Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
Coming fresh off the heels of a site-wide Twitter redesign just a few weeks ago, it looks like an even bigger change is in the works, according to Mashable. Apparently, a select few are being made privy to a new Twitter profile design that looks like the bastard child of Pinterest and Facebook’s unholy union.…
Getting materials and people into orbit has always been an expensive proposition, one that’s even costlier now that the Shuttle program has been retired. But one enterprising American inventor thinks he’s got a solution: Space Cannons. Designed and built by Richard Graf, the CEO (read: only employee) of Starfire Scientific Inc., the Starfire Space Cannon…
The noble men and women of TSA aren’t the only ones doing their part to keep the toy chests of the world free from terrorism. Just a few days ago, Heathrow Airport security successfully disarmed a one Mr. Woody of Toy Story fame, confiscating his inch-long, vaguely pistol-shaped piece of plastic and ensuring a safer…
Kotaku’s Kirk Hamilton is excited for Evolve, a game that pits four hunters against a monster, all played by humans. I don’t blame him. It looks pretty damn awesome and fun.
Because Valentine’s Day is this weekend, Amazon is heavily promoting jewelry bargains. Makes sense! But are these discounts really a deal? Not exactly. If you can get through all the cheesy heart-shaped stones and necklaces with angel wings, there’s actually a decent selection of jewelry on Amazon. We asked Gemological Institute of America-educated Kristen Dowling,…
It’s no secret that the ocean is hiding some impressive lifeforms in its depths, but good freaking lord, these pics! These pics are incredible. Jessica Rosenkrantz snapped them on a recent expedition to Bonaire and, just, whoa. Rosenkrantz is half of generative design studio Nervous System, and got her SCUBA certification a year ago; this…
I don’t know if it’s the The Verve’s Bitter Sweet Symphony or the slow twisting motion of the quadcopter’s descent, but I really love this first scene from Viktor Mirzoyan’s aerial video over a beige Washington D.C. It made me think of how quickly everything is changing. A shot like this was unthinkable just a…
In Johannesburg, where student housing is sparse, one developer is taking extreme measures—by creating a 370-bed dormitory out of shipping containers perched atop a set of abandoned concrete grain silos. Mill Junction will open its doors to students tomorrow, offering amenities like roof decks and free Wi-Fi. It’ll also offer the chance to live inside…
In the 1950s Americans were obsessed with push-button convenience. The future promised push-button meals, push-button cleaning, and even push-button schools. But this 1955 ad for ball bearings imagined something even weirder for the world of tomorrow: the push-button lumberjack. And amazingly, it was a vision that was delivered on. From the March 1955 issue of…
To all of you convinced there’s no such thing as a perpetual motion machine, behold Benjamin Shine’s brilliant Rekindle candlestick holder that slowly but steadily turns into a brand new candle as it burns and melts away. Actually, ‘perpetual motion’ might not be the best description for Shine’s creation since you’ll need a new wick…
It only took the theft of 40 million Target customer credit card details to spur Congress into finally joining the rest of the world in abandoning the highly insecure credit cards you’re used to. Starting late next year, every credit card in the United States will adopt a more secure system. Here’s what it is,…
Why do chores yourself when robots can do your bidding? These Roomba models will work in pretty much any house, but they’re optimized for pet owners, which is perfect, because you can do things like this. Roombas are rarely discounted, and all of these prices are $50-$100 off retail, so if you’ve been thinking of…
The only color in the landscape for miles, Salvation Mountain looms like a mirage on the horizon. The three-story, three-decade work of artist Leonard Knight, who died yesterday at the age of 82, is a piece of brightly painted, hand-sculpted California desert, like an impossibly scaled cathedral made from Play-Doh. Knight built his 50-foot tall,…
The always amazing YouTuber lavapix put an unopened can of Chef Boyardee ravioli in the path of a 2,000 degree molten lava flow. Unlike their previous Coca Cola can experiment, this one exploded throwing pasta 30 feet away. Then the lava ate all the pasta left in the can. SPLOID is a new blog about…
Cancer surgery is tough. Even with high-powered microscopes, surgeons have a very difficult time distinguishing cancer cells from healthy cells. But these new glasses developed by Washington University, St. Louis could change all that. Put simply, the glasses make cancer cells glow blue, after the patient is injected with a special dye that targets the…
What if, the next time you played a video game, the main character not only looked like you but had the same body, same clothes, same everything? How would it change the way you related to the game? How would it change the way you relate to the other characters in it? I found out.…
Some of these 3D optical illusion GIFs are really really good. Scrat—the saber-tooth squirrel from Ice Age—really achieves the effect. It’s perhaps the best of this collection. These GIFs use depth of field and graphic elements to achieve their effect, just like many classic paintings. The white lines define the plane where the screen is,…
The obvious plan of attack when you’re building a stool is to just toss a round wooden seat on the top and call it a day. It’s functional, for sure, but nowhere near as creative as Arthur Schmitt’s Anice Stool, which is a 3D-printed plastic core that lets you use whatever material you want for…
Remember that awesome video of a ski jumper filmed with a GoPro? It just got a lot awesomerer thanks to a cup of chicken nuggets. There’s nothing that chicken nuggets can’t better. Obviously, it’s an ad for KFC, which is not an official sponsor of the Olympic Games. But I don’t care. They should make…
Kaspersky security researchers just revealed their discovery of a cyberespionage threat they say could be the most advanced in the world. Immensely powerful and hard to detect, it’s been active since at least 2007, targeting governments, embassies, and energy companies. And nobody knows where it came from. Dubbed “Careto,” after the Spanish slang for “mask”…
