Gizmodo

This sounds about right: As of Dec. 30, 2020, well over a third of Americans believe wild conspiracy theories designed to sow fear and societal collapse. A poll from NPR and the market research company Ipsos found that a solid 40% of Americans believe that covid-19 was created in a lab in China, 37% are “unsure” of…Read more...

New research out today looks to bring us closer to understanding how covid-19 can cause brain damage. The study suggests that while the viral infection may not directly reach the brain in most cases, it can spark the sort of destructive inflammation that’s seen with other neurological conditions, like stroke.

2021 will be the year of being thankful that the world hasn’t completely ended. I don’t want to hear any “we were promised flying cars”-style whining. The new year will be all about rethinking how far we’ve come, where we’re already going, and how much we’ve been getting wrong along the way.Read more...

I’ve been using a pair of Bose QuietComfort 35 II headphones for years. They’ve accompanied me on long flights to Europe and Japan, canceled out noise on a plethora of trade show floors, and helped me block out my neighbor’s weed wacker to get work done at home. But there are a slew of new premium Bluetooth headphones…Read more...

At the corner of West Pico Blvd. and South Genesee Ave. in west Los Angeles sits a tan, six-story building. It’s nothing much to look at: It’s set back from the street by a manicured lawn, lined by a row of trees on each side. An American flag flies out front.Read more...

Losing folks you don’t personally know, but who have influenced your life in a major way thanks to their creative contributions, can be pretty upsetting. While 2020 was terrible for a whole host of reasons, io9 wants to take another look back at the losses in our community to pay tribute to all the wonderful moments…Read more...

Floating around the Earth is a bunch of satellites. Cool for GPS, monitoring weather patterns, and the internet—not so cool for space junk. This is why Sumitomo Forestry and Kyoto University are teaming up to create the world’s first wooden satellites by 2023.Read more...

A childhood spent obsessing over Batman’s wonderful toys eventually transitions to a disappointing adulthood where you realize those gadgets just can’t exist in real life, even with a billion-dollar budget. That hasn’t stopped many from trying, and JT from YouTube’s Built IRL has come closer than most at recreating…Read more...

A cursory glance at country-by-country covid-19 vaccinations shows the U.S. well ahead of other countries. But dive a little below the surface and the data tell a different story. While more than 2.1 million people have received their first covid-19 vaccine shot, more than 9.3 million doses lay waiting to be shot into…Read more...

Believe it or not, we actually like a lot of gadgets. This is why it’s always a bummer when one arrives on the scene with the panache of a deflating balloon. There were a few of those products in our list of disappointing gadgets this year. Yet while sometimes gadgets disappoint everyone, there are other times they…Read more...

Apple may have just released the AirPods Max, but it seems Apple is already working on the next addition to its headphone line with a new version of the AirPods Pro that for the first time might come in multiple sizes.Read more...

Oculus Quest 2 64GB + $15 Newegg Gift Card | $300 | NeweggRead more...

Security researchers looking to get under the hood of technology in order to improve it received a pleasant victory on Tuesday when a federal judge in Florida decided to throw out Apple’s copyright violation claims against the maker of virtual iPhone software.Read more...

Over the past 24 hours, health officials in Colorado have reported finding two suspected cases of covid-19 caused by a worrying new variant of the coronavirus. The variant, first detected in the UK, is strongly believed to be more transmissible than previous strains, though recent data has also suggested that it’s not…Read more...

There are bad ideas, and then there’s building an app to promote secret parties during the worst global pandemic in 100 years. In a move surprising absolutely no one with common sense, Apple has pulled the Vybe Together app from its iOS store, according to the Verge.Read more...

We’re absolutely inundated with fake images these days. But 2020 really seemed to be filled with more fake viral videos and photos than even we could keep up with. Today, we present the fakes that really stood out, with perhaps too much from the fakes machine himself, President Trump—that guy who’s leaving office in…Read more...

Fire TV has been due for an update for a minute—a very long minute. With its latest experience overhaul, Fire TV is finally delivering a user interface that stands up to those of rival streaming devices.

Robert Rodriguez still has hopes for more Alita: Battle Angel. Jodie Whittaker reflects on losing two of her Doctor Who companions. Plus, what’s to come on The Stand and A Discovery of Witches’ return, and a new look at Cobra Kai’s third season. To me, my spoilers!

Every new version of iOS comes with a bunch of bugs and issues, some bigger than others, and iOS 14 is no different. Apple will iron out many of these problems with subsequent software updates, but it’s useful to know whether the issues you’re seeing on your own phone are known bugs in iOS 14—and to learn about some…Read more...

Cubii Pro Under-Desk Elliptical | $249 | Amazon

Alaska Airlines announced on Tuesday that it will no longer allow passengers to bring emotional support animals on its aircraft for any reservations made after January 11. The airline is the first to ban emotional support animals following new guidance from the U.S. Department of Transportation about what kind of…Read more...

The cryptocurrency exchange startup Coinbase consistently paid women and people of color less than other employees performing similar jobs, new data from the New York Times has found, exposing a glaring pay gap that’s large even by the tech industry’s miserable standards.Read more...

Before its demise at the explosive hands of Mt. Vesuvius, Pompeii was a bustling town with a strong agricultural economy and an appetite to match. Painted scenes and archaeological remains have long hinted at the diets of its doomed residents. On Saturday, the Pompeii Archaeological Park announced the excavation of…Read more...

Google is reportedly testing a new mobile search feature that would surface TikTok and Instagram videos in their own dedicated carousel — the search giant’s apparent answer to a growing appetite for short-form video content.Read more...

In Warner Bros.’ Wonder Woman 1984, princess Diana of Themyscira whips out a bevy of new, magical tricks to aid in her fight to save the world. She does battle with both Max Lord and Cheetah, two villains meant to embody all wanton greed and consumption that defined the decade. Though both her foes are armed in their…Read more...

The newest dietary guidelines from the U.S. federal government are out, and there are some surprising omissions. While the guidelines continue to emphasize the value of a balanced diet rich in fruits and vegetables, they don’t recommend that American men substantially cut down on alcohol—contrary to the advice…Read more...

While most of us were having a horrible year, with lives and jobs up-ended by the global pandemic, tech companies sailed through 2020, buoyed by a stock market completely divorced from reality and consumers in need of products and software to do work and school at home. Apple was one such company, breaking its own…Read more...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell moved to block consideration of a House-approved stimulus package on Tuesday that includes $2,000 checks for many Americans—an amount sought after by a rising chorus of Republicans and an outgoing President Trump.

As the company wonders what the future holds for it now that Boston Dynamics is owned by the Hyundai Motor Group, its robots are showing off their impressive capabilities in a year-end video that may also be a ploy to distract humanity from their ultimate goal: total dominance on the dance floor, or the eradication of…Read more...

President Donald Trump’s bitter feud with various household appliances has landed his administration in court.Read more...

While Apple says it has a thorough system of checks to ensure components used in its products are produced in an ethical manner, a new report claims that well known Apple supplier Lens Technology uses forced labor comprised of Uighur Muslim workers in China.Read more...

The Expanse is a show with an ensemble cast, but if you had to pick a “main character,” it would probably be James Holden. Played by Steven Strait, who’s also a producer on the show, Holden captains the Rocinante and has a unique connection to the dangerously mysterious protomolecule.Read more...

It’s been four years since the laborious process of pulling the UK out of the European Union began, and one would expect the language in the final deal to be thoroughly considered. But if a section of the 1,246-page agreement regarding encryption standards for transferring DNA is any indication, this package might be…Read more...

Typically the holidays are a time of giving, however following a camera update earlier this fall, users recently discovered that Google has removed the ability to use Astrophotography mode with the ultra-wide cameras on the Pixel 5 and Pixel 4a 5G.Read more...

Here’s how weird 2020 was for movies: Unless you saw something in January or February (like The Invisible Man, Birds of Prey, or Bloodshot), there’s a good chance you didn’t see a movie in a movie theater for the entire year. A whole year without going to the movies. Frankly, it’s hard to even fathom, even though we…Read more...

There are plenty of (very justifiable) tropes when discussing video games, but the one that I can’t let go of when I’m thinking of PC gaming is the keyboard being mightier than the sword. It can make or break your gaming experience. And there are so many mechanical gaming keyboards available that choosing the right…Read more...

On Christmas Eve, the United States Patent and Trademark Office publicly released an application submitted by Toyota for a “car wash judgement system.” It’s not a patent application for a system that judges how well you washed your car, nor a system that washes your car while judging you and calling you a bad owner…Read more...

In a notice on Wednesday, the U.S. Treasury Department warned of an uptick in cyberattacks and scams linked to covid-19 vaccines, saying ransomware poses a particular threat as criminals search for ways to exploit the ongoing public health crisis.

It didn’t feel like it, what with a major pandemic and massive financial crisis, but 2020 was actually an incredible year for gadgets. For companies like Apple and Microsoft, this could have been a landmark year were it not for everything else going on. While the competition for our attention this year was steep,…Read more...

Ripple’s rough few days just got way worse. After the fintech company was the subject of an SEC lawsuit over its flagship XRP token last week, Coinbase announced in a Tuesday blog post that trades of Ripple would be suspended on its platform.

Wonder Woman is supposed to be the best of women. This isn’t me starry-eyed about a fictional character and forcing her to be a defender and icon. William Moulton Marston created her to be the best of women. The character, besides being heavily rooted in Marston’s love of bondage, was also rooted in his love for women…Read more...

Experts with the World Health Organization issued a somber warning on Monday: The next pandemic to strike humanity could be even more devastating than covid-19 has been, especially if we don’t learn our lessons this time around.

HP Envy x360 15 | $570 | HP | Promo Code WINTRSAV5Read more...

In a time when you have to go out of your way to buy a new TV with less than 4K resolution, one Redditor has decided that their eyes don’t need such luxuries as 4K, 2K, HD, or even standard def videos, and have created a custom VCR that plays full-length movies on floppy disks with just 1.44 MB of storage.

His Dark Materials ended its second season on heartfelt reunions, sinister plots, and a hero’s journey into a land of angels. Lee Scoresby’s story was a battle he’d been preparing for his whole life–one that actor Lin-Manuel Miranda knew was coming thanks to Philip Pullman’s books couldn’t quite prepare himself for…Read more...

The United Kingdom, birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, is now home to the wind energy revolution that’s reaching a new crescendo. Great Britain hit a major milestone late last week when wind farms generated more than half of the island’s energy needs.Read more...

Back in October, Twitter temporarily blocked a New York Post story that was reportedly based on materials taken from a laptop owned by Hunter Biden. The story’s dubious sourcing and suspicious timing led to widespread skepticism, and Twitter decided to temporarily ban links to the story under its policy against…Read more...

The King of OLED TVs is finally getting on that mini-LED train. Last night LG announced that it plans on introducing its first ‘QNED’ TV at CES 2021.Read more...

James Gunn heads a bizarre Peacemaker rumor off at the pass. Mission: Impossible 7 will resume filming after some covid-19 concerns. A small peek at Disenchantment season 3 and more. Spoilers right this way...

There’s a niche arms race among hardware hackers to create ultra compact versions of video game consoles, and YouTube’s GmanModz appears to have successfully miniaturized an entire Nintendo 64 into a portable that’s not much bigger than an N64 game cart—making it possibly the world’s smallest to date.Read more...