Gizmodo

The government of Norway is moving to decriminalize possession of small amounts of all recreational drugs as well as their use, including everything from weed and coke to heroin, per Bloomberg.

A ransomware gang called “Cuba” claims to be selling off data on the dark web belonging to Automatic Funds Transfer Services (AFTS), a Seattle-based financial services and data management firm that suffered a bad ransomware attack in early February.Read more...

A new docuseries from Mark Wahlberg’s production company will examine the spectacular failure of subscription service MoviePass.

NASA released a stunning photo of yesterday’s historic landing, showing the Perseverance rover being lowered to the surface during the skycrane maneuver.

Almost exactly a month before Texas plunged into darkness, a panel convened in Austin to host a discussion about the superiority of the Texan electric grid. Called “Keep the Lights and Ventilators On: The Future of Texas’ Grid Reliability,” the panel was part of an annual conference held by the Texas Public Policy…Read more...

Space fans all over the world breathed a sigh of relief yesterday when NASA’s Perseverance rover reached the surface of Mars safely. Humanity’s recent spate of bad luck aside, Mars is famous for ending missions before they even begin, with its inhospitable climate and the whole being-140-million-miles-away thing.…Read more...

With summer right around the corner, you might want to consider JBL’s Xtreme 3. It’s a durable and portable Bluetooth speaker that delivers a surprising amount of bass for those who like to listen to music even at top volumes.Read more...

Scalpers buying up graphics cards and gaming consoles only to resell them at hugely inflated prices is a problem. And iD Software co-founder John Carmack has an idea as to how to stop it, as he laid out on Twitter last night. What if manufacturers simply auctioned their own stock directly to consumers?Read more...

Even in a suburb of Montreal that’s well versed in dealing with winter storms, inclement weather can still overwhelm basic services like power, an issue with which millions of people in Texas are still currently struggling. After an especially bad ice storm in 1998, the mayor of Boucherville, Quebec, had a clever idea…Read more...

Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 (Core i5/128GB) | $800 | Best Buy

After the iPad Air got refreshed last fall, people have been waiting for the iPad Pro to get a similar revamp, which according to new leaks could happen—along with the release of Apple’s AirTags—sometime soon in mid-March.Read more...

The return of MagSafe was a big surprise with the iPhone 12 lineup, and with it came the promise of new, magnetic accessories. Aside from the ones introduced with the new iPhones last fall, Apple is reportedly working on a MagSafe battery pack.Read more...

10% off BodyBlendz Skincare Glacial Dip Set | Promo code NICOLE10Read more...

Humans have forced the Earth’s ecosystems to deal with a lot of crap, from deforestation and biodiversity loss to the climate crisis. Then, there’s our, um, literal crap, which a new study shows that the planet is surprisingly well-equipped to manage.

Elizabeth Ann is the first clone of a black-footed ferret, but more importantly, she’s the first endangered species to be cloned in the United States. Her birth represents an important milestone in the ongoing effort to increase the genetic diversity of this threatened species.Read more...

Those of us who sat through yesterday’s five-and-a-half-hour House Committee on Financial Services hearing on the GameStop short squeeze had maybe, foolishly, hoped against hope to see some cold hard accountability. We came to hear Robinhood’s CEO explain why, at the peak of the GameStop run, the trading app shut out…Read more...

There’s never been a better time to hit the open road and escape an over-crowded city, but why leave the creature comforts of home at home? Living out of a recreational vehicle can be quite luxurious, even if you’re not driving a bus, as the transforming SAIC Maxus Life Home V90 Villa Edition RV demonstrates.

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Teyonah Parris promises big sadness for WandaVision’s finale. Netflix is turning Lupita Nyong’o and Vashti Harrison’s fantastical children’s book into an animated musical. More Fate: The Winx Saga is on the way. Plus, behind the scenes on Raya and the Last Dragon’s work-from-home production. Spoilers, away!Read more...

My Dearest Reader,

When you have long, thick hair, drying it is tedious and time-consuming. I’m a busy gal, so I’ll admittedly try anything that promises to shorten the process—hence why I agreed to test this ridiculous, self-oscillating Panasonic hair dryer that also supposedly reduces frizz by shooting “tiny, moisture-rich particles”…Read more...

Up to 50% Off Microsoft Games | Best BuyRead more...

Uber drivers in the UK should be classified as workers and entitled to both paid vacation time and the minimum wage, according to a ruling Friday by Britain’s Supreme Court. But Uber’s London office is already disputing the scope and relevance of the ruling for its British drivers, insisting that its own rules have…Read more...

Facebook has endangered public safety by blocking news on the platform in Australia during the covid-19 pandemic, according to Australia’s Treasurer Josh Frydenberg a high-ranking official in the country’s ruling Liberal Party.

While the world eagerly watched Thursday as NASA’s Perseverance rover successfully touched down on Mars, snapshots flooded social media of excited viewers striking a pose on the Red Planet.Read more...

Microsoft has announced an update to its productivity suite, Office 2021, for consumers along with a variant specifically geared toward businesses, Office Long Term Servicing Channel.Read more...

If you thought the GOP couldn’t mess with our already broken internet infrastructure more than they already have, well, they’re just full of surprises. According to Ars Technica, House Republicans introduced a new bill on Tuesday that would ban municipal broadband networks nationwide. Reps. Cathy McMorris Rodgers…Read more...

A new study out Thursday is one of the first to try measuring deaths during the pandemic that were caused not by the virus itself but by the economic devastation it sparked. The study estimates that the spike in unemployment seen last spring helped cause an additional 30,000 deaths among working-age adults in the U.S.…Read more...

The city of Los Angeles has filed a lawsuit in California state court against Polymer80, a company it says has flooded the country with untraceable firearms by shipping customers all the components necessary to build a gun in minutes.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles has warned state residents that over a year’s worth of data—including customer addresses and license plate numbers—may have been compromised in a recent cyberattack on a third-party contractor.Read more...

A massive cold snap hit 25 states in the south and central U.S. this week, unleashing chaos. Millions are without power. Hospitals are being evacuated even as people suffer from carbon monoxide poisoning after trying to heat their homes with grills, generators, and other dangerous items. The air is more toxic than…Read more...

It all came down to this. Hundreds of hours of work, spread over seven months, all culminating in a single press of a button. If it worked? Glory. If it didn’t? Agony. And while one would assume a moment of this magnitude would go off without a hitch, history proved that not to be the case. Yes, I’m being incredibly…Read more...

All six wheels of NASA’s Perseverance are firmly and safely on the Martian surface, following a successful landing of the rover in Jezero crater today.

Facebook, which along with Google accounts for around 60% of advertiser spending online, has knowingly built some of its astonishing success on incorrect data, newly unsealed court documents allege. Incidentally, this may pose a problem for a business which generates over 90% of its revenue from selling ads.

It’s been a hard week for everyone living in Texas as blackouts, boil notices, and bone-chilling cold rattle the state. But data shared with Earther shows the suffering maybe be particularly acute for the millions of Texans living near oil wells and refineries.Read more...

Our favorite streaming device just got a major update.

Since November, hundreds of thousands of farmers and their supporters have been protesting across India, calling for an end to a series of new agricultural laws introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration. The demonstrations have seen record-breaking turnout in the streets—and sparked historic…Read more...

Being a teacher is rough. Being a teacher trying to teach a class of more than 20 students virtually in the middle of a pandemic is even rougher. Not only do you have to come up with clever ways to teach the same material and keep your class engaged, but you often find yourself troubleshooting your students’ tech…Read more...

Apple’s first 5G phones arrived mere months ago, but the company is already exploring the future of cellular connectivity.Read more...

Google just announced the release of the first developer preview build of Android 12, giving us a few hints at what changes to expect when the software upgrade rolls out widely.Read more...

Attempting to get ahead of cryptocurrency miners who might snatch up a good chunk of RTX 3060 stock when the GPU goes on sale next week, Nvidia announced this morning it now has a dedicated card for professional mining.

Jim Henson’s The Muppet Show—the one and only—is finally going to be more easily accessible to fans with its arrival on Disney+ this week. You might be so excited you’re just going to dive in headfirst, but if you’re down to skip around a bit, we have some suggestions for the best of the best.Read more...

Springhares are cute as can be, but their fur looks kind of dull under normal conditions. When cast under UV light, however, their fur comes alive, featuring vibrant patches of red, orange, and pink. As new research shows, these creatures are now one of only a handful of mammals known to emit a biofluorescent glow.

It snowed in the Middle East on Wednesday, covering parts of Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Palestine, and Israel in rare white blanket. The region is known more for being dry and hot than snowstorms. But a huge dip in the jet stream similar to what’s happening in Texas allowed polar air to plunge from…Read more...

As powerful workstations slowly but surely work to remaster all the world’s old film and video footage to higher resolutions and frame rates using machine learning techniques, you’d assume that one piece of footage would have been a top priority. But apparently Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” music video has…Read more...

More real-time WallStreetBets drama, the David and Goliath tale of class and meme warfare that has it all, will unfold before our very eyes today in a Congressional hearing at noon, ET. Possibly aware that at least two forthcoming movies and two TV shows need some good material, the House Committee on Financial…Read more...

With Sony having teased a new cinema camera launch next week, it seems Blackmagic Design is sneaking in a new product ahead of Sony’s announcement with its updated Pocket Cinema Camera 6K Pro.Read more...

The veil between dreamworld and reality may be thinner than we thought. In a new study released Thursday, scientists in four countries say they’ve shown it’s possible to communicate with people while they’re lucid dreaming. At least some of the time, the dreamers were reportedly able to respond to yes-or-no questions…Read more...

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2 5G (Mystic Bronze) | $1,791 | Amazon

The capacitive technology that allows us to physically interact with touchscreens isn’t just limited to our fingers or a fancy stylus. Hopefully, someone somewhere is polishing up a Nobel Prize because a researcher discovered that pastries work with touchscreens too, and with some clever baking techniques, an iPad is…Read more...