Gizmodo

You whined and you complained and you moaned. And no, you’re not getting your “Edit Tweet” button, but Twitter is testing something nearly as good. Will it make you happy?

The reign of telecoms shills meddling in internet regulations seems to be coming to a close, at least for now. The New York Times reports that Joe Biden has chosen Tim Wu, who’s credited with defining foundational concepts like net neutrality, to serve on the National Economic Council in a new role as a special…Read more...

For those of us who’ve gone a while without flexing our sheet music-reading muscle, or even for those who are looking to give piano a go for the first time but are limited by space (or budget), Lumi wants to help you learn the basics on a funky illuminated keyboard that gamifies the process. For the most part, it gets…Read more...

The covid-19 pandemic had a surprising effect on road fatalities in 2020, new data released this week suggests. Despite people staying at home more and driving less overall, more than 42,000 Americans were estimated to have been killed during a car crash last year—a higher death toll than seen in 2019. It’s likely…Read more...

John McAfee, founder of the giant antivirus and cybersecurity firm that bears his name, has been indicted in federal court in Manhattan for charges related to securities fraud and money laundering, the Department of Justice announced Friday.Read more...

I know big and shouty gaming phones aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but you still have to appreciate it when a company goes all-in on performance. That’s precisely what Nubia has done with the new Red Magic 6.Read more...

Here’s something that you’d normally see in a post-apocalyptic, zombie TV show, only instead of a mysterious radio message luring Rick and the gang to a group of cannibals, it’s a road closure notice from Obama’s second presidential inauguration. According to The Drive, the same AM radio station in Washington, D.C.…Read more...

Backroom deals, undemocratic processes, shutting out local voices in favor of industry interests. There’s soap-opera level drama happening in an unlikely space: the world of building codes. But the issues at hand are more than made-for-TV drama, and the outcome could have devastating effects on energy efficiency and…Read more...

NGC 2336 was discovered over a century ago, but the big, blue spiral galaxy has never looked better, thanks to an eye-catching image obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope.

There are two kinds of smart bulbs in this world—those that work well, and those doomed to languish in drawers with all of your other bitter regrets. If you haven’t done your research, or just failed hard a lot, you have probably come to the same conclusion many of us have: Just buy the friggin’ Philips Hue bulbs.…Read more...

The chairman of space tourism company Virgin Galactic, Chamath Palihapitiya, has sold his entire personal stake in the company for $211 million, according to a new regulatory filing with the SEC made public on Friday and first noticed by Bloomberg News. Palihapitiya still indirectly owns millions of shares through an…Read more...

The Italian government has blocked a shipment of AstraZeneca’s covid-19 vaccine to Australia in the first case of a country stopping vaccine exports in order to make sure it has enough for its domestic population. Italy consulted with the European Commission before halting the shipment of 250,000 vaccine doses,…Read more...

Meltwater from Antarctic glaciers is changing the makeup of the region’s oceans more than previously known, a new study finds. The measurements that made these findings possible were collected by an unusual group of researchers: seals.Read more...

Griddy, the Texas power supplier that’s made headlines recently for customers’ sky-high energy bills in the wake of widespread winter storm outages, has racked up another lawsuit. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing the company for “false, misleading, and deceptive advertising and marketing practices” that he…Read more...

I know, I know. Another pair of open-ear audio smart glasses? Were the Bose Frames, Echo Frames, and JLab JBuds not enough? Nope. Not according to Razer, which just announced its Razer Anzu Smart Glasses.Read more...

Virtual private networks can be great for folks wary of how their data is tracked online, but what happens when a VPN provider directly markets itself to those who would use that promise of anonymity to break the law?Read more...

What appeared to be one of the most exciting features of iOS 14.5 turns out to work a little differently than it originally seemed.

A young teen boy’s years of nasal congestion and other bizarre symptoms had an unusual culprit. His doctors say that the boy unknowingly had a BB gun pellet lodged in his nasal cavity for nearly a decade, which eventually caused him to give off an awful odor every time he blew his nose. Fortunately, they were able to…Read more...

China’s ByteDance, is planning on launching its own version of audio chat app Clubhouse for the Chinese market, Reuters reported on Thursday.

In the latest in a string of “hits” on Russian dark web forums, the prominent crime site Maza appears to have been hacked by someone earlier this week.Read more...

Right now, Calandra Davis’ water pressure is too low to take a shower. When she turns on her sinks, the water comes out at a slow trickle. For weeks, she’s had to bathe herself and her 6-year-old son with water from store-bought bottles. Like all residents of Jackson, Mississippi, she’s also been on a boil-water…Read more...

In a letter to the FCC Thursday morning, several senators called for the federal agency to redefine the current minimum speeds that internet service providers can call “high-speed” broadband from 25/3 Mbps to 100/100 Mbps. That’s not only four times higher than the minimum download speed, but senators are also calling…Read more...

An asteroid with a small chance of hitting Earth in 2068 will swing past our planet in the coming days, providing a rare opportunity for astronomers to observe this potentially hazardous object.

As the industry continues to transition to wireless audio, Qualcomm has a plan to make the audio quality on Bluetooth headphones sound a little more like the sound you hear on wired ones.

Butterflies play essential role in pollinating wild plants and crops. Which makes a new study published in Science on Thursday such bad news. It shows the climate crisis is posing an existential threat to their survival, particularly in the American West.Read more...

Rumors of a new Sonos speaker have been swirling for a while now, and it seems every detail of the new Sonos Roam has been leaked ahead of its announcement.

Samsung and Mastercard are officially teaming up on a credit card with a built-in fingerprint scanner, Samsung announced on Thursday. These so-called “biometric cards” will come baked in with a “several key discrete chips” from Samsung’s side, and are planned to be compatible with any point of sale (POS) terminal, or…Read more...

A Texas power grid oversight official who held the spectacularly wishful belief that he could keep his job after the state’s grid sputtered last month, leading to dozens of deaths and utility bills Texans will be paying for decades, has been fired. On Wednesday night, Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) CEO…Read more...

WhatsApp on Thursday announced the introduction of voice and video calls on its desktop apps for Mac and PC, expanding the ways in which you can create the illusion of meaningful human interaction in this moment of crushing isolation.

The world rightfully gawked at the engineering prowess of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory as it successfully landed the car-sized rover named Perseverance on the surface of Mars. You might think that I, an engineer with experience working on a deep space mission, would be less impressed than most. But trust me: The…Read more...

Bose 700 Wireless Headphones (Soapstone)| $300 | Best BuyRead more...

In WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar’s defense, he’s right.Read more...

Spotify and Apple Music are the two biggest players in the streaming music game, but thanks to a new deal valued at $297 million, Square is looking to change that tune by acquiring a majority stake in Tidal.Read more...

Scientists may be closer to understanding how the brain can function differently in people who have bipolar disorder. In a new study, researchers say they’ve found evidence that certain brain cells trigger inflammation more easily in those who have BPD, and that these wayward cells can be linked to decreased neural…Read more...

Behold A-74, an enormous iceberg that broke away from the Brunt Ice Shelf in Antarctica late last month. Here’s what we know about the new ‘berg and what could happen next.Read more...

It’s hard to call an $800 gaming monitor “reasonably” priced—even one that looks good and delivers on its promises of “overwhelming speed.” So let’s just say the LG UltraGear 27GN950 is less unreasonably priced than some of the competitors in its spec range.

Regulators in the UK have launched a new antitrust investigation into Apple’s App Store, according to an announcement from Britain’s Competition and Market’s Authority on Thursday. And if the details sound similar to the European Union’s antitrust probes, that’s no accident.

Seresto, a popular flea collar produced by the company Elanco Animal Health, has been tied to over 1,600 pet deaths in the U.S. alone since 2012, according to a new investigation by USA Today. But the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which regulates flea collars and any other pet treatment containing pesticides,…Read more...

If you want a good example of the kind of havoc a well-placed cyberattack can wreak on an already stressed healthcare system, look no further than the Rehoboth McKinley Christian Health Care Services center in Gallup, N.M.Read more...

Last year, Bloomberg reported that a new model of the Nintendo Switch would be out sometime in 2021. Today, they’re reporting some more specific details, like the size of the screen and some 4K news.

Arizona legislators just passed an anti-monopoly bill in a 31-29 vote, which could have big implications for Apple, Google, and, weirdly enough, Fortnite.

In a string of attacks, several of Los Angeles’ most elite private schools have had their servers hacked in recent weeks, leaving confidential teacher information and parent contact details exposed.

For anyone who feels like they’ve been held hostage by iCloud’s 5GB of free storage or just wants to try out a different photo storage app, this week Apple launched a new service designed to make it way easier to transfer photos and videos stored in iCloud over to Google Photos.Read more...

Shocker: Despite conservatives’ endless kvetching about the supposed liberal bias of Silicon Valley technocrats, one of the easiest ways to go viral on Facebook is spouting extreme, far-right rhetoric, according to a new study by New York University’s Cybersecurity for Democracy project.

The third high-altitude test of a SpaceX Starship prototype is scheduled for Wednesday. You can watch the launch live right here.

The sometimes hyped benefits of microdosing—regularly using small amounts of psychedelic drugs like lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)—might be overstated, new research this week suggests. The study found that people who microdosed did experience psychological benefits, including greater sense of well-being, but that…Read more...

Imagine the route you typically take to the grocery store. Now imagine the many identifiable landmarks that exist between your home and the store—like a specific garden, stop sign, or gas station.

If you were planning to fly to Japan to attend the Olympics, love the optimism! But most likely, your plans have been spoiled because we are, in fact, still in a global pandemic. While the final ruling has not yet been announced, the paper Mainichi reported today that a source close to the Japanese government…Read more...

It’s an unfortunate truth that snake oil salesmen lurk behind every corner of the internet, waiting for the next conspiracy or wellness fad so they can swoop in with cure-all wares and rob people of their hard-earned cash. It’s also true that people generally fear the unknown—and new technology slots neatly into that…Read more...

It could soon become a lot easier to take an electric car on some pretty cool road trips. A group of powerful utilities said Tuesday that they’re teaming up to make chargers for electric cars more accessible on highways.Read more...