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In case you needed more evidence that the internet, left unfettered, is awful: Boaty McBoatface has now won the poll to name an upcoming polar research vessel. Last month, the Natural Environment Research Council opened a poll, asking internet strangers what they should name their new boat. Rather than going with a shortlist of options,…
Information about anything inside North Korea is hard to come by, but Pyongyang’s metro system is particularly secretive. Access to foreigners has historically been secretive, but one photographer recently made it in, rode the entire system, and has the photos to prove it. Elliott Davies was part of the first group of foreigners to visit…
Driving for Uber is supposed to be the ultimate hassle-free way to generate a little extra cash. However, the city of San Francisco would like to remind all 37,000 rideshare drivers in the city that it’s not quite that simple. An existing law says that all independent contractors (which, legally, Uber and Lyft drivers are)…
Formula E is F1’s less noisey, more obscure cousin. But one place it really shines is the video highlights, which let you ride on board with the drivers as they somehow avoid crashing. These 360-degree videos are actually just the beginning of much bigger plans: Formula E is working on broadcasting races live in VR,…
What’s a peaceful alien to do on a planet full of people intent on killing each other? Hide. For decades and decades. That’s roughly the idea behind Zumbakamera’s Bendito Machine V, but it doesn’t quite do it justice. The alien lands in what appears to be France and hides from conflict beneath a drawbridge. All…
The patent for the Wright Brothers’ “flying machine,” the invention that gave birth to modern aviation as we know it, was returned to the National Archives earlier this week. What’s strange is that it was never missing in the first place. While it’s fun to imagine Orville and Wilbur’s plans as the centerpiece of an…
Over the last year, Apple processed 90 million pounds of electronics that were unwanted or broken. It turns out they were nearly worth their weight in gold—a substance which is used heavily in electronics for its conductivity and resistance to corrosion. As stated in Apple’s environmental report, about two thirds of that 90 million pound…
When Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau schooled a journalist on the basics of quantum computing yesterday, I was initially as charmed and delighted as everyone else. But then a niggling sense of dismay set in. Why should this be such a singular newsworthy event? How come so few of us can do what Trudeau did,…
About 500 years after it sank to the bottom of the Arabian Sea, researchers believe they’ve found the Esmerelda, a ship that was in Vasco da Gama’s fleet during his second voyage to India. The excavation has so far yielded over 2,800 artifacts. The Esmerelda, captained by da Gama’s own uncle Vincente Sodré, is the…
A mushroom that’s resistant to browning has become the first CRISPR-edited food to get green lit by the US government. Here’s how this mutated fungus managed to escape USDA oversight—and why this agency needs to upgrade its regulatory guidelines. Penn State geneticist Yinong Yang created the browning-defying mushroom (Agaricus bosporus) by targeting the family of…
All a 3D scanner does is capture cross sections of an object, so some people are coming up with cheap ways to do it. And for $15, this is one of the most inexpensive, and easily the grossest. Got Mesh? is a milk-based 3D scanner created by Instructables user yenfre that takes advantage of the…
Nothing makes actors miserable like running around in the desert. Screen Rant collected 20 of the best scenes that made their actors deeply uncomfortable. They span from the purely physical (running at top speed in the heat of Abu Dhabi for The Force Awakens), to the psychological (everything inflicted on Shelley Duvall in The Shining),…
If you want to go through the history of cinema, you could easily just check out who won what when. There are awards given out to films every year and the importance we place on those awards allow those films to live on long after they’re first made. But this video compilation of 100 shots…
Some day soon your favorite shirt could serve as an antenna for your smartphone. Armed with a sewing machine, fine silver wires, and a new patented fabrication technique, scientists at the Ohio State University have created embroidered antennas and circuits that seem destined to be a hot trend in so-called “e-textiles.” The high-precision circuitry is…
Dogs are friendly, lovable best friends. They don’t want to hurt anyone! So how do movies get dogs to attack people? With visual effects. A special effects team basically creates a digital double of a real dog and then makes it so that the CG-created dog attacks the actor in the way that the movie…
Facebook has declared it will never use its product to influence how people on the platform vote. Earlier today, Gizmodo reported that employees had asked Mark Zuckerberg to answer the question, “What responsibility does Facebook have to help prevent President Trump in 2017?” in an internal poll. Our report came after Zuckerberg made unprecedented political…
The internet has been my gateway to a lot of confusing, upsetting, and offensive stuff. But lately the thing that’s caused me the most revulsion has been a photoset of someone pouring tequila into a mason jar full of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. “How much do you have to hate yourself to do this,” one of…
Let’s be honest. These days, superhero movies have become 2-hour long trailers for their next movie which in turn will be a 2-hour long set up for a bigger movie and other movies in their universe. Which will then lead to another movie! It’s endless. And maddening! And a lot of them aren’t even good…
Even if you’re adamantly against putting a case on your phone, you might make an exception for the FlexCase being developed by the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria and Microsoft. When opened, it doubles as an extended touchscreen for your device that can also be flexed for unique ways to interact with your phone.…
This week, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg appeared to publicly denounce the political positions of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign during the keynote speech of the company’s annual F8 developer conference. “I hear fearful voices calling for building walls and distancing people they label as ‘others,’” Zuckerberg said, never referring to Trump by name. “I hear them…
