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IKEA’s Wireless Charging Is Almost Like Having Magic Furniture

Cheap and easy wireless charging sounds like Nikola Tesla’s fantasy brought to life. It’s downright futuristic to think your smartphone could suck up juice just by placing it near a power source. And that’s exactly what IKEA wants to do with its new wireless charging devices. Yes, that IKEA—the Swedish furniture empire. Perhaps you aren’t…

Using Apple Music: Wait, Do I Like Alternative?!

When I installed iOS 8.4 on my phone today to try Apple Music, I couldn’t find the iTunes icon. Anywhere. What had happened? Was it a glitch? Then I realized I had hidden the iTunes app in a drawer of Apple apps I never use, alongside Tips and Mail. I found it eventually, but it…

Why Genisys Had to Destroy Terminator In Order to Save It

Sometimes in order to make something new, you have to get rid of the old. And certainly, after the last few movies in the Terminator series, the franchise desperately needed something new. We spoke to Genisys writers Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier, as well as director Alan Taylor to discuss how the newest installment reinvents…

Student Suspected of Murder After “Pocket Dial” Incident Nabbed in China

The suspected killer of Iowa State University student Shao Tong—her boyfriend, University of Iowa student Xiangnan Li—has been apprehended, nearly 10 months after the young woman’s strangled body was found crammed into her car trunk. His capture was complicated because he’d fled to China after her death. Both students were originally from China, and had…

How To Get Started (And Get Ahead) In Science Fiction Self-Publishing

To self-publish or not to self-publish… That is the question more and more aspiring authors are asking themselves these days. And with good reason—self-publishing has come a long way in the decade since it really hit the market and many of the blatant scams of the past have been outed by an increasingly well-informed author…

Here’s the First Teaser for Oliver Stone’s Snowden Movie

The first teaser for the upcoming movie about Edward Snowden has just been released. And frankly it’s not much to look at. But we still can’t wait. Even if Oliver Stone is a shit historian (and he really, really is) he has a fun way of turning our garbage world on its head. Simply titled…

Galileo’s Many Inventions Helped Redefine Our Place In The Universe

Galileo is considered one of the greatest astronomers of all time. His discovery of Jupiter’s major moons (Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto) revolutionized astronomy and helped speed the acceptance of the Copernican Model of the universe. However, Galileo is also known for the numerous scientific inventions he made during his lifetime. These included his famous…

WTF, People Are Combating Facebook’s Rainbow Avatars With American Flags

If your Facebook friend suddenly debuts an especially patriotic avatar this week, it might not be because they’re extra excited about the 4th of July. To combat all that gay in their timelines, some conservatives are calling for true Americans cover their profile photos with American flags instead. To counter the 26 million or so…

The Perfect Purple Dye Comes from Milking Snails, of Course

We know the Cleopatra’s sails were dyed with Tyrian purple. We know that Roman emperors dyed their new robes Tyrian purple as a sign of wealth. What we don’t know, exactly, is what this legendary purple looked like. But we do know where it comes from—namely, “snail milk.” Snails on near-opposite sides of the world…

6 Shadows That Are Actually Perfectly Nice Guys

Shadows are the darkest sides of ourselves aired for the world to see. They’re also a really fun way to make puppets! Here are your entries from this week’s Shadow Shooting Challenge. Winner: Shadow Clones Attached is a photo from the stairwell hall of a pizza place in Pittsburgh. The lights were out and I…

What You Probably Don’t Know About the Most Famous Case in Neuroscience

In 1845, a meter-long iron rod pierced the skull of Vermont railway worker Phineas Gage. The resulting changes to his personality forever changed our perception of the human brain. But what happened next to Gage is rarely covered in textbooks — a problematic oversight, say psychologists. It’s hard to imagine that anyone could survive something…

If you needed any more reasons to sign up for Firefly Watch, check out the stunning time lapse video of male firefly courtship displaysfilmed in the Great Smoky Mountains last year, now up at the New York Times as part of their Summer of Science. Contact the author at [email protected].

Our First Look At the New Batman v Superman Batmobile Lego Set

We’ve already gotten a few glimpses of the new Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Batmobile, courtesy of the teaser trailer and the 2015 Licensing Expo in Las Vegas earlier this month. But now we’ve got an even better look at Bruce’s ride thanks to an upcoming Lego set revealed by the Wall Street Journal.…

The New Ghostbusters Proton Packs Look Homemade in the Best Way

If you and some friends decided to try and make some proton packs from the old Ghostbusters, they’d probably look like the proton backs in the new Ghostbusters. Director Paul Feig took to Twitter yesterday to reveal the brand new costumes for his 2016 film and today, he put up a second photo, this one…

Eight Books You Need To Know About To Understand The Hugo Awards Snafu

This year’s Hugo Awards controversy is confusing. There are two kinds of puppies! Are the puppies against diversity, or literary snobbery? And so on. But really, this is all about books, and particularly what kind of books we’re supposed to celebrate. So here are eight books that can help you understand the Hugo mess. But…

New ‘Scorpion’ Robot Will Inspect Fukushima Reactor This Summer

When the 2011 earthquake in Japan damaged the Fukushima nuclear power plant, teams scrambled to find a robot that could go where humans couldn’t. In many ways those robots failed, and ever since, there has been a focus on creating robots that can get the job done. Enter Toshiba’s “Scorpion” robot, which will make its…

The Best Cheap Laptop Under $250

Buying a cheap laptop can feel like a gamble. You might get lucky and find a machine with a good keyboard that isn’t slower than a tortoise-snail crossbreed… or you might get saddled with a cheap piece of crap that cries when you load a browser or try to open WordPerfect because Word is just…

Apple Will Pay $450 Million for Conspiring to Fix Ebook Pricing 

Apple violated federal antitrust law in a conspiracy with five book publishers to fix ebook prices, according to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court ended a long-running legal battle with a big blow to Apple, calling its ebooks price-fixing scheme “the supreme evil of antitrust.” Apple is a dominant force in so…

The Quickest Way to Switch Wifi Networks on Android

Being able to quickly jump from one wifi network to another is an essential skill for modern life—especially if you’re out and about and trying to get the strongest signal possible. Here’s a tip you might not have picked up if you’ve just upgraded to the latest version of Android Lollipop, and the feature is…

What Was the Huge Flash of Light Over the Southeast U.S. Last Night?

Something lit up the sky over a whole swath of the lower Eastern states last night, catching eyes all the way from Florida up through West Virginia. So what are we looking at here? A meteor, perhaps, or a fireball? Nope, it’s actually something a lot stranger. NASA finished up the analysis of this footage…