Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
During the government shutdown last weekend, the Alliance for Securing Democracy reported that the trending hashtag #SchumerShutdown, which blamed the impasse on Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, was being pushed by bot accounts from Russia. Now Senators Richard Blumenthal and Sheldon Whitehouse are asking Twitter for answers about the bot activity. According to the Alliance…
Facebook has acquired Confirm.io, a startup that verified government-issued identification for third-party businesses. In addition to ID cards, Confirm.io’s service also handled biometrics and facial recognition data. The three-year-old, Boston-based company announced the acquisition on its site, stating that it will shut down as Facebook slurps it up into its empire. TechCrunch first confirmed the…
The Grey Lady has pulled some reprehensible stunts over the years, including writing puff pieces on neo-Nazis, helping lead the United States into a deadly war in the Middle East, and even employing Bret Stevens. But today it finally burned its most dedicated customers: those of us who pay the paper of record $6.99 a…
Facebook is in the process of reorganizing how news posts will appear on its feed. It was announced last week that the basis for which publications will be given preferential treatment will depend on a survey sent to users regarding their subjective impression of how “trustworthy” that source or domain is. According to a Buzzfeed…
In addition to providing a payments platform for big clients like Lyft, Facebook, and Target, Stripe has been supportive of cryptocurrencies for several years. On Tuesday, Stripe reiterated its support for a viable digital currency, but said that bitcoin just isn’t cutting it. Going forward, Stripe will no longer accept bitcoin as a payment method.…
In her book The Imagineers of War, author Sharon Weinberger recounts one of the first deployments of simulation training: to improve America’s performance in a NATO mock tank battle that the US consistently performed poorly in, nicknamed the Canadian Army Trophy. After implementing DARPA’s rudimentary gaming-as-training regimen, the US won. Three decades later, the US…
After a recent spat led Google to pull YouTube from Amazon’s Fire TV and Echo Show, it seemed like things were finally cooling down when Amazon extended an olive branch to Google by selling Chromecast devices again for the first time in years. But in reality, the beef between the two internet giants does not…
As the biggest porn site on the internet, Pornhub already dominates the landscape when it comes to what people get off to. Now the company is also making a push to control how people get off, with a new line of interactive sex toys that sync with Pornhub videos. Smart sex toys have been around…
Remember those World War II shipwrecks that mysteriously vanished from the bottom of the Java Sea? When they were found to be missing in 2016, it was heavily suspected that illegal salvagers exploded the ships and then looted them for metal. According to new reports, those metal scavengers also brought up the remains of Dutch…
Uber has hired its first chief diversity and inclusion officer. The ride-sharing company is bringing on Bo Young Lee, currently the head of diversity and inclusion at Marsh & McLennan, a large insurance and business services firm. An Uber spokesperson told Gizmodo that Lee will start working at the company in late March in New…
The Boss Baby is one of the finest films of 2017, and on Tuesday it received an Oscar nomination that settles any further debate. But one man in Britain doesn’t seem to be a fan. The poor guy recently described a nightmarish scenario where he was shipped a DVD of the animated masterpiece instead of…
On Tuesday Elon Musk announced he will stay on as the CEO of Tesla for ten years in an unusual situation that requires him to hit some lofty targets if he wants to get paid. As the New York Times points out, Musk has previously indicated that he might move on from Tesla following the introduction…
Just in time for its tenth anniversary, Apple might finally be killing the MacBook Air, according to a new report from Digitimes. If this is true, it’d be the first axing of a laptop line from Apple since the iBook and Powerbook were axed back in 2006. It would also be about damn time. Apple…
A video of a man at an electronics store has gone viral in Asia. What’s so special about the video? As you can see in the GIF above, the man bites an iPhone replacement battery shortly before the battery explodes. Taiwan News reports that the security camera footage you see above was shot in China…
Musical.ly, the video app popular with teenagers, was acquired in November by Chinese news aggregation giant TouTiao for a whopping sum in the ballpark of $800 million. What does TouTiao plan to do with its expensive purchase? According to a planning document provided to Gizmodo, one of Musical.ly’s initiatives under new management may be a…
DJI just revealed a new, delightfully tiny drone called the Mavic Air. It’s a lot like the DJI Spark, announced last year, but its rotor arms fold in making the little bitty aircraft even more little bitty. If you set the Mavic Air on the table next to your smartphone, you’d find they have about…
Toymakers are always on the hunt for a fad or unique feature that will have parents fighting over their products come Christmas time. So if there are any toymakers reading this, the hot toy for the 2018 holidays will obviously be remote control cars outfitted with rocket engines helping them make the sickest of jumps.…
Sometimes it’s easy to forget that Facebook, as a company, is meant to be an innovator in fields beyond surveillance. But the announcement that it has created an entirely new unit of time is a nice reminder that the enormous company, which owns both WhatsApp and Oculus VR, is more than just one of the…
The vast majority of snowboarding videos are packed with high-speed slalom runs, over-the-top jumps, and stunts intended to show off a rider’s extreme skills. But watching this video of Alex Pashley gently plowing through fresh powder as he weaves through trees might be the most relaxing thing you’ll watch this week. The combination of the…
When unexplained delays pushed Apple’s smart speaker back from a 2017 debut, Apple said it needed “a little more time before it’s ready” and promised an “early 2018″ release. Now it seems Apple is making good on its revised launch window, as the HomePod will officially go on sale on February 9th. Initially, the $350…
