Tech News

Hilarious photos make Oscar nominees pose with their younger selves

This is great. The geniuses at People Magazinestitched together pictures of celebrities posing with younger versions of themselves. Think Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey was always such a fine actor? You must’ve forgot about his goofy haircut! Only remember Leonardo DiCaprio and Christian Bale as superbly talented? They were once wide eyed boys too. And what…

The hidden women of astrophysics

To start women’s history month, learn about the ladies hired by Edward Charles Pickering to categorize stars. While their boss theorized lunar maria were insect clouds, these women developed the stellar classification system and worked out Cepheid variation.

6 Essential Apps for Hip Hop Fans

Hip hop fans and artists are constantly searching for the newest ways to discover, write, see, and record new music. As we continue to move forward in the digital age, smartphones and tablets are the means of choice for a lot of that. These six apps that should probably find a home on every hip…

China’s Deepest Diving Sub Is Getting a New Set of Eyes

Studying the creatures of the deep sea—be they Giant Squid or Jaguar Sharks—is no easy feat. It’s cold, dark, and nearly inaccessible to humans. But that hasn’t stopped us from exploring the furthest depths of the ocean, and with these new 3D cameras China’s deep-diving Jiaolong submersible will be able to spot undocumented species in…

This Guy Modded Out His DeLorean With an In-Dash iPad and It’s Awesome

Today we got our first look at CarPlay, Apple’s answerto the interactive in-car infotainment craze. But YouTuber DMCPat didn’t wait around for the Apple sanctioned iPad integration—he built-in an iPad Mini complete with car-ready UI into the dash of his 1981 DeLorean. Doc Brown would be proud. DMCPat is really into modding out his 1981…

Making A Case For Intentional Stitch Glitches And Holey Knits

These cozy garments have holes in strange places and distorted patterns that look more like something you’d find in a shop selling factory seconds—yet those effects were completely intentional. The knitting machines that made them were “hacked” to get a glitchy effect. Seem weird? Sure it does. Japanese fashion designer and artist Nukeme takes two…

Is this mix between the Mac Pro and the iMac awesome or just crazy?

This is the iPro, a mix between the iMac and the Mac Pro with a 35-inch display by Swiss designer Kurt Merki Jr. Madness or genius? You decide.

The iPro is a mix between a Mac Pro and an iMac

Swiss designer Kurt Merki Jr. thought it would be cool to mix the iMac with the Mac Pro into one product called the iPro, complete with a 35-inch display and integrated sound bar. It looks… interesting, albeit a little bit far-fetched. In his own words: Ever since I was a kid, I have always been…

Sludge Arcade Techno

Glia’s “[[ LOW ]” is expert sludge techno, the beat the sound of gears dripping with dirty axle grease, trying to make traction but slipping often enough to make the whole thing sound temporary, fragile. The track doesn’t linger in the dark, either. The playful addition of some arcade-quality sounds, as much pinball as Galaga,…

A Floating Arctic City Fueled By Eating Icebergs

With glaciers firing off more icebergs into the Atlantic than ever before, it shouldn’t be surprising that people are envisioning futures that make the most of the dystopian realities a climate-changed world could bring. Cities that float around the arctic while eating icebergs are another one of those futures. This Waterworld-esque living machine ship is…

Police Hid Use of Cell Phone Tracker Because Manufacturer Asked Nicely

It appears that at least one police department in Florida has failed to tell judges about its use of a cell phone tracking device because the department got the device on loan and promised the manufacturer to keep it all under wraps. But when police use invasive surveillance equipment to surreptitiously sweep up information about…

Python eats crocodile after gruesome five-hour battle

This python fought a fresh water crocodile for five hours before eating it whole. Is this picture not gross enough for you? No problem. Here’s video: SPLOID is a new blog about awesome stuff. Join us on Facebook

America’s First ‘Wireless Newspaper’ Killed Catalina’s Carrier Pigeons

If you lived on the small Southern California island of Catalina at the turn of the century, news was hard to come by. The island had a rather unreliable carrier pigeon system and copies of the L.A. Times wouldn’t arrive by boat until around 1:30 in the afternoon. News was slow moving. But all that…

A Whiteboard With a 3D Face Will Really Improve Office Doodles

Hilarious caricatures of bosses and uptight managers are a staple of any office. But unless you work in a design studio filled with artists, deciphering who a doodle is supposed to be can be tricky. Unless you’ve got this whiteboard featuring a 3D face relief that lets even number crunchers create erasable masterpieces. Anyone familiar…

This pilot firing a missile is the coolest selfie ever, not the Oscars’

Forget about Ellen Degeneres and forget about this astronaut. This is the most awesome selfie,not theirs: A Royal Danish Air Force pilot firing a live air-to-air AIM-9 Sidewinder missile form his F-16 fighter. I feel a bit of deja vu writing about this—after this and this—but it’s such a cool image that it had to…

The World’s Safest Shiv Also Makes Your Ladder Way More Useful

Ladders might give you access to areas of your home you simply can’t reach, but that’s pretty much all they’re good for. Need to bring a few tools with you to fix a leaky gutter? You’re on your own—unless you’ve got this handy Ladder Limb in your toolbox, which adds a carabiner for hanging or…

Buildings That Used to Be Pizza Huts: Where Are They Now?

It started with some Pittsburgh humor. Pittsburgh-based comedian Tom Musial does a bit about a GPS unit that can give directions in “Pittsburghese.” Because in Pittsburgh, no one calls it “Interstate 376,” it’s “The Parkway.” It’s not “The Liberty Tunnel,” it’s “The Liberty Tubes.” And directions are often given by way of what used to…

Man builds giant 50-foot-tall snowman with entire trees for arms

A farmer in Gilman, Minnesota, decided he have had enough of the snow that was ruining his greenhouses, so he decided to start piling it all up intothis 50-foot-tall snowman.Because why not. SPLOID is a new blog about awesome stuff. Join us on Facebook

A new plan for U.S. transportation! California tries to fix its water crisis! An ugly building with good politics in Philly! Plus, Italy’s boyish new leader and a walking tour of “crushingly boring” Silicon Valley! It’s all in this week’s best Urban Reads. Obama unveiled a new transportation and infrastructure plan last week. Now he…

Color Solar Panels Let Stained Glass Windows Produce Cheap Power

Because solar panels are designed to accumulate as much light from the sun as possible, they’re typically very dark in color. It makes them more efficient, but also kind of an eyesore, minimizing their adoption. So researchers at the University of Michigan have developed what they believe to be the world’s first semi-transparent, colored solar…