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New Evidence: Antarctica’s Ancient, Ice-Covered Lake is Full of Life

A new study offers evidence that Antartica’s Lake Vostok harbors its own unique ecosystem of life forms, despite being buried under two miles of ice for the past 15 million years. This is good news for scientists who are looking for life on other worlds. It’s hard to imagine how harsh this underground world really…

Iain M. Banks gets asteroid named after him

Iain M. Banks has joined a select group of science fiction creators who’ve received the ultimate tribute, of having a celestial body named after him. The asteroid named Iainbanks is orbiting the sun in the main asteroid belt, every 3.94 years. J.L. Galache of the Minor Planet Center explains: When I heard of [Banks]’ sickness…

Garmin’s New HUD Projects Turn-by-Turn Directions Onto Any Windshield

When most of us think of heads-up displays, our brains almost immediately wander into science fiction fantasies. And lord knows I’ve been fantasizing about a relatively inexpensive unit that will put turn-by-turn navigation on my windshield. Goodbye, awkward smartphone mount, hello,Garmin HUD. The new Garmin HUD sits on your dashboard, projecting navigation information at eye-level…

All aboard the ludicrous train fight scene in the first Wolverine clip

I’m not convinced that The Wolverine is going to be terrible, but boy, have all the shots of that fight scene on-top of the Japanese bullet train looked goofy in the previews. Well, as the first official The Wolverine clip has revealed, this fight scene doesn’t just look goofy, it is goofy. Immensely. Look, I…

Every Public Sculpture Should be a Full-Size Chrome T-Rex

Every public, abstract sculpture in the world suddenly seems super lame. Why? Because right now there’s a full-scale, blinged-out Tyrannosaurus Rex standing over the Seine in Paris. Nothing will ever be the same again. Designed and constructed by French artist Philippe Pasqua, the ‘saur is made up of 350 chrome-molded bones and stands 12 feet…

SpaceX Grasshopper Rocket Flies Higher than the Chrysler Building Now

SpaceX’s reusable Grasshopper rocket is growing up. And up and up and up. It just set a new record for height, hovering at over 325 meters (1066 feet)—higher than Manhattan’s Chrysler Building—and hovering there, before coming back down and landing on its launchpad safely. The Grasshopper itself is a 10-story Vertical Takeoff, Vertical Landing rocket.…

Lincoln’s Pyramid: Failed Proposals For DC’s Most Famous Monuments

Retronostalgia is the air. Last week, we looked six New Yorks that could have been. And this week, National Geographic takes a similar look at D.C., for which there are veritable heaps of unbuilt memorials. Ever wondered what the Lincoln Memorial would look like, had it been built by ancient Egyptians? As you might imagine,…

The 15 Most Disturbing MST3K Host Segments

During its 10 years on the air, Mystery Science Theater 3000 was often smart, sometimes mean, and always funny. It was rarely disturbing, but when you have nearly 200 episodes with five host segments to fill — those skits on-board the Satellite of Love not set in the theater — you’re going to encounter some…

How Would You Carry a Jaeger from Pacific Rim?

So you have your awesome giant Jaeger and you want to use it to fight the mean Kaiju that are destroying your city. But there is a problem. Your Jaeger is here and the Kaiju are there. How do you get from here to there? Clearly, you need to fly. Well, not really fly. No,…

What if The Simpsons was invaded by characters from Game of Thrones?

Last year, we witnessed The Simpsons give tribute to Game of Thrones in their introduction. Now, the cast of George R.R. Martin’s series has invaded Springfield, and it is awesome. Created by artist Adrien Noterdaem for the Draw the Simpsons Tumblr,this may be our favorite GoT mashup in sometime. Especially with Tywin Lannister in the…

Celebrate the Roswell UFO incident by playing Google’s doodle game

Today marks the 66th anniversary of the Roswell UFO incident. To commemorate the milestone, Google has put together a fantastic black-and-white interactive doodle in which you have to help a crash-landed alien return home. It’s quite possibly the best Google Doodle yet! At the opening of the game, users watch as a UFO falls out…

A 3D-Printed SLR Makes Us Wish For 3D-Printed Film, Too

Despite the fact that many camera manufacturers have stopped producing non-digital SLRs, fans of film-based photography should be happy to hear that they’ll be able to 3D print a replacement should their beloved hardware ever fail. The OpenReflex camera was created by Léo Marius, a recent design graduate who’s posted the plans and everything you’ll…

The Best Free Apps in Apple’s App Store Anniversary Fire Sale

There have been plenty of App Store sales before, some of them quite extensive. But Apple’s never offered discounts of this magnitude before. Some of the best—and most expensive—games and apps you can find on iOS are free today, presumably in honor of the App Store’s five-year anniversary. Here are the ones you need to…

The Secret Histories of Clippy, Comic Sans, and Other Legends of Early UI

It’s human nature to hate things that remind us of how dumb we used to be; Like teenagers who can’t stand their baby pictures, we prefer to ignore the proof of our humble beginnings. The same goes for artifacts of computing history—for proof, just look at the rage directed at relics of those early days,…

This Week’s TV: Is Batman’s new show as good as the Animated Series?

Did Syfy steal the idea for Sharknado from The Middleman? And just how many memes will Sharknado spawn? Also, the brand new Batman series reinvents Bat-continuity, but will it be worth your Bat-time? Gravity Falls is back! Check out clips and previews of all this week’s television. Top image: Sharknado Today: Defiance (9 PM, Syfy):…

Lauren Beukes is here answering your questions from 12-1 PM today!

In June, the io9 book club read Lauren Beukes’ haunting novel The Shining Girls. Now, Beukes is here today from 12-1 to answer your questions about this book, her previous work (Moxyland and Zoo City), and anything else (on topic!) you want to ask. Start posting your questions in comments below, and Beukes will get…

Nikon: We Want to Change the Concept of Cameras With a Non-Camera

Nikon might be better know for their point-and-shoots, but it seems to be wanting to diversify—and it’s contemplating releasing products that are less camera and more… something else. Talking to Bloomberg, Nikon’s president Makoto Kimura explained that he knew the number of people dropping compacts in favor of smartphones was “exploding”. His solution? To “create…

The world’s deepest diving pool is like an underwater city

Add this to your list of things you never knew existed but, now that you do, you now desperately need: a visit to NEMO33, the deepest pool on Earth. NEMO33 contains over 2.5-million liters of chlorine-free, filtered spring water that’s been heated to 86°F. Much of the pool is between 5- and 10-meters deep, a…

Facebook will berolling out its Graph Search to hundreds of million users in the United States today. Look out for it!

Batman prepares to battle Aquaman and Wonder Woman in Flashpoint clip

The first clip for DC’s direct-to-home video movie Justice League: Flashpoint Paradox has arrived, as Cyborg assembles a team to stop Aquaman and Wonder Woman before the Atlantis/Amazon war kills everyone on the planet, asking a particularly red-eyed Batman to lead it (no spoilers, but he’s not just tired). Comics fans know that this is…