Here is a truth: There’s no such thing as having too many smoke alarms. There’s also no such thing as having too many companies trying to make smoke alarms smarter–which is why Roost, a $35 battery that connects any old smoke alarm to the web, is so interesting. What Is It? A 9-Volt battery that…
Research cameras pointed at glaciers are inevitably bearers of depressing news, tracking the crumble of ice rotting over the years. Yet soft moonlight and misty mountains framing blue ice transform this datapoint into a moment of pure beauty. About 51% of Kenai Fjords National Park in Alaska is covered in ice, and the rest bares…
Qulacomm has announced its next generation or chip in the form of the Snapdrgaon 820—and it hopes to usher in better signal and longer battery life to the next slew of high-end phones. The new system-on-a-chip is based on a 64-bit quad-core Kyro processor, which clocks in at 2.2GHz. Qualcomm claims that it’s twice as…
Transport for London has released another alternative version of the Tube map—and it’s actually really useful. The London transport manager has created a ‘Walk the Tube’ map, which shows how long it takes to totter between stations. The full-sized version is here. It shows that people who catch the Tube from Covent Garden to Leicester…
Let’s play a quick game of hide-n-seek. In this photo, NASA astronaut Kjell Lindgren is seen working outside the International Space Station during a spacewalk on November 6th. Can you find him among the structure of the ISS? The spacewalk lasted for 7 hours and 48 minutes. Hopefully you can spot Lindgren in less time…
Earlier this year, Microsoft unveiled a tool that could guess your age from a single photograph. Now, it wants to guess how you’re feeling too. It might not get the answer right—but it is kinda fun. Announced at Microsoft’sFuture Decoded conference in the UK, the software will take any photograph you hand it, identify the…
What if Candy Crush was turned into a movie? One that starred Liam Neeson, too? Well, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert imagined just that. Be afraid. Be very afraid. [The Late Show with Stephen Colbert]
Last year it came to light that roughly half of the households in America had their JPMorgan Chase accounts compromised. Now, over a year later, three mean have been charged with widespread hacks that include the sustained financial attack. Yesterday, federal prosecutors announced that they were charging three men in relation to a series of…
Voting in the House has not changed much since an electronic voting system was first used on January 23, 1973, with the goal of making voting periods shorter. The latest version of the EVS system was installed in 2004. There are 47 voting stations around the House chamber, according to a 2012 document on House…
It’s virtually impossible to get by in today’s modern world without digital communication. Perhaps that’s why a New York City politician has a plan to give 200 trees around the city their own email addresses. The idea belongs to Mark Levine, an Upper West Side Councilmember. In an interview with Gothamist, he explained that“NYC is…
Japan doesn’t have a track record for manufacturing airplanes—but now its first ever domestic passenger jet has finally taken its maiden test flight. The new Mitsubishi Regional Jet (MRJ) took off from Nagoya airport earlier today. A decade in the planning, design and manufacture, the two-engine aircraft has been developed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. The…
Witnessing an aurora first-hand is a truly awe-inspiring experience. The natural beauty of the northern or southern lights captures the public imagination unlike any other aspect of space weather. But auroras aren’t unique to Earth and can be seen on several other planets in our solar system. An aurora is the impressive end result of…
If you have a thing against online shopping, but you’ve always hankered after Amazon’sEcho speaker/virtual assistant, good news: it’s now available in a bunch of big-box stores like Staples, RadioShack, and uh, Home Depot. [Amazon]
The App Store is a pretty well-fenced garden, which means it’s big news when someone manages to pull off a heist. But that’s what InstaAgent, a third-party app that would let you see who was viewing your Instagram profile while skimming your password, seems to have done. As noted by developer David L-R on Twitter,…
The water rights that govern how California’s water gets used are not the easiest things in the world to understand; working out how they came to be, and how they shaped Los Angeles, is an even trickier thing. Tom Scott tells the story of one small part of it: the St Francis dam, a project…
A spacesuit is all that stands between an astronaut and certain death in the cold void of space, so no wonder some astronauts develop a certain bond of affection with their gear. Fully suited up for the fit test. This is European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano at NASA’s Johnson Space Center preparing to for…
Bad news for all greedy aspiring murderers out there: a new technique allows companies to more easily date documents — like wills —by examining a chemical component of the ink. Until now, if you wanted to suffocate your wealthy uncle with a pillow after typing up and faking his signature on a will, you had…
Can I ask what is up with the moons today? First we’ve got Pluto’s four little scamps tumbling about like a bunch of circus monkeys. Now, word is that Mars’ moon Phobos is falling to pieces. Our Moon better not get any ideas! Phobos’ unfortunate fate is but the latest cosmic upheaval announced today at…
There’s one place that Star Trek has never gone before—musical theater. And William Shatner thinks that for its 50th anniversary, Trek should burst into song. What sort of musical numbers would you want to see in Star Trek: The Musical? I’m sort of leaning towards some kind of chorus line of dead red-shirts, singing about…
It’s a traffic jam, when you tried to use Waze. A no smoking sign, when you brought your vape. It’s like swiping left on your future soul mate. On the Late Late Show with James Corden, Alanis Morissette gamely gave the lyrics of her 1995 hit “Ironic” a 2015 spin. Appearing in a red ski…
