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The Best of Gizmodo This Week

This week at Gizmodo, we got our hands on Buckminster Fuller’s FBI file, recounted your worst PayPal horror stories, told you why you need to stop drinking bottled water, and hung out with Neal Stephenson to chat about his latest novel. Here are the highlights. Stop Drinking Bottled Water There are few things on this…

Tour A Real, Abandoned Insane Asylum In This Creepy Short Video

Ghosts are implied but not actually filmed in this spectacularly eerie tour of a massive asylum, closed for 20 years. Elegant editing and camerawork, including some graceful aerial footage, capture graffiti-covered abandonment as well as what the narrator terms “a presence, as if something was still there.” The video also recognizes the explorers and artists…

A Handful Of Bronze-Age Men Could Have Fathered Two Thirds Of Europeans

Europe has surprisingly little genetic variety. Learning how and when the modern gene-pool came together has been a long journey. But thanks to new technological advances a picture is slowly coming together of repeated colonization by peoples from the east with more efficient lifestyles. Top image: An 1899 painting by Viktor Vasnetsov imagining a kurgan…

Let’s Talk About Whatever You Want Right Now

It’s the weekend, friends! In America, it’s a long weekend — Monday is off for Memorial Day, and everyone barbecues, as dictated by tradition. What’s cooking, Gizmodo? My Memorial day plans are basically to have no plans. I keep telling friends I “might be” going away, when the truth is that I intend to retreat…

Making Heroin Could One Day Be As Easy As Brewing Beer

Breakthroughs in synthetic biology have suggested a bizarre and realistic possibility for the future of black market drug trade. Genetically-altered yeast could be used to make opiates for hospitals seeking a source of the painkillers — and then appropriated by drug dealers who want to homebrew heroin. Over at Wired, Lexi Pandell reports on a…

What Is The Best Spooky Story To Tell Around The Campfire?

It’s Memorial Day weekend in the US, a time when many folks head out into nature to camp — and enjoy scary stories around a campfire. What story is even creepier when it’s told out in the woods, far from electric lights and civilization? Gif from the intro to Are You Afraid of the Dark?…

This Gorgeous Batman Figure Looks Like A 3-D Sketch

I’m a big fan of DC’s “Designer Series” figures, where the artstyle of a particular DC artist is painstakingly recreated on a poseable action figure. But this latest figure, based on the art of Batman: Hush artist Jim Lee, takes that design ethos to its most incredible extreme. The beautiful figure is one of DC’s…

The Most Popular Candidates for President, According to Social Media

Which of the current presidential hopefuls have the strongest social media base? You might be surprised. Rand Paul blows Hilary Clinton away on Facebook, while Clinton creams Paul on Twitter. No one likes Jeb Bush. Since there are many candidates, I’m only including those with social media followings above 10k on the major platforms, and…

See How SpaceX Astronauts Could Survive a Failed Launch

Two weeks ago, SpaceX successfully tested the launch abort system for its new commercial crew capsule, which is designed to carry astronauts to the International Space Station by 2017. The company has just released a first-person view video recorded by cameras mounted on the Dragon capsule, so you can take a virtual ride on the…

io9 Book Club Reminder: Meet 6/2 to Discuss Station Eleven!

This month, the io9 Book Club is reading Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. We’ll meet on June 2 to discuss it. Join us! What is this io9 Book Club all about? We meet once a month to discuss a book we’ve all read together, and then we have an online chat with the…

See The New Fantastic Four’s Powers And How @#$%ing Huge The Thing Is

MovieTickets.com scored the best look at the new Fantastic Four movie cast displaying their super-powers in their new commercial. It doesn’t have a particularly good look at the Thing, but don’t worry, you can see him after the jump. Just be ready for a shock. This new banner reveals that Ben Grimm’s Thing form isn’t…

Meet the Robots Who Will Steal Bartenders’ Jobs (or Not)

So, they say robots are supposed to be stealing all our jobs. Soon. And service jobs at especially at risk. Included in that group? Those who usher us through the magical portal of happy hour: bartenders. It’s Friday afternoon, you’ve made it through the long week, and it’s time for Happy Hour, Gizmodo’s weekly booze…

See The JLA In Action In This Incredible “Widevision” Comic Cover

We’re heading into a long weekend. Sometimes you don’t need anything to celebrate other than to gawp at a glorious, gorgeous piece of comic book art that shows the Justice League’s finest superheroes locked in an all out brawl with some evil aliens. Sit back, relax, and be amazed. The beautiful “widevision” cover is actually…

These Insects Compete Using Their Spiked Penises

Insects with nightmarish spiky penises that can harm their mates are really nothing new. But a new study in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology has determined that given the right conditions, wielding a nightmarish spiky penis could also harm a different species. Image: Kyogoku, D. and Sota, T. 2015 The study, led by Daisuke Kyogoku…

Here Are 40,000 Photos Of Old New York Plotted on a City Map

Hope you’ve already checked out of work on this pre-Memorial Day Friday because this site might eat your long weekend for breakfast. Over 40,000 vintage photos of New York City from the New York Public Library archives have been geotagged to a Google Map, letting you click right through history on every street corner. OldNYC…

Remembering Britain’s Worst Rail Disaster Of The First World War

It’s the 100th anniversary of the Quintinshill Rail Disaster — a horrific three-train collision that resulted in hundreds of casualties, the vast majority of them soldiers en route to the war. Here’s what happened on that tragic day. Credit: War/Topham Picturepoint/PA Images. The First World War was dominated by railways. The ability to rapidly transport…

This Prehistoric Pocket Deer Has Fewer Chromosomes Than A Fruit Fly

Meet the muntjac — the most interesting deer in the world. It’s the size of a dog, it’s the oldest deer around, it has antlers but fights with tusks, and it even barks loudly at things that threaten it. But its most interesting quality is this — it gets by with fewer chromosomes than any…

Two Hours of Thunderstorm Siege Made Budapest an Electrifying City

Hungarian photographer Zoltán Vanik captured this stunning panoramic image of Budapest, lit by dozens of lightning bolts during a severe thunderstorm a few days ago. I asked Zoltán how he managed to create this captivating scene. He used the following gear and settings: Nikon D800, Nikkor 24-70 f 2.8 lens, ISO 200, f:9, 13sec exposures–except…

How To Survive A Car Crash

Driving is the most dangerous thing most people do. It’s also something for which they likely have no or minimal training. Before you hit the road for Memorial Day weekend, let’s look at how to make it more survivable. The Best Way To Survive A Crash Driving is a skill like any other. And, to…

Even if Pebble is truly having financial difficulties, the show will go on. The company writes that the first batch of Pebble Time smartwatches will ship to backers on May 27th, and that every backer should receive a shipment tracking number by mid-June. [Pebble]