Gizmodo

In an effort to undo decades of building design and urban planning that’s made spaces inaccessible to those with mobility challenges, 62-year old Rita Ebel is spending part of her golden years building wheelchair ramps out of colorful Lego bricks in an effort to improve the small German town she calls home in several…Read more...

Before we became the only remaining humans on the planet, Homo sapiens mated with Neanderthals and the closely related Denisovans. New research is now revealing that the common ancestor of Neanderthals and Denisovans interbred with its own predecessor, a population of “superarchaic” hominids.

A little dose of mindfulness might ease your perception of pain and unpleasant emotions, a small new study suggests. People who practiced a brief thought exercise before touching something hot or seeing negative images were less affected than when they weren’t practicing mindfulness, researchers found.Read more...

This week, the Pearl River in Jackson, Mississippi crested at 36.67 feet, the river’s third highest crest on record. The deluge devastated the area, flooding the streets and thousands of homes. Entire neighborhoods went underwater, and residents canoed down avenues.Read more...

A new Twitter update makes it easier for users to follow up their dumb, old tweets via a “Continue thread” menu, allowing users to continue a thread without actually having to navigate to the tweet in question.

When season two of Westworld ended back in April 2018, it felt like season three would never come. The year 2020 felt so far away. Well, that time has finally passed and Westworld season three is coming—with a brand-new trailer that hammers the point home in as epic a way possible.

Potentially yielding some bitterly-contested ground, Apple is thinking about allowing its users to replace their default essential apps like Safari, Mail, and Apple Music with third-party apps, Bloomberg reports. [Muted golf clap.] This comes less than a year after the Supreme Court paved the way for app-related…Read more...

With a Sonic the Hedgehog film setting records at the box office, now’s as good a time as any to reflect on Sega’s glory days in the ‘80s and ‘90s. But instead of focusing on consoles, a new book takes a deep dive on Sega’s iconic ride-on arcade machines and includes intricate pop-up paper models of six standouts.

Baby Yoda was definitely the break out star of The Mandalorian, but it also looks like he’s the breakout star of this year’s Toy Fair too. A slew of Baby Yoda toys just dropped at a Disney event today, but of all of them, this animatronic plush by Hasbro is the highlight

Look, the story of Wednesday night’s Democratic presidential debate is the very public evisceration of former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg. But hey, some other stuff happened, too! Even some climate stuff, including letting Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Bloomberg’s mutilated corpse perpetuate one of the biggest myths in climate…Read more...

HTC Vive had big plans to put on some fancy demos at Mobile World Congress, and while the show has been canceled due to concerns about the coronavirus, that isn’t stopping HTC from announcing three new additions to its Cosmos headset family.

Star Wars toys are all about getting the characters we love in playable plastic format, but really, from Kenner Troop Transports to Micro Machines, some of our fondest memories are of getting those glorious vehicles to shove said characters into. And that’s what Hasbro’s latest Star Wars toy line is all about, in very…Read more...

Two passengers from the Diamond Princess cruise ship currently docked in Yokohama, Japan have died from COVID-19, according to Japan’s public broadcaster NHK. They’re the first passengers from the cruise ship to die since it was put under quarantine on February 5, raising Japan’s death toll from the new coronavirus to…Read more...

AUKEY 60W PD Power Delivery Wall Charger | $23 | Amazon | Clip the coupon code and use the promo code NMXPM6ICRead more...

The nation’s largest financial data broker, Yodlee, holds extensive and supposedly anonymized banking and credit card transaction histories on millions of Americans. Internal documents obtained by Motherboard, however, appear to indicate that Yodlee clients could potentially de-anonymize those records by simply…Read more...

Lawyers for beleaguered WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange claim that Donald Trump offered him a pardon if he’d claim the 2016 hacks of Democratic Party email systems had nothing to do with Russia, the Guardian reported on Wednesday.

Peloton accused rival stationary bike company Flywheel of stealing its ideas back in 2018, and now the two companies have settled. Flywheel is ending its at-home classes—both live-streamed and on-demand—in March, The Verge reported, which means Flywheel bike owners won’t have anything to watch on their giant screens.…Read more...

A rudderless young man begins to suspect something’s a little off about the London firm where he’s just landed an entry-level gig—and he’s not wrong. For instance: one of the middle managers is secretly a shape-shifting goblin. That’s the set-up for The Portable Door, a book series set to become a movie with some very…Read more...

Just because Rey heard Ahsoka Tano’s voice mixed in with a bunch of dead Jedi in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, it doesn’t necessarily mean she’s dead. That’s the implication the character’s co-creator Dave Filoni gave io9 when we spoke to him this week.Read more...

The devices we use every day are increasingly voice-controlled or internet-connected, even if they probably shouldn’t be. If you’re also one of those folks that’s morbidly curious about which of these devices are hiding behind bullshit privacy policies to collect reams of data on you, there’s now a handy app for that.Read more...

We learned late last year that the Planet of the Apes franchise would not end with 2017's War for the Planet of the Apes, something that had actually been rumored since shortly after that acclaimed film’s release. And now, we know that the new Apes film won’t be another reboot, but rather a continuation of the saga.

Around 20 million Americans have tried to raise money through crowdfunding websites to pay off their or someone else’s medical bills, a new survey out Wednesday estimates. Meanwhile, one in five Americans has donated to these campaigns at least once, a third of the time to complete strangers.Read more...

My committed film enthusiasts: I have some incredible news to share. The long-awaited Alamo Drafthouse subscription service for all-you-can watch movies has arrived—and if you’re a frequent moviegoer (and can restrain yourself from going nuts on pricey snacks), it could save you a good chunk of change.Read more...

Samsung’s newest flagship, the $1,380 Galaxy Z Flip, might actually be the first foldable phone worth buying. The company gave me a Flip to use for 24 hours, which isn’t long enough to fully review the device, but I used the Flip as my main phone for a full day to see how it stands up to my daily life.Read more...

Scientists studying the new coronavirus that has infected tens of thousands of people in China have published an atomic-resolution image of the protein that the virus uses to gain access to cells. This feat, which was accomplished using a Nobel Prize-winning method, could aid in the development of treatments or…Read more...

A House subcommittee that oversees consumer protection and information security in the private sector is pursuing a deeper understanding of how Ring’s partnerships with local and state law enforcement agencies mesh with the constitutional protections that are afforded Americans against unbridled government…Read more...

White-bellied sea eagles are majestic, keen-eyed predators that soar effortlessly above coastal forests and marshes. They can also be colossal jerks. These eagles were recently spotted tormenting an innocent fruit bat, repeatedly carrying it out to sea and dropping it into the waves.

Oracle isn’t a household name. Its product is software and cloud computing, and its customers are other companies—and so, it’s avoided much of the scrutiny heaped on public-facing firms like Facebook, while making its co-founder Larry Ellison the fifth-richest man in the United States. And amid worker backlash across…Read more...

Researchers have identified a potential issue with sensors used in some older Tesla models that misinterpreted speed signs to read the speed limit as 50 miles per hour greater than the sign stated when a piece of electrical tape slightly obscured one of the numbers.Read more...

Many of the potentially harmful chemicals found in our homes linger on walls and other surfaces, suggests a new study out Wednesday. Unfortunately, ventilating rooms with fresh air or cleaning surfaces might not do much to reduce our exposure to these contaminants.

PlayStation is pulling out of PAX East due to “increasing concerns” related to the illness colloquially known as the coronavirus, it said on the PlayStation blog today.Read more...

Worried about what online shenanigans your child might get into with their first smartphone? In Japan, a company has released a budget phone with at least one feature you won’t find on a flagship iOS or Android device: an AI-powered sensor that prevents naked selfie shots from being saved or shared.

Attorneys for imprisoned activist and former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning have filed a new motion for her release from the Virginia jail that’s been holding her for almost a year.

Scientists have released their initial analysis of a meteorite that fell over Europe last September. They report that the rock, the remnant of a daytime bolide that impacted Earth with an energy of 0.48 kilotons of TNT (around this much), is a carbonaceous chondrite—the kind of meteor that contains material from the…Read more...

All over the world, kids are saying world leaders’ weak climate policies are putting their futures at risk. They’re right, new research shows.Read more...

For decades, scientists have struggled to define the stuff that comprises a quarter of the universe: dark matter. As experiments continue to turn up empty-handed, one team hopes to find dark matter by incorporating the laws that govern subatomic particles—quantum mechanics—with a nascent kind of technology called a…Read more...

After recent earnings fell way short of expectations and caused its stock to fall a record 38 percent, Groupon has announced that it will stop selling physical goods and merchandise and will refocus the company around providing local experiences.Read more...

Your USB peripherals may be making your PC vulnerable to hackers. The data security firm Eclypsium reports that the majority of Windows and Linux-based peripherals use “unsigned” firmware that leaves them open to all manner of attack—ransomware, spyware, and even full-on device takeovers.Read more...

Companies say that a lot of single-use plastic items are recyclable: cups, trays, lids, cutlery, straws, stirrers. But it turns out those claims are misleading.Read more...

The advent of the personal computer wasn’t just about making these powerful machines available to everyone, it was also about making them accessible and usable, even for those lacking a computer science degree. Larry Tesler, who passed away on Monday, might not be a household name like Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, but…Read more...

A Marshall Speaker, a pair of Tactronics Earbuds, an Anker Gold Box, a G2 Keychain, Asus Vivobook 15, and a Crocs sale are some of Wednesday’s deals of the day.

Patreon, the beloved subscription platform whose independent media creators would really like it to stay the course, is following what seems to be the inevitable trajectory of online payment processors and giving out small loans–in this case, cash advances for upcoming projects. This may be getting into hairy…Read more...

The Apple AirPods and their successors have been huge hits for Apple—but are you making the most out of your pair? We present to you some of the tricks and features you might not have come across yet—from using your AirPods as a remote listening system to sharing audio between two pairs of earbuds, here’s how to make…Read more...

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Meal kit delivery service Blue Apron is “evaluating a broad range of strategic options”—phrasing that usually indicates a company is instead running out of said options—after posting dismal Q4 2019 results on Tuesday that came in below investor estimates, CNN Business reported.

More than 2,000 people have died from the ongoing outbreak of the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus which causes a disease known as COVID-19, CNN reported on Tuesday, citing the latest figures including an updated tally from China’s National Health Commission.Read more...

There’s a potential problem when you announce that a film will be getting two sequels to make the series a trilogy. The second movie could end up feeling insignificant because we already know the story will continue.

When last we left some of the biggest characters on The Walking Dead, they were pretty much screwed. It appears not much will have changed when the second half of season 10 picks up this weekend. In fact, things are only getting worse.Read more...

Following earlier reports that beleaguered game app HQ Trivia was finally shutting down for good after failing to secure funding, founder Rus Yusupov says the app may have a shot at surviving after all. Maybe.Read more...

A 22-year-old YouTuber and Instagram personality advertising “legal” money for “serious ppl only” with “no scams!” turned out to be a scammer, allegedly. Nothing is real.