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For nanomaterials scientists, just getting a look at what they’re working with presents a serious challenge — you can’t see something a couple atoms wide with a normal microscope. And while they have all the fancy toys you’d probably expect in a hi-tech lab, office supplies also play a disturbingly prominent role. YouTuber Tom Scott…
Rumors about an Apple TV, and associated Apple TV service are about as old as the history of rumor blogs. But according to a WSJ report, this fall could finally see Apple launching a streaming TV package, featuring a bunch of big-name broadcasters, available only on Apple devices. The WSJ report lists ABC, CBS and…
A Chromecast is just about the cheapest (and best) way to get Netflix onto your TV with minimum hassle, but one of the tradeoffs is that you have to control everything from your smartphone or laptop — which kinda sucks. But as of now, you can at least play and pause without poking a screen.…
Film editor Jacob T. Swinney put together this interesting edit showing 55 movies side-by-side, putting each film’s first scene right next to the final scene. Sometimes you get a story that comes completely full circle, sometimes you get a finished story with coherent imaging and other times you get something else. Swinney writes: What can…
1,100,000 units of housing. 6,200 miles of boulevards. 2,000 schools. $45 billion dollars. Egypt is planning a sparkling new capital outside of Cairo, and it wants to do it fast. Image: AP Photo/Hassan Ammar As we wrote last week, Egypt hosted an economic development conference in which it detailed plans for a massive new pyramid.…
The anti-robot protest at SXSW got tons of publicity, and it was a hoax. Even worse — it was actually a viral marketing stunt for a dating app. [io9]
Audio cables look just plain sexy, especially when they’re encased in those retro braided fabric jackets that make it even easier to coil them up. And now you can get that audio cable hotness for your smartphone cord, thanks to SuperFly Cables. Most of us carry smartphone cables around every day, and they are an…
A prediction about the future that I’m pretty confident in making: this picture will be the best thing to come out of St Patrick’s Day 2015. The photo, showing a line up of DeLoreans and a BTTF DeLorean caboose, was taken by BruceK and shows the DeLorean portion of the 2015 St. Patrick’s Day Parade…
Do you like vintage maps? Do you like the internet? Then you’ll love this vintage-inspired world map of the underwater cables that connect the entire planet. The data-minded folks at TeleGeography just updated their world map. Of course, the submarine cables that span from continent to continent don’t just carry internet traffic but also all…
Before you sic the No Fun Federation of Parenting onto Jorge Tirado, an awesome dad and surfer, just look at how much fun his 9-month-old baby who was apparently born for the thirst of the ocean is having. And just think about how awesome he’s going to be when he grows up after having such…
Austin’s South-by-Southwest used to be a music festival, but now it’s an app happening. It’s where Twitter started, as SXSW organizers love to remind us; and this year’s app headliner is Meerkat, a live streaming app built for Twitter. At least, it used to be. And that’s where things get interesting — or broken, depending…
Not content with merely being one Master Chief, this new statue from Kotobukiya has decided to become three different iterations of the video game supersoldier instead, thanks to the addition of some nifty addon packs that let you kit out your Spartain whichever way you want. It’s not the first time a Halo product has…
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Jeremy Bentham was an eccentric guy. The 18th century British philosopher is known for designing the Panopticon, a type of prison building with an all-seeing eye. He also asked for his skeleton to be dressed and put on public display. And that display now has an all-seeing eye of its own. It’s called the Panopticam.…
At SXSW, Bill Simmons gave a legitimately interesting interview to Re/code. It features Simmons sliding from passive-aggression to bluntness, but always railing against his ESPN bosses for not giving Grantland the funding or credit he believes it deserves. [Deadspin] Contact the author at [email protected]. Public PGP key PGP fingerprint: CA58 326B 1ACB 133B 0D15 5BCE…
Whatever you’re stressing about right now, try to clear your head by watching this epic video of a mountain climber attacking the Ledge Route of Ben Nevis, Scotland. We’re just a small part of this world, it stretches beyond what we can see. Winter is ending, adventures are beginning. Enjoy it! Rob Johnson, who filmed…
Not long ago, I asked you for your picks of the worst sounds that technology has cursed us with. You answered with the shrill, shreiking screams of text across the internet. And here are a few of the standouts from our collective list of the most unappealing blips and bloops. https://gizmodo.com/what-is-the-most-horrible-technology-sound-1690889727 Dial-up modems Old dial-up…
As we inch up on the two-year anniversary of the Snowden leaks, it’s important to think about how the Earth-shattering revelations about America’s intelligence-gathering have affected Americans. We’re all using Tor and DuckDuckGo and PGP and protecting ourselves against surveillance now, right? LOL, no. Not even close actually. A new Pew study reveals that the…
No, that’s not a picture of Han Solo’s trusty ship ripped straight from a Star Wars movie. It’s an incredible model made by Bernard Szukiel — but here’s the real kicker: it’s made entirely out of paper. This is no hunk of junk. Header Image Credit: Bernard Szukiel. All images credited as such unless otherwise…
Why do people give their kids certain names at certain points in history? It’s not always clear — but at least we can amuse ourselves with data about it. Abacaba created this strangely captivating bubble chart that contracts and swells with the popularity of U.S. girls names for every year since 1880. Abacaba uses this…
