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Cab Owners Sue NYC Because Uber is Ruining Their Business

There’s so many bullshit arguments thrown around surrounding Uber, it’s refreshing to hear the real reason that cabbies hate the company: it’s killing their revenue, and the value of medallions. A suit filed today against New York City and its Taxi and Limousine Commission claims has a few bones to pick: regulators have allowed Uber…

Biologists Found a Crazy Solution to That Deadly Amphibian Fungus

In an first-of-its-kind victory, a team of biologists has figured out how to clear ponds of the lethal chytrid fungus that’s decimating amphibian populations worldwide. (Spoiler: It’s pretty damn intense). As reported this week in Biology Letters, biologists from the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) and elsewhere have eliminated the deadly fungus from four out…

Abunch of Apple servicesare down, it’s not just your imagination! The App Store, iTunes Store, and a bunch of other Stores you didn’t even know about aren’t working. Use your time free from capitalist digital tyranny carefully. [Apple System Status]

DJI Will Also Help Drone Owners Not Screw Up

Earlier today, popular maker of consumer drones 3DR announced that its Solo quadrotor would be updated with a system that tells owners where they’re not allowed to fly. Now DJI, makers of the ubiquitous Phantom line, is following suite. Currently, DJI drones have a list of US airports inputted, and physically won’t let you fly…

Badass Historical Chemists: The Woman Behind Antoine Lavoisier

Antoine Lavoisier is deservedly considered one of the great chemists in history. We might not know of his experiments if it weren’t for his wife. She became a remarkable, if unconventional, chemist herself and had one of the weirder lives in history. When Marie-Anne Pierrette Paulze was only 13 years old, she found herself in…

The Reservoir That Made the World Pay Attention to California’s Drought

Do you remember where you were when you first realized the severity of the drought in the Western US? I would guess that you weren’t staring at a cloudless sky or a dry faucet. You were probably looking at a photo of Folsom Lake. Although drought conditions were technically declared after the low-precipitation winter of…

We Almost Got An Incredibly Different Version Of Jessica Jones

This Friday, the second phase of Marvel’s four-series deal with Netflix begins with Jessica Jones. But if original plans went ahead, we might have seen a very different version of the show. First of all, we would’ve seen it four years ago—on ABC itself. Speaking at AOL’s Build Series yesterday afternoon, producer Melissa Rosenberg revealed…

A Third Season of True Detective Is Still Possible

We loved True Detective season one. We wanted to like season two, but creator Nic Pizzolatto had trouble keeping the anthology series’ magic alive in a new setting with new characters. There might be chance for redemption, now that Pizzolatto has signed a new HBO deal—but TD3 isn’t a sure thing yet. https://gizmodo.com/all-the-ways-true-detective-season-2-should-have-worked-1720533449 As Variety…

Supergirl Is Straight-Up a Show about Women Tearing Each Other Down

When Supergirl isn’t about competing with the absentee Superman (whose dreamlike cameos represent a vision of heroism that is so iconic, it can only be seen via abstraction, or synecdoche), it seems to be a show about women who show affection by criticizing and belittling each other. And weirdly, the show makes this dynamic not…

Is There Any TV Show That Treats Tech Realistically?

I’m getting tired of computer systems that are hacked in seconds, cars hotwired like it’s no big deal, databases that instantly find criminals, and other crimes against tech. What is there to watch for some realism? I know that entertainment requires a suspension of disbelief and that a lot of the limitations (and actual speed)…

Enceladus and Dione Make a Glorious Pair In the Latest Cassini Image

Is anything more striking than this family portrait of Dione and Enceladus? The two Saturnian moons are night and day when you put them side by side, and yet they’re made from the exact same material. Both moons are largely ice, with a dense, rocky core composed of silicate minerals. But while Enceladus (background) is…

Disney Wants To Turn The Merlin Saga Into Their Next Big Fantasy Movie

Big-ticket Fantasy has had a rough go of late at the box office—but it looks like Disney wants to get behind the genre in a big way: They’ve tasked Lord of the Rings screenwriter Philippa Boyens to write a Merlin movie… and thankfully, it’s not another live-action adaptation of one of their own cartoons. Deadline…

MST3K Has Found the Perfect Formula for Reviving a Beloved Series

Whenever a beloved project like Mystery Science Theater 3000 returns to life, there’s always the danger that it’s going to be a pale simulacrum of the original. Or so awful that it tarnishes the original version. But the new MST3K is uniquely positioned to avoid these pitfalls—not just because of what it was, but how…

These Speedy Microscopic Submarines Are Powered by Light

Holy Fantastic Voyage, Batman. A team from Rice University has developed single-molecule nanosubmarines that could eventually be used to deliver medicines directly inside the body. Back in 2006, this same group developed nanocars—a single-molecule vehicle with four wheels, axles, and independent suspensions that could be “driven” across a terrestrial surface. Unfortunately, many of the nano-scale…

Oh God, Frank Miller Is Going to Write a Dark Knight Returns IV, Too

Dark Knight 3: The Master Race isn’t even out yet, but co-writer Frank Miller has already announced that the trilogy has turned into a quadrilogy. Miller told Newsarama that “after he reads DK3 in full, he intends to create his own fourth chapter” which, frankly, is terrifying on about eight different levels. It also pretty…

Baltimore’s Stealthy Plan to Make Its Harbor Swimmable By 2020

If a friend told you he was off to take a dip in Baltimore’s Harbor, you’d probably be concerned for his health and sanity. But five years from now, swimming in Baltimore’s waterways might not sound so crazy—and there’s an innovative piece of technology to thank. Meet the Water Wheel: A hydro and solar-powered barge…

On Blindspot, All The Best Characters Are Bad Guys or Dead

Bond. Jane Bond. That’s the aesthetic on this week’s extremely silly adventure into the world of Blindspot, where evil Dark Web millionaires host fancy dress parties. Martinis and black tie shootouts, anyone? Anyone? Spoilers for Blindspot episode 9, “Authentic Flirt,” shaken, not stirred. I think we can agree that the entire purpose of this episode…

Winter is Coming to Winnipeg

Environment Canada confirms what we always suspected: Westeros is part of Canada. A special weather alert for Winnipeg ominously begins: “Winter is coming.” But unlike the forecast from Game of Thrones, Winnipeg, Manitoba’s warning is a lot more literal than metaphorical as the alert goes on to describe an intense low pressure system, a plummeting…

This Congressman Doesn’t Understand How the Internet or the First Amendment Work

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) has a plan to stop ISIS today at a Federal Communications Committee hearing: Censor the internet. Here’s what Barton proposed today during an FCC hearing: “ISIS and the terrorist networks can’t beat us militarily, but they are really trying to use the internet and all of the social media to try…

Wait, Google+ Still Exists?!

For the second (or maybe third?) time this year, Google is overhauling its fledgling social network. Or whatever you want to call Google+. Me, I call it a zombie. This thing just won’t die. The press release humbly reminds you of this fact in the first line: “If you head over to Google+ today, you’ll…