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Tesla Battery Economics: On the Path to Disruption

Elon Musk announced Tesla’s home / business battery today. tl;dr: It’ll get enthusiastic early adopters to buy. The economics are almost there to make it cost effective for a wide market. And within just a few years, it almost certainly will be cheap enough to be cost effective for a broad market. Not a complete…

Life On The Space Station Just Got Infinitely More Civilized

A new espresso maker and unique zero-gravity cups are bringing new luxury to the International Space Station. Today at 12:44 GMT, astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti enjoyed the first space-brewed espresso, and she had an awe-inspiring view while doing it. European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti takes in the view while sipping espresso from a zero-gravity glass.…

Nine Directors Bring Their Unique Styles To Animated Take On The Prophet

A passion project for producer Salma Hayek, who also heads up the voice cast along with Liam Neeson, Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet taps eight animators (including Bill Plympton and Nina Paley) to bring Gibran’s poetry to life. The frame story is helmed by The Lion King co-director Roger Allers. [Via Cartoon Brew]

NASA’s Ten Engine Electric Drone Goes From Chopper to Airplane and Back

Space missions get all the hype, but NASA Aeronautics is doing some pretty rad stuff, too. Their ten engine, unmanned electric plane, for instance, has just successfully transitioned from hover mode to wing-borne flight and back again in mid-air. Top image: NASA Langley/David C. Bowman Dubbed the Greased Lightning (GL-10), the current prototype for this…

The Answer To This Puzzle Is Not What You’d Expect

There’s an obvious answer to this classic puzzle, and there’s the correct answer. Which will you choose? This week’s puzzle was suggested by reader Eric Ennis. It’s a classic brain teaser that reads a little like a distance problem (i.e. “if Train A leaves the station at such and such a time traveling such and…

Free Apps May Be Tracking Your Phone Without Your Consent

Free Android apps are getting a bit promiscuous. That, at least, is the conclusion of a group of security researchers, who find that poorly vetted apps on Google Play are connecting to a massive number of ad and tracking sites—without users being any the wiser. While Apple rigorously vets everything that appears in its app…

Damn, The Falcon 9 Rocket Looks Hot Even When It’s About To Crash

SpaceX is binging on rocket launches and landing attempts this year. While the company is 2 for 2 with crashing the theoretically-reusable Falcon 9 rocket into its autonomous drone ship instead of landing gently, this photo has us admiring just how good it looks while failing. Failed Falcon 9 barge landing attempt on April 14,…

Emojis are Becoming the Dominant Language of Instagram

There’s no question emojis have become wildly popular. But on Instagram, the familiar happy faces, hearts and kissing lips are more than just a cute shorthand. They’re on their way to becoming the dominant, universal form of communication. “It is a rare privilege to observe the rise of a new language,” Thomas Dimson, a software…

Orphan Black Reveals A Major Secret About Its Two Sets Of Clones

So that happened. We’ve only known about Orphan Black’s Castor line of clones for just a few episodes, but we’re already getting some hints as to how they are linked to our familiar Leda clone crew. But of course, there’s a lot of science and betrayal on the way to the latest discovery. Family is…

Trailer For Absolutely Anything Shows The Downside Of Penis Enlargement

Simon Pegg stars in what more or less looks like a riff on Bruce Almighty, except with aliens instead of Morgan “God” Freeman. It also boasts the voices of Monty Python (Terry Jones directed and co-wrote) and Robin Williams (in his final role). Check out the Absolutely Anything trailer below!

Collapse of Large Herbivores May Lead to “Empty Landscapes” Worldwide

It’s happening across the world, from grasslands to savannas to forest to deserts. Earth’s wild ecosystems are emptying out and falling silent. Large herbivores—rhinos, zebras, camels, elephants, tapirs, hippos—are some of our planet’s most iconic creatures. They’re also among the fastest disappearing animals on Earth, according to a report published Friday in Science Advances. The…

Star Wars: The Force Awakens Toys And Merchandise Will Arrive Sept. 4 

After the recent reveal that Josh Trank is no longer directing the second Star Wars Anthology film, the folks at Starwars.com dropped some cheerful intel ahead of tomorrow’s May the Fourth geekout: all your Force Awakens swag needs (“toys, collectibles, books, and apparel”) will be met on September 4. The dramatically worded press release, which…

SNL Hilariously Skewers Marvel’s Idea Of “A Girl Superhero Movie”

Spoiler alert: it’s a rom-com! “For Black Widow, falling in love can be hard, but it can also be … INCREDIBLE!” Cardigan-clad Scarlett Johansson, last night’s Saturday Night Live host, is a true hero for participating in this (probably depressingly accurate) sketch. [Via]

The Empty Quarter Is The Largest Sand Sea On The Planet

This is a tiny fragment of the Empty Quarter, a sand sea larger than France. Ar Rub’ al Khali is an erg that stretches across four countries, covers most of the Arabian Peninsula, holds half as much sand as the larger Sahara Desert despite being 1/15th the size, and is absolutely gorgeous. A small fraction…

This Is What It Might Be Like to Fly Through a Giant Space Habitat

Want to live in a space city? You can’t move there next week, but artist Micah Ganske has designed an incredible VR experience where you drive a small spacecraft through an O’Neill cylinder, a massive tube-shaped space habitat that spins to create gravity so that people can build cities and farms on its inner surface.…

The Best Way to Ruin the New Force Awakens Trailer? Jar Jar Binks.

You know what made the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer especially great? A distinct lack of Jar Jar Binks. But some people, it seems, just want to watch the world burn. It’s amazing what a little video editing can do. The new Force Awakens trailer, for instance, was an instantly lovable global sensation.…

In 2014, Italian archaeologists discovered a 15th century skeleton of a young woman, dubbed “witch girl” because she was buried face down. But new analysis of her bones has shown she suffered from scurvy, an ailment whose frightening symptoms (seizures, bleeding) likely led to her becoming an outcast.

Everything You Need to Know About Drug Incarceration Rates Across the US

The United States has only 5 % of the world’s population, but 25 % of its prisoners. The biggest contributing factor to our booming prison population? Drugs, drugs, and more drugs. The Coalition Against Drug Abuse has just released a report investigating how federal drug sentencing varies across the country, pulling statistics from a 2013 report by…

An Iceberg Rises Above The Frozen Water Of Greenland’s North Star Bay

As a support scientist for NASA’s Operation IceBridge mission, Jeremy Harbeck spends most of his time processing data at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. But it was on a recent visit to Greenland that he snapped this striking composite image of an iceberg frozen into North Star Bay. According to NASA: He had…

Two Candy-Crazed Monsters Battle For Sweet-Tooth Supremacy In This Short

Brown-eyed beastie Chubzilla may seem like a harmlessly delusional fellow (except for all the indiscriminate stomping), but don’t get between him and dessert. Seriously, DON’T. This thesis film was co-directed Elizabeth Lee and Dominik Koscinski, students at New York City’s School of Visual Arts. [Via Kuriositas]