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Turn a Printed Page Into a Touchscreen With This Brilliant Concept

Realizing that the oft-promised ‘paperless office’ may never actually come to fruition, researchers at Fujitsu are working on a backup plan that gives printed documents similar tablet-like touchscreen functionality. Using a tabletop projector, webcam, and other sensors, the system can precisely detect finger movements and motion in 3D, allowing a user to interact with a…

The Latest on Captain America 2, Guardians of Galaxy, and Avengers 2!

Screenwriter David S. Goyer explains what exactly Man of Steel and Batman Begins have in common. Doctor Who star Jenna-Louise Coleman shares why the Doctor’s best friend doesn’t like Clara. Michael Bay offers a three-word summary of Transformers 4. Plus Eli Roth exposes his Netflix horror show Hemlock Grove! Spoilers ahead! Top image from Guardians…

This Lab-Grown Kidney Can Keep Rats—And Maybe Even You—Alive

For the first time ever, a whole lab-grown kidney has been successfully transplanted into a rat, where it allowed the creature to process urine like a really kidney would—and it could someday save your life. A team of researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston took kidneys from donor rats and washed away the…

Why Does the Earth Have Rain Forests and Deserts?

You’d think with all the tumultuous weather and winds the Earth experiences, the planet would be covered in a fairly even mix of green space. But it’s not. Some parts are covered in fertile rain forests, while others are barren deserts. And it’s all because of a weather effect known as Hadley Cells. Named after…

Four of the Five Highest-Paid Execs in the US Work for Apple

If you already feel a little hard done by when it comes to your pay check, brace yourself. Bloomberg reports that four of the five best-paid executives across the whole of the US are employed by Apple—and just wait until you hear how much they earn. They each, apparently, receive a base salary of $805,400.…

How Chinese Scammers Are Swapping Fake iPhone Parts for the Real Deal

A very ingenious new kind of high-tech scam has been going down in China, where clever thieves are returning fake iPhone components to Apple and claiming they’re broken official parts, receiving genuine Apple-made pieces in return. And making a nice profit in the process. The scam, reported by TechWeb, sees people involved in the mobile…

Dish has kicked off a $25.5 billion bid to acquire Sprint—to try and derail a purchase by Japanese carrier Softbank.

This Desk-Bed Makes Snoozing at Work a Cinch

The mid-afternoon lull is a common problem. But if you often find yourself dribbling upon your keyboard during a short power nap at work, maybe you need something like this convertible desk, designed for specifically for snoozing, in your life. A concept by Studio NL, it provides enough room for you to stretch out and…

Technology Has Sure Moved On in the Last 20 Years

Sometimes, it’s easy to forget just how much technology has changed over the last few decades. Fortunately, Redditor ImTheGuyWhoLoveGems decided to remind us all—and, boy, should we be happy about the progress. ImTheGuyWhoLoveGems assembled a selection of gadgets from 1993 that have now all in 2013 been ably replaced by a single smartphone. There are…

WSJ: Microsoft Is Designing a Touch-Enabled Watch

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Microsoft is working with suppliers to develop a new touch-enabled watch device, which sees it jumping on the same rumored bandwagon as Apple and Samsung. https://gizmodo.com/the-nicest-apple-iwatch-concept-yet-5990104 Citing executives from Microsoft’s suppliers, the Journal reports that Asian manufacturers have been shipping components to Ballmer and co so that the…

YouTube Celebrates 57 Years of VCR With an Analog Video Mode

Do not adjust your computer screens. There’s no problem with YouTube, other than the fact that it’s getting a little misty eyed—by choosing to celebrate the 57th anniversary of the VCR with a little added analog character on its digital videos. On plenty of YouTube videos you can currently find a small VCR button: click…

TurboTax Went Down At a Kind of Crucial Moment and Didn’t Handle It Well on Twitter

So taxes are due…any minute now. And TurboTax is a popular service for doing taxes. Yes? Sure. Well, that’s a lot of pressure! Cue meltdown. Everything was going fine for whoever mans the TurboTax Twitter. He or she was spending the evening watching Food Network and was then rudely interrupted by a deluge of Twitter…

This 90-Year-Old Grandma Freaking Out Over the Oculus Rift VR Goggles Is What Makes Technology Great

More or less, this is all anyone ever wants from a piece of technology. Here’s a 90-year-old woman strapped into an Oculus Rift VR headset, and totally losing her mind over how amazing it is. Oh, man alive! Originally, were these made in Tuscany??? Oh this is something else. And I’m still sitting where I…

Katniss is back! And the Capitol is plotting her death in the Catching Fire trailer

The trailer for the second Hunger Games movie has arrived, and it takes us far outside the arena. While President Snow and Plutarch Heavensbee plot Katniss’ fall, Katniss starts to grow into her role as a symbol of hope for the people of Panem. There’s some truly fantastic stuff in this trailer: Philip Seymour Hoffman…

A piano makes a handy projectile in this Iron Man 3 clip

We get a brief, but intense clip of Tony Stark suiting up in this clip from Iron Man 3, which aired during the MTV Movie Awards. When his usual weapons won’t fire, Tony isn’t afraid to improvise.

The Bar Fight Dominator Is A Slingshot That Shoots Glass Ashtrays

What is there to even say? Joerg Sprave dreamed up a slingshot that shoots glass ashtrays and has a broken beer bottle attached as a bayonet. It’s all pretty legit. The slingshot is pump-powered and holds four ashtrays at a time (three in the clip plus one in the chamber). It’s accurate at close range…

Giant Damage-Causing Snails Are Aggressively Invading Florida

Yeah, so giant African land snails are infesting southern Florida. They’re the kind that can eat through plaster and stucco and they get as big as rats. When the rainy season ends in a few weeks the population will explode. It’s a bad situation. The same snails invaded in 1966 when a kid brought three…

General Zod delivers his message to Earth in the latest Man of Steel ad

General Zod breaks through the static to address the people of Earth and one man—one Superman—in particular. It’s a slightly creepy new teaser for Man of Steel. Man of Steel hits theaters on June 14, 2013.

The New Pornographers: The Bleeding Heart Show

There are three or four parts of “The Bleeding Heart Show” that are catchy. The beginning, that middle part and don’t even get me started on the hey-las at the end. Good stuff. But the best thing about “The Bleeding Heart Show” is the melodica backups. You don’t hear melodica (a wind instrument with a…

Storyboards reveal the climactic ending to the J.J. Abrams-scripted Superman: Flyby

A decade ago, J.J. Abrams wrote the script for Superman: Flyby, a Superman origin movie that was to be directed by Brett Ratner or McG. Although this particular film was never made, with Warner Bros. instead producing Superman Returns, storyboard and concept art for the script exist, including a blow-by-blow of the final battle’s aftermath.…