Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
If you take a temporary factory job at Amazon, you have to sign away your ability to work almost anywhere else, for 18 months after your gig is finished. The Verge recently got one of the non-compete agreements Amazon makes its low-paid warehouse laborers sign, and they’re absurdly vague and wide-reaching: Amazon is requiring these…
I can just close my eyes and listen to the sounds of this video about Swan Lake and The Royal Danish Ballet. Or I can just mute the audio and watch the visuals of the ballerinas. No matter how I watch this video, I always walk away impressed with the intense dedication and sacrifice. It’s…
Despite both being big hits on The CW, it’s taken a while for Arrow and The Flash to get some great toys (we’re still waiting on that Felicity Smoak from Toy Fair!). Funko are stepping in to fill the void with some new figures based on the shows… but you might want to hold off…
This past Sunday workers demolishing a former telescope factory in Pittsburgh were surprised to find a 19th century time capsule in the cornerstone. Now the demolition company is claiming that it has every right to keep the capsule — along with the incredibly cool telescope artifacts that they found inside. Image courtesy of Al Paslow…
A few years ago, the Pentagon started misplacing some very expensive and highly sensitive equipment. As if that weren’t embarrassing enough, the equipment has since started appearing on sites like eBay and Craigslist. It’s an astounding story. A Navy intelligence document obtained by The Intercept spells out the situation in clear terms, noting that the…
Occasionally, we get to catch a glimpse of the hidden tests that ensure our technology-infused world runs smoothly: color bars on TV or blocks of “lorem ipsum” gibberish text. There’s a fascinating story behind how each of these tests came to be and how they work. Some standard test files are well-known; others have played…
The 9.0 Tohoku earthquake damaged thousands of buildings when it ripped through Japan four years ago. Much of that debris is gone now, but the broken buildings had an invisible effect, too: The earthquake released thousands of tons of ozone-destroying greenhouse gases into the air. The chemicals, called halocarbons, came from old insulation, refrigerators, and…
Oh man, this video is absolutely horrifying. Put together by AAA, it shows how distracted teenagers are when they drive. You see drivers take their eyes off the road to text, people ignoring cars while they’re on the phone and a lot of them just not paying attention at all. You get to see the…
Buying a $450 motorcycle to ride across a communist country devastated by war with your own sounds like a great idea, right? I thought so. Here’s how you can do it too. I’ve been traveling the world for the last seven months or so. It’s been amazing. But one thing that I’ve missed most about…
What’s great about this time lapse that shows a container ship moving around a dock is that it’s not doing anything special and yet, the carefully orchestrated ballet of dropping off shipping containers is almost hypnotizing to watch. You get to follow the ship from dock to dock and see other boats move around it…
Welcome to a new week with plenty of new apps, and we’ve got all the best right here. Part of me wants to call this week’s app roundup a special “music” edition because an odd amount of great music streaming and discovery apps came out this week—but let’s not forget the huge app drops from…
Hotel internet is so far from secure—it’s downright scary. You should know this by now. However, a new report from cyber security researchers suggests that issues with shitty security at hotels extend far beyond hackable Wi-Fi networks. Entire systems at some of the world’s top hotel chains are very, very vulnerable. Justin Clarke, a researcher…
Anyone who’s put together a Gundam Model kit know that the models usually house a lot of little pieces and articulation joints within the plastic shell — but this new one tries to show you what would be underneath the armour of an actual Gundam, and looks pretty fabulous while doing so. Based on the…
Welcome back, dear readers, to The Kerfuffler, where every other week we take a look at the culture wars raging online. This week we’re looking at the debate surrounding the nature and aims of one of the first ‘internet generation’ terrorist groups, Islamic State. As western governments grow increasingly invested in anti-IS efforts, the foreign…
If the opening shot of Star Wars emphasized one thing, it’s that the Empire’s Star Destroyers are gigantic imposing spaceships that everyone in the galaxy should fear. The same goes for Oliver C’s lastest quadcopter creation: a flying Star Destroyer that looks just as intimidating as it descends on you from above. And the loud…
It’s like learning that French fries aren’t from France. Or that apple pie isn’t from the United States. Well, here’s another food origin story that might shock you: American cheese was invented by a Canadian. That’s right, the most American of possible food products, American cheese actually owes its existence to a canuck. James Lewis…
Even those completely unskilled in the kitchen can manage to successfully boil a pot of water and make pasta. But Barilla doesn’t want to stop there, it wants even those who can barely differentiate between a stove and a fridge to be able to make spaghetti, and so has created a new line of pastas…
Our ability to harness nuclear energy has existed for quite a while now and yet nuclear energy is only responsible for providing 10% of the world’s energy. There are 439 nuclear reactors spread across 31 countries with 160 more reactors planned for the future and yet nuclear energy has stagnated since the 80’s. What gives?…
Engineers have experimented with using sonic waves to douse flames for years—but it took a pair of students to turn the concept into an affordable, hand-held device. Viet Tran and Seth Robertson, who are both students at George Mason University, spent $600 of their own money to build their prototype, according to the school. The…
In 1871, the USS Nipsic went to Limon Bay to scout out an appropriate location for the north end of the then-soon-to-be-constructed Panama Canal. The USS Nipsic in Limon Bay in 1871 as part of the Darien Expedition. Image credit: John Moran The Darien Expedition was led by Thomas Oliver Selfridge for the U.S. Navy.…
