Internet

India’s Porn Ban Reversal Is Essentially Bullshit

Today’s headlines are triumphantly declaring that India’s government walked back its sweeping ban of internet porn sites. But that’s not quite true—for all intents and purposes, online porn is still banned in India. Let’s take a look at the devil in the details. Following widespread condemnation of a ban on 857 pornographic websites, the government…

Why Are URLs Full of So Many Garbage Characters?

#?&%! Why do some URLs look like cuss words in comic books? We have the answer. As you probably know, URLs (uniform resource locators) are basically “addresses” for websites. Type one into your browser, and you’re instantly reading news, watching videos, scheduling sketchy tête-à-têtes, and so on. That’s why URLs were originally supposed to be…

A Private High-Speed Network Will Help Researchers Do Better Science

Scientists working with supercomputers (or machines like the Large Hadron Collider) are generating vast amounts of data. Trying to pass around terabytes of numbers using Dropbox can get a little slow, so researchers on the West Coast are getting their own private fibre-optic network, dubbed the Pacific Research Platform. The network will link a few…

India Just Banned a Ton of Porn

Monday brings bad news to the India-based lovers of former Gawker Media blog Fleshbot. Porn is now banned in India. So are some racier corners of the online dating world, apparently. The Indian government has ordered internet service providers to block 857 websites that host porny content. Among those are our friends Fleshbot and everybody’s…

This Guy Redirected the Arkansas Governor’s Domain to an LGBT Forum

Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson’s website now redirects to an LGBT chat room and forum. That’s because when Hutchinson’s domain registration expired, it was quickly grabbed up by college student Dylan Hailey, who set the site to redirect to the forum. It’s a response to, among other things, Hutchinson’s February refusal to veto a bill which…

The FBI Built a Database That Can Catch Rapists (And Nobody Uses It)

For roughly 30 years the FBI has virtually ignored a system meant to help cops track the behavioral patterns of violent criminals. More than 30 years ago, the Federal Bureau of Investigation launched a revolutionary computer system in a bomb shelter two floors beneath the cafeteria of its national academy. Dubbed the Violent Criminal Apprehension…

Reddit’s head of community, Jessica Moreno, has left the company as it continues its meltdown. She’s the the fourth senior female member of staff to quit within the last month.

Google Is Finally Divorcing from Google+ Accounts

The oft-mocked Google+ is getting stripped of features that’ll be incorporated elsewhere into the Googleverse. Google has decided to “move some features that aren’t essential to an interest-based social experience out of Google+,” according to a post on its official blog today. That includes Google+ Photos elements being phased into the Photos app, and location…

New Study Shows How Deeply Awful Those ‘Get the App’ Web Pages Are

Those web pages that stop you getting to the information you really want in favor of asking you to Download An App are deeply annoying. But now a study by Google shows just how counter-productive they actually are for the people that put them there in the first place. If any company was to test…

9 Movies That Were Greenlit Because Something Went Viral On The Internet

Adam Sandler’s new movie Pixels will leave a lot of people wondering how this movie even exists. What kind of a universe allows such a travesty to happen? But Pixels came about because a short film went super-viral. And here are nine other films that were greenlit purely thanks to internet manias. There are definitely…

Judges Revive Claim that AT&T Overcharged Schools for Internet Service

For seven years, a Wisconsin telecom consultant has waged an unsuccessful legal fight against AT&T, alleging that the company long defrauded a federal program by overcharging the nation’s schools and libraries for Internet and telephone services. Now an appeals court in the District of Columbia has given new life to his case. The little-noticed June…

The Starbucks app already lets you read some New York Times articles for free, but from the start of 2016 you’ll get access to the top news of the day, briefings and other articles “addressing key social, political and economic issues”, all for free.

Malaysia Admits to Censoring the Internet

In 2011, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak promised that Malaysia would never censor the Internet. Speaking at the first Malaysian—ASEAN Regional Bloggers Conference, Najib said: “I have no doubts whatsoever that Malaysia has one of the liveliest blogospheres in the world. And definitely one of the freest if not the most free…[former Prime Minister Dr.…

Instagram Hijacked An Account to Give It to Soccer Star 

Andres Iniesta is a Spanish soccer star, captain of FC Barcelona and player on the national team. A different Andres Iniesta is a regular guy from Madrid, and owner of the @ainiesta Instagram account. Or at least, he was. According to a post written by the non-sports-star Iniesta, his Instagram account was spontaneously frozen on…

The Following Types of Content Are Now Rightfully Banned on Reddit

Reddit is a total fucking mess, but the new boss is laying down the law. The site’s CEO Steve Huffman opened a traditional Ask Me Anything session this afternoon with a fairly non-traditional type of announcement. Or at least it’s non-traditional for Reddit because CEO Steve is banning specific types of content. It all makes…

Is This the Color of Cyberspace? 

What about the color of software? Or the web in general? This week, William Gibson tweeted a link to a collection of Sherwin Williams’ paint colors—specifically, one called “cyberspace,” a term he of course coined. The link revealed that the company has a whole collection of internet-focused paint colors, each part of a new palette…

Obama Announces New ConnectHome Plan to Get Poor Households Online

President Barack Obama has announced a new initiative that he hopes will take high-speed internet to all Americans—a plan that he hopes will “close the digital divide.” During a speech in Durant, Oklahoma, yesterday, the president explained that the new scheme, called ConnectHome, will take high speed broadband to families that currently go without. “In…

Tomorrow You Can Tell Reddit Exactly How You Feel

Think you can fix Reddit? Have you come up with an amazing way for the giant internet community to stay popular, make money, and yet somehow eject the filth? On Thursday, Reddit’s own founders are hosting a very special Ask Me Anything where you can help them decide just how much free speech to allow.…

It Seems Reddit Ex-CEO Ellen Pao Isn’t to Blame for Site’s Meltdown

If you thought that the Reddit drama had ended with the ousting of Reddit CEO Ellen Pao, think again: according to a series of posts, Pao didn’t make the decision to fire anybody: Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanion did. The story so far goes something like this: Reddit employee Victoria Taylor, the de-facto company liaison with…

Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren Are Fighting for Cheaper Internet

Internet-loving Americans have been waiting way too long for a team of benevolent juggernauts in Washington to take on massive money-hungry cable companies. This week, four freedom-fighting senators took their first swing in the form of a strongly worded letter to the Federal Communications Commission. The message was clear: Bring down broadband prices. Senators Bernie…