Latest

Do Not Let Super Mario Out Of Your Sight, He’ll Destroy Your House

Ever wonder what Super Mario does when he’s not running across your screen kicking Koopa Troopas? Filmmaker John Huffnagle shows us what everyone’s favorite plumber might do if left alone in your house. Long story short: Don’t let Mario out of your sight. Anyone who ever picked up a controller knows that Mario’s adventures can…

The Continuing Adventures of Major Matt Mason

Major Matt Mason was a Mattel toy inspired by the incredibly cartoonish space suit designed by Allyn B. “Happ” Hazard. Major Mason was the must-have toy for space-loving geeks of a certain age, and he’s come out of storage for a photo shoot. Major Mason decked out in an early space suit design, returning a…

Tomorrow’s Cancer-Blasting Wonder Drug Could Come From a Tobacco Plant

Australian researchers published findings this week on a newly-discovered plant compound that destroys cancer cells, but leaves healthy cells unharmed. They found it in possibly the last place you’d look for a cancer cure: the family of plants that brings us cancer’s number-one culprit, tobacco. The research team at Australia’s La Trobe University discovered the…

Chili’s Will Donate 10% of Customers’ Checks to Anti-Vaxxers on April 7

Chili’s intends to donate 10% of its customers’ checks on April 7th to the National Autism Association, in honor of National Autism Awareness month. The problem? The NAA claims on its website that vaccines can trigger or exacerbate autism in “some, if not many, children.” Dammit not this again. UPDATE 04/06: Chili’s has cancelled its…

A Striking Animated Short Made With Nothing But Sticky Notes

You don’t need amazing computer graphics, bowel-jiggling surround sound, or eye-popping 3D effects to make a powerful film. In fact, all you really need is a tall stack of yellow sticky notes and a black pen. And a whole lot of talent. Luckily, the 15 animators who helped make this short film had all of…

Report: Android TV Is the New Google TV

Not content with millions of Chromecast dongle sales, a new report suggests that Google is preparing to take on the Apple TV, Roku range and newly-released Amazon Fire TV with a smart TV streaming platform of its own. The Vergehas unearthed details of a new television offering called Android TV, which looks like Google’s most…

Oh Good, Yelp Now Suggests Businesses Based on Emoji

Emoji is strangely useful, whether you’re recapping wildly popular TV shows or sending your friend a smiling pile of poo when real words fail you. Until now, this lexicon was probably inscrutable to machines. Those days are over: Yelp’s mobile app now suggests businesses when you type tiny pictures in the search bar. A Yelp…

Watch the Extended Godzilla Trailer and Know Bryan Cranston’s Horror

Warner Brothers just dropped a new, extended trailer for Godzilla. Some of this footage we’ve seen before, but a decent chunk of it is brand spanking new – including the first publicly released glimpse into why Bryan Cranston’s character is so very, very angry. A minute-long TV spot was also released yesterday, giving us still…

This week in Tech Reads: coal, animal actors, wasteful government spending, and more! Coal provides 40% of the world’s electricity. It’s also a killer, whether by dangerous mining conditions or the toxic pollution it produces. Michelle Nijhuis takes a long look at how coal is produced and consumed, and asks, can it ever be clean?…

Reframe Roundup: This Week’s Best Photography Posts

Did you guys know there is a Gizmodo subdomain where you can go for all things photographic? Yep! It’s called Reframe, and it’s where you’ll find additional coverage of gear, techniques, news, and all kinds of great stuff related to the crafts of photography and videography. Olympus SH-1: High End Image Stabilization in a Point…

Report: Android TV Will Be Google’s Next Big Set-Top Box Push

The Verge just revealed that Google may venture into set-top TV devices with the as-yet-unannounced Android TV. Quoting internal documents, the report indicates Google is planning a device like Roku or the new Amazon Fire TV to put Android in your living room. Judging by the documents The Verge quotes (which so far have not…

Captain America, Amazon Fire TV, World’s Strongest Man, and More

A lot of stuff happened this week, whether it was new streaming TV devices being revealed or a new superhero sequel’s debut. From a tearjerker time capsule story to a day at the World’s Strongest Man competition, we’ve gathered our best stories of the week right here for you. It’s a Saturday brunch buffet of…

An aluminum slug melts and levitates at the same time

Run an alternating current through a coiled length of copper and you’ll create a levitation cylinder. Drop a bar of aluminum in and you’ve got yourself some hovering metal. But leave the metal there too long… The thing about this levitation cylinder is that it doubles as an induction heater. In a nutshell: the current…

The Life and Death of a Volcanic Island

Under the sea, volcanoes erupt, building land until they break the surface as a new island. These islands evolve and change as they age, following a predictable pattern of landform evolution until one day returning to the sea. The Emerging Volcano: Niijima and Nishino-shima, Ogasawara Islands Volcanic islands are born below the waves, growing from…

Shipping Container Tailgate Party Is the Pinnacle of Pop-Up Design

Football season may be months away, but that doesn’t mean we can’t daydream about tailgating. Forget about the rickety old camp grill and cooler in the back of your van: the future of tailgating is boxGATE, a brilliantly overkill pop-up party that unfolds from a shipping container. It’s the Transformers of tailgating! Texas Tech alumni…

This Is The Moment We Kept Rewatching From Last Night’s Continuum

What’s better in the Continuum season three opener: The badass action, or the explanations of the show’s time travel mythos? They’re both pretty great. Relive the awesome fight scene that blew our minds, and then read on for the time travel goodness. Spoilers ahead… First up, some ground rules. I am recapping the show as…

The A-10 Warthog looks especially cool in this photo

It must be the combination of the steel grey palette, the black accents, and their patches and rivets, but these two A-10s look especially cool and futuristic to me in this photo. Like they can be piloted by this guy: Perhaps it’s because this airplane has become such a design icon that it has already…

Make the Switch from Windows XP

As of Tuesday, the venerable Windows XP operating system is going kaput. Microsoft is pulling update support for the OS, leaving it vulnerable to rapidly mutating cyber threats. There’s precious little time to make sure your computer isn’t left to the wilds of the Internet. Here’s how to make the jump to the modern era…

All the Secrets and References in Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is a superb action flick, but it also does a commendable job of serving up scenes for even the most die-hard fans. After the jump, Kevin Garcia dissects the film’s various secrets and subtle references to the broader Marvel Universe in an exhaustive review. Warning: Here be spoilers GALORE.

Remembering Kurt Cobain (Feb. 20, 1967 – Apr. 5, 1994)

Grunge, drones, and fame: This is the last paragraph of the third chapter of my recently published 33 1/3 book Selected Ambient Works Volume II, about the Aphex Twin album by that name released by the labels Warp and Sire 20 years ago last month. Today marks the 20th anniversary of the death of Nirvana’s…