Tech News

Here’s How to Call the International Space Station

Last week, amateur radio enthusiast Adrian Lane sent a call signal to the International Space Station. To his shock and delight, he got a reply. He chatted with an astronaut for about 45 seconds before the station went out of range. Lane’s brief “phone call” with an actual astronaut in space garnered international media attention,…

Epic Lego Hyrule Castle Took Zelda Superfan Two Years to Build

Lego builder and Zelda superman, Joseph Zawarda spent an insane 2 and a half years building the Hyrule Castle from the Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. The19-year old recently unveiled his massive creation at Virginia’s BrickFair this August. The lego castle is so huge it takes two cars to move it. A few specs: The…

England is Exploring Electric Car Charging Lanes

One of the biggest concerns with electric vehicles is whether they’ll be able to hold enough juice to get you from A to B. But what if we didn’t have to worry, because we could charge our cars on the highway? England will soon be pilot-testing tech that could lead to EV charging lanes. Later…

The U.S. Embassy in Havana Is a Perfect Metaphor for American Diplomacy

John Kerry watched a soldier hoist the American flag over the United States Embassy in Havana on Friday morning. He’s the first secretary of state to visit the land of Castro, communism, and cigars in 70 years. The embassy itself, an acclaimed example of midcentury modern architecture, has been rotting for just as long. In…

The Animas river, which turned sickly orange last week after 3 million gallons of toxic waste rushed in from the Gold King Mine during an EPA cleanup incident, reopened to the public on Friday, The Associated Press reports. “The data show levels of contamination are below what would be a concern for human health during…

Russia Bullies Reddit Into Removing Thread on Shrooms

It took a bloody revolution at Reddit to come up with some (messy, confusing) guidelines on what constitutes bannable content, but in countries where censorship is already rampant, Reddit’s policy is apparently much more straightforward: Cave to political pressure. Case in point: Russia, which recently ordered Reddit to remove a two-year-old thread describing how to…

Watch a jawbreaker get carved into a shot glass on a lathe

The craftsmanship of candy. The art of an edible cup. The carving of a jawbreaker into a shot glass. It’s a thing that you never thought would make any sense but once the jawbreaker starts spinning on the lathe and getting shaved down to expose the different layers of its colors, you realize that all…

Finally, A Convincing 3D Display That Doesn’t Require Glasses

Viewing 3D content without glasses or goggles has proved to be one of the toughest things for interface designers to achieve—it never really looks right. At this year’s SIGGRAPH, a group of researchers presented a display that creates a 3D human in stunning detail using a cluster of 216 projectors. A team from USC’s Institute…

Tough as nails Nokia cell phone fights valiantly against red hot nickel ball

There are few materials in the world stronger or more resilient or tougher than that indestructible Nokia cell phone that everyone had at one point in their life. You could run it over with a tank or drop it off the Empire State building or chuck it across a parking lot into a burning building…

Scientists Want to Transplant Genetically Modified Pig Organs Into Humans

In news that sounds straight out of a dystopian Margaret Atwood novel, surgeons managed to keep a genetically modified pig heart alive inside a baboon for 945 days before it failed last month. “Xenotransplantation” experiments like this may one day lead to doctors raising pigs for organ transplants. The recent GM-pig-heart-in-a-baboon transplant bests the previous…

Let’s Talk About Whatever You Want Right Now

Gizmodo citizens, take the wheel. The weekend is once more upon us. What’re you looking forward to? What pissed you off this week? What’re you looking forward to? My day has been immeasurably brightened by the ongoing Iliad Online livestream event and Twitter account. It’s a reminder of how much I love Greek myths—I spent…

The Navy Built an Algorithm That Predicts Pirates’ Behavior Before an Attack

The Navy is a veritable patent machine—it regularly beats all other government bodies when it comes to sheer volume, with 364 filed last year alone. One recent filing: Patent #US8838515, a “Method for predicting pirate attack risk.” It’s no surprise that the Navy wants to use artificial intelligence to predict what a team of engineers…

Why Isn’t Google Launching Its Modular Ara Smartphone in Puerto Rico?

In January Google announced that Ara, its highly anticipated modular smartphone, would debut first in Puerto Rico as part of a pilot project. Today, Google says it’s not launching Ara there after all, and that it’s “re-routing” its plans. What gives? Some are wondering if the Google-Alphabet announcement is the reason for the shakeup, and…

Why the Cervix Is More Amazing Than You Realized

Technically, the cervix is the bottom chunk of the uterus, a circular plug-like mass of tissue dividing the uterine space from the vagina. But where most of the uterine wall is made of smooth muscle, up to 90% of the cervix is built of stiff and unyielding connective tissue. At least, it’s stiff most of…

That Apple Car May Be Further Along Than We Thought

Apple seems to want a little piece of everything that could possibly be considered “technology,” and its most ambitious undertaking is its rumored autonomous vehicle—the Apple Car. And now, according to a report from The Guardian, the Apple auto hearsay is becoming more fact than fiction. Basing its report on documents obtained by a public…

The White House Interns Have Pretty Good Taste in Music

Mr. President, you have great taste in music. I know this because you have posted a few playlists on a newly-created White House Spotify account. You see? Barry Obama is just a regular guy who isn’t afraid to put Coldplay on a public playlist. If you wanna connect with constituents, you gotta use the socials.…

Seizurecore web 1.0 image-making service Blingee is shutting down. If you have a collection of overwhelming sparkle-laden bits of web kitsch, you’ll need to download your archive by August 25.

The Ghoulishly True (And Still Unsolved!) Tale of the Cleveland Torso Murderer

In the 1930s, a brutal killer stalked the streets of Cleveland, gutting and beheading his victims. Decades later, the butcher’s identity remains a mystery. In September of 1934 a woman’s torso, with thighs still attached, washed up on the shore of Lake Erie near Cleveland, Ohio. Her skin was red and textured like leather—indicating that…

We Cannot Allow These Awful Sliding Airplane Seats to Become Real

It’s easy to think of ways we could improve airplane seat design. It takes some sick creativity to think of how we could make it worse, though. But the world is full of sick people—like these dudes from North Carolina who want to put airplane seats on wheels and control them with an iPad. Please…

Scientists Have Hacked Yeast to Produce Narcotics

Yeast, that magical microorganism that provideth bread and beer, can now make narcotics, too. In a much-anticipated update, a team of scientists from Stanford University has engineered a strain of common brewer’s yeast to turn simple sugars into opioid drugs. Last year, bioengineer Christina Smolke announced that her lab had coaxed yeast into producing precursors…