Tech News

Under Armour’s Clutchfit Shoes Conform to the Shape of Your Movement

Under Armour is about to release a new line of gear coated in a sheath of sturdy plastic, designed to provide support while also flexing with the shape of your movement. “Clutchfit,” as the new tech is called, isn’t aesthetics—it’s science. Under Armour’s “Clutchfit” skin has appeared on a few higher-end professional cleats already, but…

Real Apollo 11 Training Photos Look Like Prep For a Fake Moon Landing

No, these aren’t photos from the Hollywood studio where Stanley Kubrick faked the moon landing. These are real training simulations in Houston just three months before these men would actually set foot on the moon. Amazingly, there are some people who still don’t believe that humans actually landed on the moon—these folks are commonly referred…

Fascinating aerial photo of a tire dump yard

This awesome photo of tires about to be burned in a cement factory was taken by Klaus Leidorf. It is as fascinating as it is gross. Spotted by a redditor, check out the original at high resolution here. SPLOID is a new blog about awesome stuff. Join us on Facebook

Listen to John Frusciante’s Latest Album Right Now via Satellite

With the traditional music industry floundering, some acts have embraced the rapidly changing musical landscape more than others. While the Wu-Tang Clan is hawking just a single copy of its upcoming double album, John Frusciante is letting anyone on Earth listen to his for free—at least for as long as the satellite it’s riding stays…

The Fossilized Machines Humans Will Leave Behind

In the debut issue of a new journal called The Anthropocene Review, University of Leicester geologist Jan Zalasiewicz leads a team of five writers in discussing the gradual fossilization of human artifacts, including industrial machines, everyday objects, and even whole cities. They refer to these as “technofossils,” and they’re destined to form a whole new…

Solar-Powered Umbrella Automatically Inflates When the Sun Shines

A passing cloud can make the sun’s rays a little more bearable on a hot summer afternoon. Which is presumably what inspired the Netherlands’ Studio Toer to create this cloud-shaped parasol that automatically inflates whenever the sun is shining, providing some much-needed shade without you having to get off your comfy backyard lounger. Using a…

You Can Pre-Order Samsung’s New $700 4K Monitor Right Now [Update]

Priced at an extremely competitive $699, Samsung’s new 28″ 4K monitor packs in two HDMI 1.4 ports, a Displayport, and audio out, all while leaving a very small footprint on your desk. It also has a “picture-in-picture” mode which allows you to plug in two computers and see both video feeds by dividing the screen…

This Super-Sized Cargo Plane Carries NASA’s Biggest Loads

When NASA needs to ship its outsized spacecraft components between production, testing, and launch facilities around the country, there is only one plane big enough, powerful enough, and—most importantly—wide enough to do the job: the Aero Spacelines Super Guppy. First developed in 1962 as a successor to the Pregnant Guppy cargo aircraft, the Super Guppy…

Dive-Bombing Hawks Force Florida Library-Goers to Cower Under Umbrellas

No less than six patrons of the Port Orange Library in Florida have been attacked by a pair of book-hating hawks over the past week. Now, the library is protecting its brave bibliophiles the only way it knows how—with umbrellas. The (presumably illiterate) nesting duo are lashing out library-goers in an attempt to protect what…

How Daft Punk’s bad english made Get Lucky a hit

Owen Pallett has a great article on Slate explaining why Daft Punk’s Get Lucky was such a huge success through the lenses of classic Western music theory. It may be a little technical but, if you know a bit about music, it’s fascinating stuff. This bit is not music theory but very interesting too: ……

Why Is My Laptop On?

Why is my laptop on? To answer this question sufficiently, I found a four-year-old boy on the street, offered him candy, kidnapped him, and now every time I think I have the answer to the question, he’ll ask “Why?”—because that’s what four-year-olds do—and that’ll force us to get to the real answer. We’ll call him…

Philips Says “Screw It,” Turns Entire Ceilings Into Giant Lights

Philips has been making light bulbs for as long as anyone can remember, but the company might actually soon make them obsolete with its new OneSpace illuminated panels, which promise to make entire ceilings glow to light up a room. Instead of using electroluminescent technology—the same stuff that powers those glowing t-shirts you can buy—the…

South Korean marines storm the beach as smoke screens explode above them during a military exercise with the United States in Pohang on Monday. The same day, South Korea exchanged fire with North Korea, who is threatening a fourth nuclear test, in the Yellow Sea, a violent sign of increased tension between two countries that…

The Best Smartphone Display (It’s Not Who You Think)

The Samsung Galaxy S and Galaxy Note series of smartphones are flagship products for Samsung to show off its latest and greatest OLED displays and display technology. Samsung provided DisplayMate Technologies with a pre-release production unit of the Galaxy S5 so that we could perform our well known objective and comprehensive display Lab tests, measurements,…

Supercut of Heroes Getting Geared Up Will Make You Want to Kick Ass

Before confronting great adversity, your favorite film hero has to prepare him or herself mentally, physically, and with massive weaponry. That’s the delightfully simple premise of this supercut, which collects some of the best gearing up moments from film. It’s Monday. Are you ready to fight the world? Maybe you didn’t strap on a bunch…

You Can Finally Fulfill Your Fantasy of Sleeping Inside a 747 Engine

It won’t quite give you access to the mile high club, but if you’re harboring deep down fantasies involving a romance with an airplane mechanic, MotoArt’s new Jumbo 747 Sleeper should scratch that itch. As is probably obvious from the bed’s curved stainless steel finish, it’s made from the nacelle of a GE 747 engine…

Heartwarming Harness Lets Wheelchair-Bound Kids Walk Alongside an Adult

If you’ve ever held a little kid’s hands while they stood and your feet and walked along with you, then you already understand the inspiration behind Debby Elnatan’s Upsee—a harness that allows special needs children to finally walk with the help of an adult. Available sometime next week from a company called Firefly (with pricing…

These Crumbling Industrial Silos Hide Beautiful New Spaces

The oldest beer factory in Guangzhou, China, dates back to the 1960s—a hulking concrete building on the edge of the Pearl River, with 12 silos rising 114 feet into the sky. Two years ago, O-Office Architects decided to do something with the 60-year-old behemoth: Turn it into their own studio. Images: Likyfoto/ArchDaily Jianxiang He, the…

How Dropbox Knows When You’re Sharing Copyrighted Files

You might have seen over the weekend that Dropbox is capable of telling whether you’re sharing copyrighted files over its cloud service—without even actually looking at your stuff. But in fact, it’s been able to do that for years. A tweet this weekend from Darrell Whitelaw spoke of a DMCA takedown in his personal folders…

Remember Intel’s Edison from CES, the SD card-sized computer that would run Linux and also sounded too good to be true? Well it was! Intel has admitted that the device will now use an Atom processor and be larger as a result. Shame.