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It’s Official: The ISS Cargo Ship Is Totally Screwed

The Progress spacecraft looked good at the launch of its journey to the International Space Station, but problems quickly emerged. Now it’s tumbling out of control, can’t dock with the space station, and only has days to recover before burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere. https://gizmodo.com/this-cargo-run-to-the-space-station-is-starting-with-a-1700599489 https://gizmodo.com/russias-iss-bound-cargo-craft-is-spinning-out-of-contro-1700681972 Top image: The launch of Progress M27M seemed…

Watch the Microsoft Build Keynote, Right Now

Microsoft’s developer conference, Build, started early this morning in San Francisco. You know it’s for developers because they’re showing off API code on stage — and you can tune in right now, via livestream. Find out what’s next for Windows! Gizmodo is here in the audience, and will be bringing you updates on all the…

How to Use Robots.txt to Hide Your Dumb Blog

Completely deleting something from the internet is like corralling drunk, feral geese after setting them loose: Damn near impossible. But there are ways to conceal the web content you don’t want anyone to lay eyes on. You can hide all sorts of webpages with what’s essentially a “Keep Out” sign for search engines: a special…

A Supersonic Hair Dryer Blasts Ice and Snow Off Train Tracks

To ensure a locomotive pulling a heavy load has enough grip when a winter’s blast covers the tracks in ice and snow, engineers at GE’s transportation division have spent the last five years perfecting what can be described as a supersonic hair dryer that blasts tracks clean just inches in front of a train’s front…

If You Haven’t Been Watching Agents Of SHIELD, You’ve Cheated Yourself

Last night’s episode of Agents of SHIELD was a terrific action movie, a major gamechanger for the TV show, and a prelude to Avengers: Age of Ultron, all rolled into one. But it was also a huge present to those of us who’ve been watching the show since the beginning, proving that it was all…

X-Men: Apocalypse Concept Art Reveals Professor X Still Has His Hair

The next mutant movie, X-Men: Apocalypse, is going to take place in the ‘80s. And director Bryan Singer has warned that while this will be an X-Men movie, it’s going to also be a massive monster movie at the same time. Well, at least Professor X still has his hair. Empire Magazine got to spend…

Morphing Wings Will Turn Planes into Fuel-Saving Shape-Shifters

Flying’s great—you can be whisked across time zones in a matter of hours—but it’s not so great for your wallet, or the atmosphere. But NASA’s new wing design that adjusts its flaps mid-flight could be the fix. NASA teamed up with the U.S. Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) and Michigan-based engineering firm FlexSys Inc. to…

Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 has the most terrifying vision of the future

If real life imitates art, we’re doomed. This teaser video for the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 video game paints a very plausible vision of the future, so much so that watching it totally feels like channel surfing while fast forwarding through time. We’re going to build awesome stuff, which is great, and…

With Just Hours To Live, MESSENGER Continues To Snap Pics Of Mercury

After four years in orbit around Mercury, NASA’s MESSENGER mission is coming to an end. With its maneuvering propellant depleted, the probe is expect to crash onto Mercury’s surface tomorrow. Here are some of the last pics taken by MESSENGER we’ll ever see. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington. MESSENGER…

A Terminator Figure That Does Retro Right

San Diego Comic Con is just over two months away, and you know what that means? It’s time to unveil the oodles of Con-exclusive merchandise that’ll be available. NECA’s kicking off the wallet-tempting with a take on a retro toy idea that doesn’t fall into some of the pitfalls of the recent “retro style” boom.…

The Giant Robots That Serve the World’s Largest Library Archives

The largest libraries do more than just store books and newspapers on their shelves. When a library collection contains millions of documents, it needs complex and highly sophisticated logistical systems in order to serve its readers’ requests. It needs library robots. In many libraries, amazing automated transportation and robotic retrieval systems are behind every book…

This Plush Giraffe Will Rock Your Kids To Sleep For You

A stuffed animal can be an easy way to entertain or comfort an infant, but this plush giraffe called the Bounceroo goes above and beyond the call of duty by automatically rocking a bouncer, car seat, or crib while you attend to other things. Given the motor and electronics needed to make it work, Gerry…

The Heroes Of Star Wars Rebels Could Make Their Way To Live-Action

Good news for you Star Wars Rebels fans. Despite the fact the animated show is set in-between Episodes III and IV, producers Simon Kinberg and Dave Filoni have declared that it’s possible for Ezra, Hera, Kana and the others to show up elsewhere in the Star Wars universe — and possibly in the live-action movies…

New Chrome Extension Warns You If Your Google Password Gets Phished

Here’s a Chrome extension you should go install right now: The new Password Alert extension helps secure your Google account by letting you know when you’ve unwittingly given your credentials away to a website that’s not Google. GO INSTALL IT. The extension works by storing a hashed version of your password that’s compared to any…

Short film: Being in a relationship is never easy

Being in a relationship is hard. It doesn’t matter if it’s brand new or long term or just casual or really serious, trying to balance and figure out what two very different people want is so impossible that it’s remarkable that it ever works out. This short by Sam Boyd starring Dakota Johnson shows how…

We’ve Got the New LG G4. What Do You Want to Know?

LG’s got a brand new phone going up against top Android smartphone contenders from HTC and Samsung—and we got our hands on one. We’ve already said how the G4 seems like a well-crafted upgrade to the G series, but if you’ve got a few more Qs, we’re here for you. We’ll be spending the next…

That ‘60s-era, one-of-a-kind NASA tele-lens that appeared on Ebay out of Germany has found a buyer for $33,500. Among the specs for the 180-lbs. lens (which the seller claims was part of the Saturn V mission) is the vaguely Faustian detail that the original cost to the buyer was “1 family home.” Dark.

What’s The Greatest Space Photograph You’ve Ever Seen?

Space is not just an incredible scientific and travel destination, it’s also a site for some killer photoshoots. Today, we want to know about the most incredible space pics you’ve ever encountered. Will it be a close-up view of some far away galaxy? An astronaut selfie? A GIF of a comet behaving rather unusually? A…

Four Missing Features I Want to See in Windows 10

Confession time: I love Windows. Yes, I work from a MacBook Air every single day, and it’s fine, but I prefer a Windows machine—and I’m really looking forward to Windows 10. That said, there are four things Microsoft hasn’t announced that I really want. https://gizmodo.com/can-a-cheap-windows-tablet-replace-your-desktop-1684130353 They’re not BIG features—more like little creature comforts that would…

How A Judge Named “Learned Hand” Changed Scientific History Forever

In 1900, a new wonder-drug was discovered and patented. Over the next 10 years multiple companies protested that patent, which led to a man named Learned Hand making rules about a scientific discovery, while declaring that he probably shouldn’t be allowed to do so. It was the 1890s, and John Jacob Abel believed he was…