Tech News

X-ray machines reveal the beautiful underworld of art

X-rays are usually the colorless bringer of bad news. Hey look there’s your broken hip. See that crack? That’s where it hurt. But if you look closer, the detail and image quality of x-rays can be pretty damn incredible. A radiation physicist Arie van’t Riet noticed that and has now used the machine to create…

Heat the Room You’re Actually In This Winter, Not the Entire House

Baby, it’s cold outside. Actually, it’s pretty darn chilly inside too. But before you go cranking up the house’s thermostat and heating a bunch of empty rooms, take a look at some toe-toasting space heater alternatives. Unless your going old-school and building a proper fireplace fire with proper firewood, you’ve got three primary technologies at…

How Design Observer Founder William Drenttel Changed the Conversation

Graphic designer William Drenttel died on Saturday, a multifaceted creative who played many roles: a Mad Men-era ad man, a design industry legend, an advocate for social change. But as the founder of Design Observer, the influential design blog launched 10 years ago, Bill irrevocably transformed the way we talk about design. For much of…

Your Choice Of Bluetooth Headphones, 2013’s Popular Games [Deals]

If you’ve been waiting for a good deal on a pair of Bluetooth Headphones, today is your lucky day. Go the bargain route and pick up the Monoprice Bluetooth Headphones for only $60, or step up to the Parrot Ziks, complete with touch controls, for $80 off. Need last-minute gifts with free one-day shipping? Gizmodo…

These Massive Japanese Submarines Doubled as Aircraft Carriers

The attack on Pearl Harbor was just the first half of Japan’s plan to bring the US to the bargaining table. The second phase involved a reign of terror to shatter American morale through sustained air strikes against the East Coast, launched from the decks of three gigantic submarines. Yeah, from submarines. Known as the…

Where Are You Working From Today?

It’s December 23, and it’s almost certainly National Work From Anywhere But The Office Day. I’m currently dispatching from my parents’ kitchen. Where are you? God knows you’re definitely not in the office. Chances are over the weekend, you flew off to whatever locale you’ll be spending the impending holiday, and you’re posted up wherever…

Mikhail Kalashnikov Has Died

Mikhail Kalashnikov, inventor of the AK-47 assault rifle, passed away this morning at the age of 94, according to the BBC. Kalashnikov’s contributions to small arms design cannot be overstated. His AK-47, developed in 1946, is the embodiment of the Soviet virtues of simplicity and reliability. Rugged and easily maintained, AKs are capable of operating…

A blind man tries to guess the color of scented markers

Tommy Edison, our favorite blind-since-birth YouTube-er, is back to give us yet another glimpse into a world where the mere concept of light is unfathomable. And this time, he’s doing it while sniffing markers. But he’s not inhaling a bunch of noxious fumes to get loaded, mind you; he’s sniffing each scented marker in an…

A TV Anchor Tries to Gift Bitcoin On Air, Is Immediately Robbed

This past Friday, Bloomberg TV anchor Matt Miller took an on-air opportunity to give the gift of Bitcoin to two of his fellow anchors during his “12 Days of Bitcoin” segment. And in a beautiful twist of karmic justice, punishment for running such an absurd segment in the first place, every last digitally invested cent…

5 Crazy Places We Can Go Looking for Diamonds

Hold on to your engagement rings. Diamonds, according to an industry report, are falling off a supply cliff in 2018. As existing diamond mines are depleted even as worldwide demand increases—thanks, especially to a newly rich Asia—three months’ salary might soon buy you a much punier rock. But look at the big picture: A diamond,…

Amazon’s Amazing Free Overnight Shipping: The Best Gifts

Behind on your holiday shopping? No worries. Amazon’s got free overnight shipping on thousands of products through tonight. Here’s the best of what can still get to you—for free—in time for Christmas morning. http://www.amazon.com/b?tag=gizmodo08c-20 Everything below ordered by tonight (12/23) at 11:59 PM EST will get to your house by end of day Tuesday, with…

T-Mobile’s GoSmart brand of plans is about to get a new trick: looking at Facebook without chewing up your mobile data. Starting next month, folks on GoSmart plans will get unlimited access to anything and everything on Facebook, no data plan required. [AllThingsD]

The Amazing Quest To Preserve and Restore 52,000 Holocaust Testimonials

From 1994 to 1999, some 52,000 testimonies from Holocaust survivors and eye-witnesses were recorded on Betacam SP tapes by USC’s Shoah Foundation‘s Institute for Visual History and Education. Last year, a massive preservation project was completed that digitized all the inventory—but about five percent of the tapes were discovered to be almost completely unwatchable. Time…

Airships and Automobiles Were Going To Put Santa’s Reindeer Out of Work

Every generation changes Santa Claus to fit with their times. But at the turn of the 20th century, ol’ Father Christmas wasn’t just getting an update to his stature (in the original “Night Before Christmas” poem he used to be a tiny elf), his ride was also getting modernized. With all the new innovations in…

A Guy Recreated Home Alone Starring Himself As Every Single Character

Well, Merry Christmas. Some beautiful weirdo named Paul Little recreated Home Alone for his Christmas card starring none other than himself. As everyone. Now that is a Christmas card anyone would feel lucky to receive. Expect to see Kevin? Nope that’s Little. Looking for Buzz? Also Little. Wait and aren’t those the Wet Bandits? Nope,…

Parts of New York City Are Built on the Ruins of English Cathedrals

Last week, Jalopnik’s Michael Ballaban posted about what is easily one of my favorite urban stories of all time, which is that parts of Manhattan are actually built on the wartime ruins of English towns—churches, homes, pubs, libraries, shops, and businesses—all shipped to the U.S. as ballast during World War II. https://jalopnik.com/how-the-ruins-of-europe-built-a-major-road-in-america-1487127149 I had first…

A US Army Base Is Running a Bunch of Illegal Windows 7 Copies

Given the United States’ intolerance for copyright infringement and the piraters that propagate it, you’d think Uncle Sam would be a little more keen on making sure that his men were playing by the book themselves. As it turns out, a whole mess of computers running unlicensed, illegal copies of Windows 7 belong to none…

The 100 Most Astonishing Images of 2013

We post tons of great images on Gizmodo, from space to science to art to design. Here’s a treasure trove of our very favorites that proves that 2013 was, if nothing else, eye-catching. The Most Spectacular New Year’s Eve Fireworks Are Definitely In Dubai Photo: Gerald Donovan The USS Zumwalt Deck Looks Like a Part…

Berkeley Researchers Create Robo-Muscles 1,000 Times Stronger Than Ours

The world may be oohing and awing over all the wonderful uses we’re finding for graphene, but there’s another super-material vying for the spotlight. Vanadium dioxide might eventually become a household name because in addition to revolutionizing electronics, researchers have now discovered it can be used as an artificial muscle 1,000 times stronger than our…

12 Maps of America From Before We Knew What It Looked Like

The island of California. A huge triangle of land called Florida. A great ocean that cut down from the Arctic into the Midwest. As the New World came into focus beginning in the 17th century, explorers and cartographers struggled to measure a massive expanse of land that would take centuries to accurately map. Take the…