter

If a primary task of fiction is to explore the human experience—who we are and what we mean to each other—then the fantastic and unreal must surely be key elements in that exploration. But plenty of people still claim that fantasy and other genres are less “real” than purely mimetic fiction. And Kazuo Ishiguro has…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Cult Children’s TV Character H.R. Pufnstuf Is (Briefly) Returning to the Airwaves

I am rarely in the company of children, which I’ll use as my excuse for not knowing about Nick Jr. show Mutt & Stuff until now. Get this, though: it stars the “nephew” of H.R. Pufnstuf—arguably the biggest star* to emerge from the psychedelic world of Sid and Marty Krofft, kings of 1970s kiddie TV…

io9 Cheryl Eddy

A Chinese Consortium Plans to Buy Opera—for $1.2 Billion

Scientists Can Make Aerogel From Waste Paper

Google’s Banned Flash From Display Ads

The Tron-Like Machine Visualizes Atoms on the International Space Station

You Can Finally Use Apple Music With Sonos

Once Again, You Can Read Politicians’ Deleted Tweets

We’re Entering a Golden Age of Space Tourism Propaganda [Updated]

9 Blatant Lies About Pop Culture That Everybody Instantly Saw Straight Through

How Star Wars: The Force Awakens Really Should Have Ended

Universal Just Cast Johnny Depp in The Invisible Man

You Could Win All 6 Mind-Blowing Finalists for the Philip K. Dick Award

Supreme Court Slams the Brakes on Obama’s Clean Energy Plan

This Stop Motion Short About Robots Packs in a Surprising Amount of Action

Chopping Open a Giant Rubber Band Ball Basically Reveals a Hidden Monster Inside

You Can Get 2GB of Free Google Drive Storage Today

The Sequel To Deadpool Is Already Being Written, Because Of Course

Michigan Will Use Biopesticides to Wipe Out Lampreys En Masse

This Essay on Being the Only Black Person at a Science Fiction Event is Essential Reading

Kazuo Ishiguro Has a Brilliant Response to People Who Think Genre Fiction Doesn’t Matter

Cult Children’s TV Character H.R. Pufnstuf Is (Briefly) Returning to the Airwaves

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