Tech News

A Truck-Turned-Photo-Studio For a Different Kind of Drive-By

LA-based photographer Johnny Tergo has taken an interest the kind of drive-by we can actually get behind. A frequent commuter, Tergo decided to use time on the road to his advantage—by building a custom camera and lighting rig in his Chevy Silverado that lets him snap studio-quality shots of unsuspecting passers-by. Remaining in the driver’s…

Layered Veneer Beats a Wicker Seat Any Day

There’s nothing quite as comfy to plunk down on as a soft cushion. Unfortunately they get dirty, they absorb spills like a sponge, and they get misshapen in no time. But is there a better alternative than hideous wicker? Yep, the layers of thin bamboo veneer that make up Min Chen’s Hangzhou stool. The multiple…

A $100 Nexus 7 Is Your Deal of the Day

Do you want a Nexus 7—the best small Android tablet—for a cent under $100? Of course you do, and as of this writing it can happen at Tiger Direct. However, this is not an easy deal, and it requires quite a bit of attention on your part. https://gizmodo.com/the-best-small-tablet-5969636 Right now Tiger Direct is selling a…

3D Printed Headphones You Can Build From the Ground Up

It may not be as easy as print, plug, and play, but designer J.C. Karich is proving that you can make a pair of working headphones with nothing but raw materials, a 3D printer, open source designs, and a little gumption. Karich 3D-printed the body of his headphones, which others have done before, but he…

Report: The Next Xbox Controls Your TV and Cable Box—with Kinect

This would make a lot of sense in a lot of ways. According to the Verge, the next Xbox will control your TV, and makes some actual sense out of the rumored “always online” feature of the new console. It’s also packed with some interesting new Kinect features that could foreshadow the direction Microsoft is…

There’s Gross Alternative Fuel Just Hanging Out in the Sewers

Everybody knows about using oil as a fuel source, but London is putting a new spin on the concept. Soon the city will be mining its own sewers to bring up glorious globs of old cooking grease and melting them down into fuel. Delicious. The chunks of fat, oil, and grease build-up—affectionately(?) referred to as…

Shooting Challenge: First Moments of Spring

It finally—finally—feels like spring. Time to get out there and enjoy it. For this week’s Shooting Challenge, shoot a photo of the best season of the year. The Challenge Take a photo that shows the first bits of spring coming to life. You have until April 15th to do so. The Technique I don’t know…

GE Is Freeing Up ‘Thousands’ of Patents to Fuel Your Imagination

Today, at an event in New York, GE announced that it will open up “thousands” of patents from its library of some 20,000 to inventors using Quirky’s crowdsourced product development platform. That means that if you’re bright enough, you can use a GE patent to invent something. GE will still collect royalties on your brain…

The Ten Most Wasteful Transportation Projects in Modern History

With a Dock This Awesome, Who Needs a House?

This 3,000-square-foot dock is on Storm Bay in Ontario is so awesome, but unfortunately because of the recession, the guy who owns it couldn’t afford to build a house to go with it. But hey, it’s basically the size of a house anyway. The port has a fixed extruded aluminum plank boardwalk that leads to…

Foursquare for iPhone just overhauled its suggestions, so you’ll get personalized tips the second you open the app.

Teeny Tiny Analog Synthesizers Are the Most Adorable Way to Lay Down Your Jams

Well, these new itty-bitty analog synthesizers from Korg are just so cute I want to gobble them up. And from the demo video above, it sounds like the three Volca series keyboards are lovely little groove machines you might want to use, too. The synthesizers come in three Volca flavors: Keys (for leads), Bass (for…

Baby Gorillas and Business Decisions Go Together Like Baby Gorillas and Everything

“I’m really glad we hired that in-house psychic,” said no one, ever. But you know what’s sad? IBM reports that 46 percent of midsize companies make gut decisions, even now. Sounds crazy, right? You don’t want anyone’s gut or a game of darts determining the future of your midsize enterprise. So don’t let it. Business,…

There’s an All-Natural Bed Bug Cure That Actually Works

As man still struggles to find a way to overcome the scourge that is bed bugs, it turns out that Mother Nature has already created a highly effective trap for the pests. Using bean leaves was once thought to just be an old folk remedy, but researchers at the University of California, Irvine and the…

The 15 Best Digital Designs of the Year

The Design Museum has announced the contenders for the sixth annual Designs of the Year. And their shortlist for digital showcases some of the most innovative interpretations of technology we’ve ever seen. Candles In The Wind. This revolutionary new lighting concept uses modern LED technology to recreate the experience of light from a candle flame.…

Jurassic Park’s Dinosaur Sound Effects Were Actually Animal Sex Sounds

So, uh, this is an uncomfortable one. You know the dinosaur sounds from Jurassic Park that framed the way you imagined every dinosaur ever? They were actually recordings of animals boning, or just about to bone. The velociraptor raspy bark, a basic means of communication for the dinosaurs in the film, were actually cut from…

Beets Parody Headphones Are Actually Not a Prank

Revealed while the internet is still recovering from last week’s barrage of fake April Fool’s products, OrigAudio’s Beets headphones—a parody of Dre’s Beats headphones—are real and will set you back just $25 a pair. Will they sound as ‘good’ as an authentic and considerably more expensive pair of Beats? Probably not, even when you consider…

The Casiopea Lamps Are Elevated, Illuminated String Art

These lamps are made from string, and yet somehow they don’t look like they were glued together by a second grader. They’re elegant and modern, though the materials they’re made from are so simple. They’re part of a collection by Miguel Herranz called Casiopea, which is actually a misspelled version of the constellation Cassiopeia. That’s…

Burner: The Single-Serving Phone Number App Is Now for Android

You may already be familiar with the iPhone version of this disposable phone number app, but Burner has just opened up its brave, new, anonymous world to Android—use it wisely. https://gizmodo.com/burner-stop-worrying-about-creeps-calling-5932884 What does it do? Cornered into an awkward situation with a doe-eyed, phone-number-requesting stranger? Selling your couch to a potential weirdo on Craigslist? Making…

What’s Inside the Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Headset?

The Oculus Rift might be something out of Demolition Man. Or it might be a Virtual Boy. However it turns out, it’s deeply ambitious, and iFixit has the first look at what’s inside the new VR headset. To start, the OR—a development sample here—has a single 1280 x 800 resolution LCD (640×800 viewable per eye)…