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Sometimes the world in this video by Joe Pease is mirrored horizontally, like a city folding itself on top of itself. Other times, it’s mirrored vertically, like in perfect symmetry. But what makes the video even more mind bending than seeing a world mirrored is seeing how certain people are able to break it and…
Wikipedia is no stranger to scandals, but a quiet update on its administrators’ announcement board reveals a big problem. The site’s CheckUser team recently banned 381 editors’ accounts for “undisclosed paid advocacy.” In other words, these Wikipedians were secretly shilling for brands and even resorting to extortion. The scam is relatively straightforward. Using sockpuppet accounts,…
It’s been just over two years since Gizmodo wondered publicly why McDonald’s didn’t serve breakfast all day. And that was already years after hungry citizens everywhere wondered why they could eat Egg McMuffins for dinner. Now, McDonald’s has heard our call: All day breakfast will be available across America on October 6. So why didn’t…
Donald Trump wants to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. But whether you agree with his plan or not, America’s already doing it. The wall just happens to be digital. The idea for a brick-and-mortar wall with Mexico has gone through fluctuating degrees of popularity over the past few decades. But whenever the plan…
If you thought showing up to a fancy shindig in a full-on tuxedo was as classy as one could get, you probably weren’t aware that someone on Etsy was selling tiny GoldenEye N64 cartridge cufflinks to perfectly complete that ensemble. Arguably the best game on the N64, and possibly one of the greatest video games…
A new study on seabirds has come to a disturbing conclusion: Their bellies are filled with plastic. Up to 90% of marine birds alive today may have ingested plastic, and by 2050, that number could be as high as 95%. “This is a huge amount and really points to the ubiquity of plastic pollution,” said…
Going to DragonCon in Atlanta this weekend to show off your cosplay swag? Look for Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Project Secret Identity. Gizmodo is co-sponsoring this weekend-long project to photograph cosplayers — and protect anonymity and privacy at the same time! You have a right to be in disguise. Contact the author at [email protected]. Public PGP…
Even if you haven’t touched a Super Nintendo in 20 years, you probably still remember the first time you held its near flawless controller. So why not indulge in a little nostalgia with this $87 portable charger that looks like an SNES controller, minus all the Doritos stains. With a 10,400 mAh battery inside you…
Inventors have been coming up with devices to improve sex for decades. But before Google digitized all the records of the US Patent and Trademark Office to launch their Patent Search feature, if enterprising creators wanted to check whether their ideas were truly original, they had to search the sex patents by hand. According to…
We’ve teased that the term “soft” landing is utterly inappropriate, but our latest video makes that painfully clear. The preparation, waving goodbye, and gentle undocking are a deceptive moment of calm before the parachutes fling open and the chaos begins. The Soyuz spacecraft is currently the only way for astronauts to get to and from…
Summer is slipping away fast, but there’s still time to spend a long weekend devouring a book on the beach. And it doesn’t have to be the trashy romance variety: We’ve collected a bunch of great science and tech reads that’ll entertain you while getting your brain in shape for school — or just get…
Against all odds, the Nissan NV-200 will rule the streets of New York. As of today, the vast majority of cab drivers must buy the so-called Taxi of Tomorrow when they retire their old yellow cabs. Anybody who’s ever taken a cab in the city will agree that new cars are a good thing. This…
Last night, I did something that many Americans do on the regular: I decided to watch reality TV. Except I wasn’t watching bridezillas squabble over seating arrangements or desperate housewives cope with each other’s husbands. Nah, I was watching sea otters. Last night marked the first US airing of Big Blue Live, a 3-part TV…
Since a watermelon looks like it’s ripped off the screen of like a Super Mario Bros video game and is wonderful at exploding because of its red flesh and is even more excellent at housing molten aluminum, it very probably is the world’s funnest fruit to play with. Here’s another fun trick you can do…
Using the iPhone 6 one-handed isn’t easy, but reaching the top corners of the screen on the iPhone 6 Plus is nigh impossible with regular-sized hands. So PureGear has created a new glass screen protector with a set of shortcuts to the top corners of the screen positioned next to the home button. Being able…
Google recently changed its logo a little. Now they’ve changed it a lot. And it’s actually a heck of a lot better, too. I kinda love it. The idea here is that Google doesn’t need as much of logo anymore as it needs a constantly morphing identity that can quickly resonate across mediums, from smartwatches…
Research on the biological origins of human sexual orientation remains controversial (and poorly funded), and more than two decades of slow work is starting to reveal a much more complex process than anyone first suspected. In an article for the Boston Globe Magazine last month, Neil Swidley examines the current state of the field, and…
Man can’t fly but with the help of 54 drone propellers and an umbrella to protect the ol’ noggin, man can kind of fly. This mad genius made what he calls, The Swarm, which is essentially a lawn chair strapped to some metal bars and 54 counter-rotation propellers and six grouped control channels with Hobbyking…
Do you like Venmo? Then you’re going to love PayPal.me, a new Venmo-like payment platform by PayPal, Venmo’s parent company. It works a lot like Venmo except, you know, it’s PayPal instead. It’s not quite as confusing as it sounds. PayPal.me is basically a streamlined version of its namesake that also makes it easy for…
How do you regain control of a spacecraft tumbling through space? The Mercury astronauts trained by spinning in this gimbal rig in an effort to mimic the disorienting chaos they’d need to battle during the earliest human spaceflight missions. All Mercury astronauts trained on this multi-axis space test intertia device, nicknamed the gimbal rig, to…
