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​12 Aliens That Look Way Too Much Like Penises

If there is other life in the universe, it could have evolved look like almost anything. And yet, as our movies and TV shows have proven, a disproportionate amount of them end up looking like cocks and balls. Here are a dozen extra-phallic terrestrials science fiction has dropped trou and revealed to us. 1) Xenomorphs,…

Find the Perfect Laptop in This Comprehensive, Interactive Map

There are a lot of laptops out there. A lot. Too many to navigate easily. But this chart thrown together by Marek Gibney helps. It’s called the Tourist Map of Laptops, and it can help you grok the whole wide range of available computers at least a little bit. The concept is simple; each laptop…

A Spartan Knife Block That’s Anything But Austere

You can pretend they’re there for easy access, but there’s something primevally enjoyable about leaving your cutting implements on display in a knife block. It’s like knights mounting swords on the wall of a castle, and it’s also why this knife block that looks like a Spartan under attack is particularly amusing. Made from a…

War Of The Worlds‘ Martian Tripods Invade Actual World War I Footage

Last year, the History channel aired a mockumentary about the “Great Martian War” of 1913-1917. The real treat is the videos of the battles, which places War of the Worlds-style walkers in real footage from World War I. Christian Johnson (Plazma) and Steve Maher (impossible factual) directed these mashups of HG Wells and World War…

The World’s First Clean Coal Commercial Plant Just Opened In Canada

Canada switched on its Boundary Dam Carbon-Dioxide Capture and Storage (CCS) Project yesterday. In doing so, it has become the only country on Earth with a commercial-scale, coal-fired power plant capable of harvesting its own CO2 and sulfur dioxide emissions. Richard Van Noorden sums up the project over at Nature: The Boundary Dam project, in…

Ebola Vaccine Delay May Be Due To An Intellectual Property Dispute

For the past six weeks, about 800 to 1,000 doses of an experimental ebola vaccine have been sitting in a Canadian laboratory instead of being dispensed to West Africa. The delay, it would now appear, may be on account of an intellectual property spat. Back on August 13th, the Canadian government announced that it would…

5 Infographics That Actually Say Something

There’s been a swift and concerted backlash against terms like “infographic,” and for good reason. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t data journalists and designers doing fantastic work—from The New York Times’ Graphics Desk to National Geographic’s design team. The Best American Infographics 2014, a new book from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, collects some of…

This Week’s craziest Star Wars theory has nothing to do with Episode VII

There’s been a lot of wild speculation about Star Wars this week – Rumours for Episode VII have been flying around like Mynocks in a Giant Space Worm and got everyone talking (or in our case, Photoshopping!). But the weirdest Star Wars tidbit floating around this week has nothing to do with Episode VII at…

You Wouldn’t Want To Be Left Behind With These Idiots

The genius of the Left Behind series is the way it combines Roland Emmerich-style disasters with its Biblical lectures. And the new movie version even stars Nicolas Cage. So it’s too bad this new movie fails on the “disaster epic” front, because it’s too busy torturing its incredibly clueless characters. Spoilers ahoy… In case you…

Report: Google Is Making Yet Another Messaging App

The Economic Times is reporting that Google is working hard to launch a messaging service similar to WhatsApp. Because what the world definitely needs is another messaging app. While every tech company under the suns continues to try and crack messaging once and for all—without ever really seeming to know how to go about it—the…

Hack-O-Lantern Turns Your Kid’s Pumpkin Into an Interactive Spooker

Except for maybe the addition of child-safe power tools, not much has changed in decades when it comes to carving a Jack-o-lantern. But if you want Halloween to be about more than gutting a pumpkin and sugar rushes, LittleBits has come out with a simple kit that turns a Jack-o-lantern into a lesson about basic…

The most iconic photos in history recreated in impressive live action

German camera brand Leica celebrates the 100 anniversary of their first camera with this beautiful homage to photography: An emotional and impeccably shot commercial recreating the most iconic photographs in history. SPLOID is a new blog about awesome stuff. Join us on Facebook

Physicists Have Found A Particle That’s Also Its Own Antiparticle

Back in 1937, an Italian physicist predicted the existence of a single, stable particle that could be both matter and antimatter. Nearly 80 years later, a Princeton University research team has actually found it. Ettore Majorana proposed these exotic particles back in the 1930s. Named after him, they’re a unique exception to the standard relationship…

If Michael Bay directed a Bond movie it would be like this crazy TV ad

I remember seeing the Peugeot 205 GTi everywhere in Europe when I was a kid. Thirty years later, the French carmaker, launches a modern version of their classic urban automobile with an epic ad that seems extracted from a James Bond movie directed by Michael Bay. SPLOID is a new blog about awesome stuff. Join…

Bramitol, The Fictional Drug That Still Turns People Into Jerks

Have you ever taken Bramitol? No, and you never will. It’s a fictional drug that psychologists give to experimental subjects, supposedly as a “mood-freezing” drug, but one that can make people either very aggressive, or unusually non-aggressive. Waiting for Catharsis Catharsis is a useful dramatic device but, psychologically speaking, it’s useless. It might even be…

Learning From Mount Ontake How To Survive An Eruption

A sudden pyroclastic flow erupted in Japan on September 27th, sending hikers fleeing to the dubious safety of mountain lodges. Here’s an update covering your questions on what happened, why we didn’t predict it, and what you could do to survive. Top image: Nagoya City firefighters (orange) and Japan Ground Self-Defense Force personnel (camo) climb…

Edmunds App Shows What’s On the Car Dealership’s Lot, No Salesman Needed

Car shopping has always been a pain—it’s damn near impossible to just browse the lot without a salesperson breathing down your neck. Thankfully, Edmunds.com is here with an update to the Lot Buddy app that lets you search the dealership without invoking the sales sharks. Update: The app is now live on the Apple App…

I can hardly believe that the B-1B—the U.S. Air Force’s four-engine supersonic, sweep-wing strategic bomber—is 30 years old. It still looks like an aircraft from the distant future. This one was photographed over Iraq after conducting air strikes in Syria against ISIL targets, on the 27th of September 2014. Here it is refuelling, too: [U.S.…

This Party Is The Greatest Collection Of GIFs Ever Assembled

The streamers have been hung, the routers have been set up, and the files have been saved all to bring you this: The greatest GIF Party ever thrown. We want your GIF classics this week — both the old ones and the brand new classics yet to be recognized as such. So assemble your favorites…

The Guardians Of The Galaxy Blu-Ray Has An Exclusive Avengers 2 Preview

As if you needed any more reason to want to purchase Guardians of the Galaxy when it hits Blu-ray on December 9th, now word is that it will contain an exclusive preview of Avengers: Age of Ultron. That clicking sound you hear is thousands of people frantically adding it to their Amazon wishlist. Unless Marvel…