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Skip-It and Twister Now Work With a Kid-Friendly Fitness Tracker

Remember Skip-It, the toy kids shackled and spun around their ankles in an attempt to rack up the high score on its built-in counter? It’s back, and now packing some legitimate technology in the form of a kid-friendly wearable fitness tracker that remembers their high score, as well as other fitness-related metrics. Because now that…

Watch Four Minutes Of The Lazarus Effect Because Dead Is Better

Dammit, we love a good resurrection horror movie, and it’s been so long since we’ve had a zombie-free undead horror story. The Lazarus Effect looks like it’s channeling that classic “we shouldn’t be meddling around in this” feeling. Check out four minutes of the flick here.

WNYC Says Why It Deleted Its Controversial Podcast on Women in Tech

Earlier this month, we asked a question: Why did WNYC delete an episode of its internet-focused podcast TLDR that criticized Vivek Wadhwa, a professor frequently quoted as an expert on the issue of women in technology? The updated episode is now available online, complete with a painfully tense interview between host Meredith Haggerty and Wadhwa.…

Cardboard Table Tennis Folds Down Into a Portable Cardboard Suitcase

The next time you’re stuck at an airport waiting for a delayed flight, instead of turning to your smartphone to pass the time, just make sure this cardboard version of table tennis is one of your carry-on items. In just seconds it can be unfolded and assembled into a working ping-pong table, complete with a…

Our Best View Of A Stellar Debris Disk Warped By A Massive Exoplanet

Astronomers working with the Hubble Space Telescope have released the most detailed picture ever taken of a circumstellar debris disk viewed edge-on. It’s the only picture we have of a protoplanetary disk with an actual planet orbiting within it. Beta Pictoris is a 20-million-year old system located about 63 light-years from Earth. This star is…

A History of Internet Spying, Part 2

How long have intelligence agencies been keeping tabs on the internet, and what role did these agencies play in creating the internet we use today? For the most part, these kinds of questions have been relegated to comments sections on random blogs and the occasional tweet from researchers. We’re hoping to remedy that in whatever…

The Water’s Gotten A Lot Fouler In Hot Tub Time Machine 2

Hot Tub Time Machine had a clever spin on the “male midlife crisis” comedy genre, sending four dudes back to the 80s to relive their best weekend. And now there’s a sequel, which doubles down on the time-travel hijinks, but also goes all-in on the gross-out dude-bonding humor. Spoiler-o-rama… The best thing about Hot Tub…

Galaxy S6 Rumor Roundup: Everything We Think We Know

There are smartphones, and then there are smartphones. Phones that you pay attention to. Phones that are like whoa. The iPhone is one. Maybe the new Nexus. The Galaxy S3 was one. The S4 and the S5? Not so much. But the S6 looks poised to make a splash again. The S6 is looking serious.…

Why Do Moths Want To Drink Our Tears?

We’ve written before about lepidoptera that drink the tears of animals, including humans. The general consensus on them was, “Please, god, no!” Perhaps it will help to know the probable reason for these insects’ quest for delicious, delicious tears. https://gizmodo.com/amazonian-butterflies-and-bees-drink-the-tears-of-turtl-1317269051 Your tears are complicated cocktails. They contain a variety of proteins, as well as some…

This Book Of Countless Cameras Is An Ode to Analog Photo Nerds

If you have that obsession with camera gear that so many of us behold, you’ll want to check out the new book Tokyo Camera Style. It’s based on the website of the same name, which gathers snapshots of everyday folks and their coveted shooter of choice. Published earlier this year by Thames & Hudson, Tokyo…

Your Phone’s Battery Use Lets Spies Track Your Movements

Spies and cops can use your smartphone to track your movements. That’s no mystery—most smartphones come with a GPS chip that makes it pretty damned simple. So if you don’t want to be tracked, you just turn off the GPS feature, right? Unfortunately, there is another way prying eyes can follow your movements: through your…

Gigantic Super Mario Warp Pipe Pens Are Obscene But Great

Giant ballpoint pens are a staple of most tourist trap gift shops, and rarely worth more than a fleeting glance. But paint one of those pens green like the warp pipes in the Super Mario games and put a tiny Mario and Luigi inside? Suddenly you’ve got a must-have $20 collectible that even comes with…

The Greatest TV Episodes Where Someone Lives A Whole Lifetime In One Day

One of the annoying things about real life is, you can only gain experience by getting older. You can’t just luck into a trove of experience points and level up painlessly. Except on a lot of science fiction TV shows, there’s a loophole. Here are seven episodes where someone lives for years, while no time…

This Godzilla Toy’s Fire Breath Is So Badass, It Needs Its Own Stand

I mean, look how big and flame-breathy it is! Only such extreme fieriness could be possible through the magic of translucent plastic stands. This new Bandai Monsterarts figure, based on last year’s Godzilla movie, is labelled as the ‘Spit Fire Version’, which might just be my favourite name for a toy variant ever. The figure,…

The Himalayas Divide Lush Vegetation From Plants Struggling To Survive

The Himalayan Mountains are a seam on our world, marking a place where continental plates are slamming into a new land. But they’re more than that: they also mark the boundary between different climates. That is made explicitly clear in this false-colour satellite image. Taken on February 20, 2009 by the European Space Agency’s Envisat…

How to Remove Superfish Adware From Your Lenovo Computer

We recently learned that PC manufacturer Lenovo is selling computers preinstalled with a dangerous piece of software, called Superfish, that uses a man-in-the-middle attack to break Windows’ encrypted Web connections for the sake of advertising. (Here’s a list of affected products.) Research from EFF’s Decentralized SSL Observatory has seen many thousands of Superfish certificates that…

The Natives Are Murderous In The New Wayward Pines Trailer 

It’s been a while since we’ve seen new footage of M. Night Shyamalan’s 10-episode “event series” Wayward Pines, but this trailer adds a bit more outright violence and murder to the mysterioussetting. Could that be enough to save it from its earlier poor reception? I do not expect a shocking twist in this regard. https://gizmodo.com/another-strike-for-m-night-first-impression-of-waywar-1611317873…

The much-anticipatedreport on the new dietary guideline recommendationsis out, and it has some suggestions, like for goodness sake eat some more plants, will you? It also includes a review of the average American diet, a full 15% of which is comprised solely of sandwiches. The guidelines will be out later this year.

Are We Doomed to Get Rashes from Our Fitness Trackers?

Constant 24/7 fitness tracking can have itchy, scratchy consequences. Those would be wrist rashes, as Fitbit users have been learning. But rashes aren’t just a Fitbit problem—any wristband can leave you red, thanks to some basic biology. There may be no miracle cure for this malady of the quantified self. Our skin has the thankless…

Win These RPG Contests By Designing Monsters or Whole New Worlds

Some of the biggest companies in tabletop gaming are holding contests right now, including a monster design challenge, D&D trivia, and one for scifi mini settings. Here’s how you can win fabulous prizes from Monte Cook Games, Wizards of the Coast, and Kobold Press. The Strange Recursion Design Competition The Strange is the second RPG…