Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
You know the old adage, “It’s what’s on the inside that counts.” That’s just what GoPro is banking on with its new flagship camera, the $500 Hero6. Physically, it looks identical to last year’s Hero5 Black, and that’s not a bad thing. Under the hood, though, there’s a hell of a lot more power. https://gizmodo.com/gopro-hero5-review-a-more-perfect-action-camera-1787751992…
Nearly a week after Hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico, President Trump finally waived the Jones Act for the island, allowing more emergency supplies reach the battered territory’s shores. The World War I-era law prevented foreign-owned ships from delivering their goods for days, leaving Puerto Rico without enough food, water, and fuel. And that’s…
I’ve seen a lot of EPCOT concept art in my day. But a new video released by Disney has some behind-the-scenes shots that I’ve never seen before, including scale models of everything from the Horizons attraction (RIP) to the countries of the World Showcase. It’s all pretty cool. The video, titled “The Dream Called EPCOT,”…
Flood waters are receding in Houston after the historic rainfall from Hurricane Harvey earlier this month. But the water itself was not the only threat. Flooding breached dozens of waste treatment centers, sending a deluge of bacteria throughout the city. The New York Times reports on the victims of the bacterial spread, including an elderly…
Even though it feels like we’re still processing all of Apple’s latest devices and announcements, it’s time to switch gears and prepare for what’s coming on the other side of of the smartphone divide. That’s because Google’s big fall event is less than a week a way, and it’s going to have important news for…
A monthly box of personalized beauty products may sound like a nice gift if you don’t have time to shop or if you suffer from decision fatigue, but opting in to receive a box of sample-sized junk shouldn’t come with the risk of getting doxed. A Consumerist report revealed that when you get someone a…
Bed bugs are bed bad. People’s entire lives have been overturned by these (increasingly common) blood-sucking, itch-inducing pests. Thankfully, they’re not disease vectors, but I would rather not share my home with a roommate who wants to eat me, thank you very much. Scientists have noticed an expansion in bed bug cases across the world,…
Even though Nvidia’s Shield TV has been out for a while, in many ways, it’s Android’s answer to the recently revamped Apple TV 4K. Like the $179 Apple TV, the $200 Shield TV can stream media in 4K and HDR, in addition to having built-in Chromecast support, access to all your regular Android apps, and…
It’s widely assumed that the next Classic Edition of retro hardware from Nintendo will be a tiny version of the N64. But I disagree. With four controllers, 3D games, and complications over bringing Goldeneye 007 back, a retro version of the N64 would make for some expensive nostalgia, particularly when the Game Boy would be…
Earlier this week, Gizmodo reported that the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was tracking the social media accounts of immigrants to the US, including green card holders and naturalized citizens. We reached out to DHS, but it took the agency days to get us any substantive answers. And now DHS says that nothing about…
On Wednesday, freshly divorced former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, who has been teasing some sort of bizarre internet-based venture titled the Scaramucci Post for weeks, finally revealed what the damn thing is. Unfortunately, we are no closer to understanding what sort of sauce the Mooch is simmering after his explanation than before. In a…
Saudi Arabia’s under-secretary for educational curricula and programs has found himself sacked after an official social studies textbook ran with a photo of King Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the country’s leader from 1964 to 1975, seated next to none other than Jedi master Yoda. According to Arab News, Minister of Education Ahmed bin Mohammed…
The House and Senate Intelligence Committees have asked executives from major tech companies to appear in open hearings tied to the committees’ Russia investigations. The requests follow a week in which Facebook, Google, and Twitter have faced intense scrutiny over foreign ad campaigns that sought to influence Americans during the 2016 election. The Senate Intelligence…
In what is surely a horrific preview of what we have to look forward to during the 2020 presidential debates, Mark Zuckerberg and Donald Trump are fighting on the internet. Trump accused Facebook of being “anti-Trump” this morning and now Zuckerberg is firing back, saying that making Trump and liberals angry at the same time…
Several prominent net neutrality advocacy groups were targeted in a spearphishing campaign, with around 70 attempts made to break into the accounts of activists at Free Press and Fight for the Future. The campaign, revealed in an Electronic Frontier Foundation report, used details about the activists’ personal lives and sexually explicit content to try to…
Ripping the faces off ATMs and injecting them with malware is great fun, sure, but not so much when you get caught by a security guard and tossed in jail. For these reasons and more, many cyber criminals are turning to a less than hands-on approach. In its latest cyber threat report, Trend Micro’s researchers…
Boasting 9 million weekly users, troves of information flow through workplace chat app Slack from inside tens of thousands of companies. And for employees of those companies who spend 8 or more hours on Slack most days, the only way not to use the service is to find a new job. So what’s Slack doing…
Donald Trump got mad at Facebook on Wednesday morning. In a tweet, the president said the social network “was always anti-Trump” before complaining vaguely about fake news and “collusion.” Trump, a 71-year-old former reality TV show host, used to be a fan of Facebook, and, at one point, he even claimed to own Facebook stock.…
Amazon just announced a new Fire TV. It’s a dongle with a cable on one end and a black hunk of plastic on the other. For $70 it’s very reasonably priced, and you get a ton of features, too. The new Fire TV works a lot like Google’s $70 Chromecast Ultra. The Amazon competitor is…
A large fire at an ammunition depot in central Ukraine has triggered a series of massive explosions, prompting the evacuation of about 30,000 people. Hinting at sabotage, the country’s Prime Minister said “external factors” could be attributed to the blasts. The explosions happened early Wednesday (local time) near the town of Kalynivka, which is situated…