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American companies’ shameless 9/11 “tributes” are disgusting

Like every year, some shameless companies exploit the 9/11 anniversary with their alleged heartfelt tributes. It’s embarrassingly disgusting, from corporations to small business like this equine spa that shaved the towers on a horse’s butt. http://gawker.com/commemorating-9-11-on-a-horses-butt-1293717154 Or this terrible Tumbledown Trails golf course coupon: Have more? Post them in the comments. http://gawker.com/never-forget-pic-twitter-com-74br2rbl3a-at-t-att-s-1293984529

Yep, Tor Traffic Really Is Dominated by Botnets and Porn

The anonymous, secure Tor network has always had a reputation as a place for botnets, porn kings, and drug dealers. “But it’s such an amazing tool for political dissidents, a way to escape the spying government!” you might think in the wake of this NSA debacle. Then again, first impressions are often correct. https://gizmodo.com/tor-the-anonymous-internet-and-if-its-right-for-you-1222400823 Such…

Gogo’s About to Make Its In-Flight Wi-Fi Way Faster

https://gizmodo.com/why-inflight-wi-fi-sucks-and-is-getting-more-expensive-5949085 Inflight Wi-Fi sucks, but it’s about to get a little better. Gogo just announced it’s going to start using satellites to make its in-air Wi-Fi speeds six times faster. Which is to say: usable. Up until now, Gogo Wi-Fi has been powered by Air-to-Ground spectrum Gogo bought up back in 2006, which gave it…

Anno Dracula‘s Kim Newman explains why there’s not just one Dracula

At long last, Kim Newman is publishing the fourth volume of his Anno Dracula alternate-history series, Johnny Alucard. In an exclusive essay, Newman explains why a late-20th-century Dracula story had to encompass the many Draculas of pop culture. Plus there’s an exclusive book excerpt! I’ve often described my book Anno Dracula as ‘literally, a vampire…

A new digital ecology is evolving, and humans are being left behind

Incomprehensible computer behaviors have evolved out of high-frequency stock trading, and humans aren’t sure why. Eventually, it could start affecting high-tech warfare, too. We spoke with a researcher at University of Miami who thinks humans will be outpaced by a new “machine ecology.” For all intents and purposes, this genesis of this new world began…

Astronauts Arrive Home in a Brilliant Ball of Fire

Without any context, it looks like something has gone terribly, terribly wrong in the photo above taken around midnight last night. But that little ball engulfed in flames is doing just fine—and so are the three members of the International Space Station Expedition 36 that were snuggly inside and on their way home. The Soyuz…

Neill Blomkamp’s Elysium is real, and located in Malibu

Not all of Neill Blomkamp’s movie Elysium was green screen. Both the dystopian Earth and the beautiful space habitat Elysium were shot in physical locations. And this FX breakdown video shows where the richest of the planet live: California! Blomkamp filmed Earth in one of Mexico’s biggest landfills, while Elysium was shot in Malibu, California.…

Distant Ruins: How Scientists Hunt Space for Dead Alien Civilizations

‘Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’ says Ozymandias’s ruined statue in the desert of Shelley’s imagination. Shelley’s sonnet is often interpreted as a sober warning that human works are fleeting, but when I read it as a young boy it kindled a sense of adventure; it suggested a wonderfully mysterious past beneath my…

Vintage NASA animations make us long for a fully funded space program

From NASA’s 1977 Aeronautics and Space Report comes this retro-tastic animation of the Agency’s logo in spiral. It’s one of a few old-school logo-animations from the Agency that have been making their way around the internet this week. WE WANT MORE.

The Brilliant Simplicity Behind the iPhone 5C’s Design

Yesterday, we saw Apple introduce a new plastic iPhone. Why plastic? Because it’s cheaper, sure. But Apple’s shrewd decision to use plastic is about more than just money. Manufacturing the 5C: Harder, Better, Stronger I can’t put a dollar figure on what Apple’s bill of materials for the 5C is, but it’s safe to say…

Intel Bay Trail: Laptop-Tablet Hybrids Might Actually Keep Up Now

Just a couple of months ago, Intel’s new 4th generation processors helped laptops get a whole lot better. Now Intel’s trying to work the same magic on mobile. Meet Bay Trail, a new flavor of chips designed specifically to make Windows 8 and Android tablets more awesome. https://gizmodo.com/the-kickass-processors-that-will-power-your-next-comput-510668761 Bay Trail is Intel’s newest Atom chip……

Macrophotographs of insects to melt your face

Whether it’s the claws of a carnivorous caterpillar or the clashing mandibles of warring ants, the most fascinating insect-parts are often the smallest – and we love getting a good look. Macrophotography is one of the best ways to do just that, and the USGS Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab‘s collection offers some of the…

Girl attributes Hitler quotes to Taylor Swift, gets into real trouble

This is the horror story of a girl who one day decided to paste innocuous Adolf Hitler quotes over Taylor Swift photos, attributing them to her. Her work went viral, which resulted in an army of people attacking her in the vilest ways. Sometimes, going viral sucks. https://kotaku.com/going-viral-sucks-1282348530

A map of the world’s happiest (and least happiest) countries

The UN-sponsored World Happiness Report 2013 has just been released — a project that determined a country’s level of happiness by using a number of social and economic indicators taken from 2010 to 2012. This map provides a quick overview of the results. Above image: Max Fisher/The Washington Post. To get these results, the researchers…

This GPS-Based Plane Tracker Makes Highways in the Sky

At bustling traffic hubs like O’Hare International, planes can spend an interminably long time waiting for their turn to land. And at airports like Rio de Janeiro–Galeão International, pilots must contend with tight flight paths to avoid crowded population centers and hills on their final approach. But thanks to a new hyper-accurate GPS-based tracking system,…

Watch a Queen Bee Mate With a Drone in Mid-Flight

Apiphobes, look away now. Everyone else, you’re about to see an incredible close-up of a queen bee getting busy in mid-air. Spoiler alert: the drone dies in the end. All hail the queen. The clip comes courtesy of More Than Honey, a new film that examines the increasingly persistent buzz surrounding the worsening plight of…

Will toy companies keep us from ever getting a superheroine movie?

Welcome to Postal Apocalypse, the only mail column on the internet written by a fake mailman from the future (that I know of)! Today we’re discussing how toys affect movies — or prevent them, why DC seems determined to piss off everybody, and the best songs to sing around your apocalyptic campfire (besides “Every Rose…

8% of college-educated Americans brought a parent to a work interview

According to human-resources firm Adecco, 8-percent of college-educated americans brought a parent to a job interview in 2012. Worse: 3-percent actually had the parent sit on the interview. Perhaps it’s time to come up with a population control and parenting licensing program—before it’s too late. Forced exile in a fenced Millennial camp in some Mongolian…

Flipbook Sculptures: Art That You’re Supposed To Touch

Run your hands over a painting or a sculpture at an art gallery and security will ensure your day spent soaking up culture is immediately over. But artist Robert Cohen has no complaints about people touching his verticalCINEMA sculptures. In fact, that’s the only way the flipbook creations can really be enjoyed. https://gizmodo.com/these-mechanical-flipbooks-are-like-gifs-you-can-put-on-1226816911 Far more…

The view from the base of New York City’s annual 9/11 memorial, Tribute in Light, captured by AP photographer Mark Lennihan last night. Now in its 12th year, the installation lights up the sky over Manhattan with 88 high-powered searchlights. [AP]