Gizmodo

Cheap smartwatches have come a long way in the last few years. If you wanted a good-looking watch with a color AMOLED touchscreen and built-in GPS-tracking, it would’ve once set you back at least $300. Now, there’s a whole slew of devices that offer a range of basic smartwatch features for under $200. Timex’s new…Read more...

As movie theaters struggle to re-open and attract patrons again, even while the Covid-19 pandemic rages on, they’ll be facing yet another obstacle to financial recovery this summer as Walmart has revealed plans to turn its parking lots into drive-in movie theaters starting in August.

Jason Momoa is the reason for the season in Warner Bros.’ new... Frosty the Snowman movie? The Conjuring 3 might just conjure itself out 2020 entirely. Power Rangers’ new showrunner discusses adapting Ryusoulger for the west. Plus, what’s to come on the next Agents of SHIELD, and Lovecraft Country sets a start date.…Read more...

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New Zealand’s top health official stepped down on Thursday following a relatively minor scandal that shows the enormous difference in how the U.S. and other wealthy countries are dealing with the covid-19 pandemic.Read more...

Cinemark will, in fact, require you to wear a face mask in its theaters after first releasing a murky policy that encouraged—but did not require—face coverings. That policy naturally received blowback as we have been, and continue to be, in the midst of a deadly pandemic.Read more...

A new review out Wednesday paints a sorry picture about the state of antibody tests meant to find out whether you’ve ever had covid-19. It suggests that these tests range wildly in accuracy from manufacturer to manufacturer, with tests that quickly return results at the doctor’s office faring so badly that they…Read more...

As part of T-Mobile’s contentious mega-merger with Sprint, one of the Federal Communications Commission’s stipulations was that new T-Mobile would have to sell off some its holdings, including Boost Mobile. And today, in a deal worth $1.4 billion, Boost Mobile’s new owner Dish has finally begun its attempt to become…Read more...

Fellow film streamers, should you find yourself looking for something to stream amid the muck of the overwhelmingly mediocre titles available on Netflix, I strongly advise against relying solely on the algorithmically driven top 10 trending carousels to inform your viewing options. If you do, you may find yourself…Read more...

Democrats in Congress are calling on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to support a coronavirus relief package that’ll bring the U.S. closer to a clean energy economy. There’s never been a better time than now to make the leap.

If DC Universe and HBO Max’s Doom Patrol were a comic book—not that comic book, but rather a comic based on the live-action series—one might safely assume that the consequences of season one’s gloriously demented finale would be dealt with off-panel, in the narrative void. Even though the show has prided itself by…Read more...

After the proposal received unanimous support from the city council, Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan last Friday signed in local ordinance 119799, the seemingly unimpeachable purpose of which was to impose “premium pay” for gig workers delivering groceries during the ongoing pandemic. Not even a week later, the city is…Read more...

While Samsung still hasn’t officially announced the Galaxy Note 20, Samsung’s Russian website may have just let the cat out of the bag by inadvertently posting photos of the Note 20 featuring an enchanting copper finish.Read more...

In honor of the Tenth Anniversary of Social Media Day, influencers have issued a declaration of independence and the formation of an autonomous trade association, hereby known as the American Influencer Council. Founding members—most with over one million followers, all casually flawless—influence in such areas as …Read more...

In recent builds of Chrome for Android, Google provided a hidden option that allowed users to force dark mode onto websites that would normally feature bright white backgrounds. Sadly, based on updated settings from the Canary build for next version of Chrome (86), it appears Google is dropping support for forced dark…Read more...

With the announcement that HBO Max would be bringing some version of Zack Snyder’s take on Justice League to the streaming service, actors involved with the production have become increasingly frank about the movie’s troubled path to box office and critical disappointment. But in recent days, Ray Fisher has made those…Read more...

Gold mining is becoming an increasingly dangerous threat to the Amazon. A new study has found that barely any trees or plants grow where mines once sat. This is bad news for the wildlife that depends on vegetation for habitat. Without trees or vegetation, though, the Amazon also can’t store as much carbon to prevent…Read more...

A month after Amazon released its flagship third-person shooter/MOBA/battle royal/what the heck even is this game, Crucible, the company has unreleased it due to copious amounts of negative feedback. “Starting tomorrow, Crucible is moving to closed beta,” said the Crucible team in a blog this morning. All current…Read more...

A right-wing social media app that’s billed itself as a “free speech” alternative to Twitter is quickly proving itself to be even more restrictive than the alternative apps its users routinely accuse of censorship.

Dr. Anthony Fauci has assured us that things are going to get a lot worse for everyone if certain states don’t start taking the pandemic seriously. “I would not be surprised if we go up to 100,000 [cases] a day if this does not turn around,” he testified to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and…Read more...

A new U.S. government-led study has found that common materials such as cotton can effectively filter particles as small as the coronavirus, especially when layered. The findings offer more evidence that homemade masks can slow the pandemic’s spread and possibly provide some personal protection against covid-19,…Read more...

Before the coronavirus pandemic threw the U.S. into recession, the Navajo Nation was already dealing with a recession of its own. With the closure of a giant coal plant last year, the tribal nation had lost more than $40 million in revenue. Now, the pandemic is exacerbating an already-tough situation for the Navajo…Read more...

For better or worse, there’s a good chance your current love life owes something to automation. Even if you’re just hooking up with the occasional Tinder fling (which if you are, no judgment), you’re still turning to Tinder’s black-box algorithms to pick out that fling for you before turning to more black-box…Read more...

For the last three years, YouTube TV has been the affordable alternative to pricier live TV streaming services, such as Hulu and AT&T TV. But that price gap just vanished. YouTube TV is jumping from $50 a month to $65 due to the “rising cost of content,” the company announced in a blog post.

Months of free time and loads of untapped ingenuity has resulted in competitively-challenged hackers coming up with clever ways to use technology to dominate various sports. We’ll leave it up to you to decide if Cornhole officially falls into that category, but either way, Michael Rechtin’s managed to upgrade the game…Read more...

It seems like Facebook is really trying (for real this time, guys!) to get a handle on its fake news problem. Today the company announced a major change to the way it prioritizes news articles in your feed. Instead of prioritizing news content that has the most engagement, the social media giant will now show users…Read more...

After months of rumblings from the Trump administration claiming the use of Chinese networking equipment posed a risk to the U.S., today the Federal Communications Commission officially designated both Huawei and ZTE as threats to national security.Read more...

Streaming is more important than ever. As huge numbers of people stay home during the global pandemic, many have turned to the plethora of services for a much-needed escape. At the start of each month, most streaming services do a little shuffle, adding new movies and taking some off, and we’re here to help with your…Read more...

Last Friday, it was reported that Canadian smart glasses startup North was on the verge of being snapped up by Alphabet, Google’s parent company. Today, it’s official.Read more...

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Researchers in China are sounding the alarm over strains of the influenza virus that have become common among some farm pigs—strains that have the potential to erupt into an easily transmissible pandemic in people, they warn. But while the threat is serious and worth keeping an eye on, it’s not an urgent risk of doom.Read more...

Amazon’s streaming service is introducing a co-viewing option to stream movies and TV shows with up to 100 other Prime Video account holders, a nifty feature that’s already officially available on platforms like Hulu and HBO.Read more...

Marine biologists from Japan say whale sharks have eyeballs coated in tiny teeth, in a discovery unique to this hulking but gentle aquatic species.

This is the story of a microvlogging app that nobody had heard of two years ago, and how it lured the world’s teens with karaoke, gobbled up their data, ballooned to monstrous proportions, and, finally, became a geopolitical bargaining chip in an escalating feud between the world’s two most-populous countries. The…Read more...

While accelerometers and gyroscopes are generally how smartwatches detect hand movements, a newly-released patent hints that Apple may be considering scanning veins in your wrist via the Apple Watch to detect non-touch gestures in the future.Read more...

It’s a weird situation when the second largest smartphone maker in the world is treated as persona non grata, but that’s precisely what Huawei is facing when it comes to selling gadgets in the U.S. And based on the current political climate, there’s very little chance that will change between now and November.…Read more...

An unusually bright star in a nearby galaxy has gone missing, in a mystery of cosmic proportions.

The New York Times has announced it is ending a partnership with Apple’s news aggregator app, with the company citing a greater need for a more direct relationship with readers.Read more...

Comfortable, good-looking VR headsets might not be available in the near future, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be available at all. According to VentureBeat, Facebook is researching a holographic optics design that would slim down present-day VR headsets from their bulky, brick form to something more like a thick…Read more...

During a public meeting on Monday, Detroit Police Chief James Craig estimated the facial recognition technology used by his department fails to identify suspects accurately “96% of the time,” adding that nearly every case would go unsolved if police relied solely on the technology to identify suspects.

This weekend’s rumors were true: Reddit has swung its mighty banhammer, taking out 2,000 groups, including r/The_Donald and r/ChapoTrapHouse. A few hours later, the Verge reported that Twitch temporarily banned the Donald himself, namely over video of his racist rallies, with few additional details.

Apple developers have supposedly started receiving their Apple ARM transition kits, and now a few benchmark numbers of those dev kits have also appeared in the wild. Spotted by 9to5Mac, benchmarks for the Developer Transition Kit seemed to have surfaced on Geekbench, despite strict confidentiality clauses in the…Read more...

Buying a TV can feel overwhelming, with dozens of models to choose from and a bunch of confusing specs rattling around your head. Couple that with a global pandemic ensuring you can’t even see these TVs in person before you buy, and you’ve got a tough call to make. If you’re on a strict budget, we’ll save you the…Read more...

The pharmaceutical company behind a drug that’s been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use for covid-19 patients announced today the drug will cost $3,120 per typical treatment course for individuals with private insurance plans.Read more...

In a blog post today, Amazon announced it would be distributing “a special one-time Thank You bonus” to its workers, the largest sums of which would go to non-hourly managers.

Right now, we’re living through a timeline where everything from unemployment rates to death tolls appear to be much more grim than authorities let on. So it’s somehow both deeply horrifying and deeply unsurprising that, while states across the country are facing unprecedented floods with disastrous long-term impacts,…Read more...

If you have shame spiraled after sending a birthday message to a secondary contact on LinkedIn or had a few too many at a professional event, you, too, have probably wondered how much you would be willing to throw down for a networking cheat. Enter the platform Rooftop Slushie, where you can post a bid for a referral…Read more...

In the depths of the water just west of Greenland, scientists have discovered a previously unknown coral garden. They described the ecosystem in a new study published in Frontiers in Marine Science on Monday.

There has been no shortage of wild influencer stories during this period of social distancing and political unrest, including Instagram personalities who posed in blackface to “combat racism” and those who monetized their ill-advised road trips away from covid-19 hotspots. Still, those egregious behaviors are…Read more...

The Chinese government is spending millions of dollars each year implementing population control measures against the Uighurs, the country’s largest Muslim ethnic group, including mandatory IUDs, sterilization, and forced abortions, according to a story published Monday by the Associated Press.