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Activist trolls have taken ownership of Reddit’s r/race_realism, finally establishing a safe space on the “frontpage of the internet” to discuss politically incorrect opinions about NASCAR and cycling. “Race realism,” as you may already know, is yet another euphemism used by clay-brained internet fascists to try to disguise their bigotry. Essentially a new name for…
With all the fascinating planets in our solar system, it sometimes feels like the Sun gets overlooked. The Sun is amazing! People still worship the Sun, and that actually makes a certain amount of sense. So, what would happen if you took a small piece of the Sun and brought it back to Earth? Well,…
Equifax, one of the largest credit reporting agencies in the US, revealed today that it has suffered a massive data breach at the hand of hackers. The stolen data includes names, Social Security numbers, birthdates, and other personal information for 143 million Americans. The data was accessed via a web application vulnerability, Equifax said in…
The founders of Silicon Valley startup UploadVR were sued for a number of damning sexual harassment allegations in May, and according to TechCrunch, have settled the case with former employee Elizabeth Scott. While the lawsuit has been settled, a former employee expressed concern to TechCrunch over the fact that the co-founders accused remain in leadership.…
We’re all familiar with Nikola Tesla and his brilliant work helping to invent the electric technologies that we live with today. But did you know that there’s a guy named Thomas Edison who also helped invent some of that tech? If you didn’t, you should check out the new trailer for the upcoming movie, The…
As we head deeper into the 21st century, the prospect of getting robots to do the dirty business of killing gets closer with each passing day. In Max Tegmark’s new book, Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence, the MIT physicist and founder of the Future of Life Institute contemplates this seemingly…
Normally, we think of evolution as a good thing for a species. Humans, we evolved to walk on two legs and talk and stuff. Bacteria evolve to overcome whatever new antibiotic we try to throw at them. But it appears that, for wooly rhinos, evolution decided “lol, no.” You have seven cervical vertebrae (neck bones)…
Social media companies need to start being more transparent about their roles in the U.S. presidential election, Sen. Mark Warner told reporters today. Twitter will need to explain to Congress how its platform was used by Russian trolls attempting to influence the U.S. presidential election, and Facebook ought to make political ads purchased by fake…
Having a broken phone is not a situation you want to be in for long but there’s always the question of whether to stump up the cash for a professional repair or have a go at fixing it yourself (assuming you’ve no insurance or warranty coverage). This should be your guide for deciding when to…
To ensure the foam fire suppression system actually worked before bringing aircraft into its new helicopter maintenance training facility, safety personnel at the Fort Indiantown Gap Army Reserve base in Pennsylvania performed a full scale test of the emergency equipment. But I can’t understand why no one is running through that hanger like a kid…
Apple’s iPhone event is coming up fast, and we’re expecting Tim Cook and company to announce far more than just some new handsets. Here’s a quick primer. The event kicks off at 1PM ET/10AM PT on Tuesday September 12 at the brand new Steve Jobs Theater. You can watch it live on Apple’s website, and…
Over the weekend, China banned initial coin offerings (ICO) and briefly paused the seemingly unstoppable price increase of bitcoin. But the cryptocurrency has already bounced back. With the likes of Paris Hilton, Kim Dotcom, and John McAfee all jumping into the ICO world in one way or another, it seems worth asking what the hell…
Facebook outsourced its fake news problem, and it appears the company isn’t keeping its fact-checkers fully satisfied. According to a report from Politico, third-party fact-checkers want more internal data from Facebook both on how impactful their work is on the platform and also on which stories they should prioritize. Facebook isn’t handing the information over,…
On Thursday morning, President Donald Trump tweeted a message to immigrants protected by Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), telling them they “have nothing to worry about” because there will be no action until the program expires in six months. Bizarrely, the tweet was reportedly sent at the behest of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.…
As the strongest Atlantic hurricane in recorded history continues to wreak havoc in the Caribbean, two more threats have emerged in the form of hurricanes Jose and Katia. Though it’s unusual for three hurricanes to be active in the Atlantic basin at the same time, it’s not without precedent. Earlier this year, scientists at the…
Old sailor’s tales about the seas being so full of fish you could walk on them, or oysters the size of frisbees, tend to inspire skepticism today, and for good reason—most of us have very little direct experience with the oceans, except for the occasional news article about how we’ve screwed it up beyond repair.…
In 2012, when everyone assumed that no one wanted a smartwatch, the original Pebble became the poster-child for the crowdfunding site Kickstarter when it raised just over $10 million from excited backers. Five years later, Pebble is no more, its intellectual assets are now owned by Fitbit, and the company’s CEO is returning to Kickstarter…
The TS100 is an open-source, precision soldering iron that includes the ability to program its temperature. In service of that, the device uses a tiny OLED screen, which allowed YouTube’s Joric to hack the device and make playing Tetris another one of the tool’s many features. https://gizmodo.com/playing-tetris-on-a-business-card-is-everything-i-hoped-1794176951 As with a lot of software hacks, this is…
Jeff Bezos and friends are on a bit of a spending spree. Amazon just announced that it’s looking to drop a cool $5 billion on a “second headquarters” that will employ as many as 50,000 workers. In characteristically splashy fashion, the company also announced that cities across North America will get to bid on the…
Security researchers last month discovered a trove of scanned images depicting the credit cards and passports of more than 88,600 international travelers. It’s unknown for how long the documents, which were secured on Wednesday, had been sitting online, just waiting to be stolen. Researchers at the Kromtech Security Center say a cache of more than…
