Gizmodo

After kicking off a historic rally around GameStop stock that has incited the ire of hedge fund tycoons and the SEC, the r/wallstreetbets channel was banned from Discord on Wednesday over apparent hate speech violations.Read more...

The U.S. Department of Defense spent close to half a million dollars—at least $466,810—on fringe science research, in the hopes of someday creating an aircraft that bends the laws of physics. That news comes via a new report from the War Zone, which recently acquired DoD documents via a public records request as part…Read more...

New research suggests that doctors are, thankfully, skilled at correctly identifying a person’s time of death—a crucial aspect of ensuring healthy organs for donation. At the same time, the body can sometimes show flitters of cardiac activity even after death has become truly irreversible, according to the study…Read more...

The National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, a congressional advisory panel—helmed by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt—has mulled whether or not the U.S. should deploy artificially intelligent autonomous weapons, and, after taking into account the numerous reasons it would be a terrible idea, decided …Read more...

If the online MAGA army wasn’t nervous before today, the Department of Justice just gave them a good reason to tighten their sphincters. In a surprising announcement, DOJ officials said on Wednesday that they’ve charged a prominent Twitter user with taking part in a conspiracy to trick citizens into not voting during…Read more...

When President Joe Biden revoked the Keystone XL pipeline permit, Republicans responded by over-inflating job loss numbers and generally making stuff up. On Wednesday, though, the administration showed it won’t cede ground to the lies.

It’s been more than 20 years since Intel released its last desktop graphics card, the Intel740, but as of yesterday the company is officially back in the discrete GPU game.Read more...

Earlier this month, Lucasfilm announced something of a pivot in its video game licensing. Rebranding its outreach as Lucasfilm Games, it looked toward a future where studios outside of EA, which currently holds an exclusivity deal until 2023, could make Star Wars games. Naturally, that led to us inevitably making a…Read more...

The criminal operation behind a dangerous, global botnet has been disrupted.

You typically use Amazon’s Alexa to play music, provide weather forecasts, and respond to other household requests. But Alexa just got a somewhat unusual new skill: the ability to bark like a dog.

When space is limited and corners of your home have to be multi-functional, consider a standing desk converter that can easily break down to be stored out of sight.

Everyone’s had a boss who sent a tone-deaf email but imprisoned Samsung heir apparent Lee Jae-yong has one-upped them all. Sending a message on Samsung’s intranet, Lee apparently apologized for landing himself in jail once again and urged them to “maintain their work” in his absence, Yonhap reports.Read more...

In March 2016, a research team dropped 39 seismometers to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean off the western tip of Africa, to listen for the rumblings of earthquakes near and far. A year later, they’ve found a hidden story of how the continents are growing farther apart—not pulled from either side by subduction zones,…Read more...

The two wealthiest men in the world—Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos—are bickering about their competing satellite internet projects, in an argument prompted by SpaceX’s recent request to move some Starlink satellites to a lower orbit.Read more...

With great popularity comes great scrutiny. Following WhatsApp’s controversial announcement of changes to its privacy policy, users have flocked to the encrypted messaging app Signal. The app has maintained a relatively small userbase for years, but in the last month, it has reportedly doubled in size. And now it’s…Read more...

Often, when I show off a new smartwatch I’m testing to my gal pals, they inevitably crinkle their noses. “It’s...so big. And ugly,” they say. “I’d never wear something like that.” It’s something I’ve harped about in many a smartwatch review, a plea from the small-wristed among us for a wearable that doesn’t leave us…Read more...

Sharks are doing really badly, according to a new report. The study, put together by the Global Shark Trends Project and published in Nature on Wednesday, found that the number of sharks and rays in the world’s oceans has fallen by more than 70% since 1970.Read more...

Science fiction is about the unbelievable. The impossible. Things most people wouldn’t equate with a show about aging karate champions and their students. And yet, that Cobra Kai not only exists, but is so freaking good, is unbelievable. It is impossible. And that, along with the mountains of nostalgia the show…Read more...

The first capitalism-boosting holiday of the year is almost upon us but due to the ongoing pandemic, an intimate meal in a quiet bistro isn’t an option for Valentine’s Day 2021. There are alternatives, thankfully, but why waste your money on roses when beef jerky conversation hearts and neon pink mac and cheese do…Read more...

I liked the original Bose Frames. They were stylish sunglasses that featured audio-based augmented reality, which actually seemed like a clever workaround for the technological challenges of smart glasses. But alas, Bose AR wasn’t meant to be. Last summer, the company shuttered that division and as a result, Bose…Read more...

Luke Evans has boarded another live-action Disney remake. Tika Sumpter has an update on the Sonic the Hedgehog sequel. Robert Rodriguez is rebooting Spy Kids. Plus, the new Willow adds a familiar Spider-Man face, and filming begins on Thor: Love & Thunder. Spoilers, away!

Today at Fujifilm’s global X Summit, the company announced two new cameras including the new GFX 100S, which is the company’s most compact large format camera yet.Read more...

If the folks who are responsible for beaming content to your eyeballs are to be believed, streamers are thirsty for more ads of all things.

Newark, New Jersey has reached a settlement with environmental justice advocates who sued the city over its pipes leaching lead into residents’ water supply.Read more...

In the summer of 1997, the only reason I survived a family road trip through western Canada was my trusty Walkman.Read more...

Xbox Elite Series 2 Wireless Controller | $160 | Microsoft StoreRead more...

Health authorities in China have deployed anal swab tests to detect covid-19 in the lead up to the Lunar New Year celebrations, according to the Chinese state media outlet the Global Times, a technique that some claim might be more accurate than traditional nasal swabs, throat swabs, and antibody tests. But not…Read more...

Do you have an iPhone or iPad? You should update your device right now to iOS 14.4. No, not later today or after lunch or whatever. Update now.

Do you hear that? It’s the last dying breaths of Adobe Flash, which might finally be rendered obsolete by Mozilla’s release of Firefox 85 on Tuesday.Read more...

The Environmental Protection Agency said on Tuesday that one of the garbage barges helping clear the federal Superfund site in Brooklyn’s infamous Gowanus Canal of toxic waste has itself sunk.

We’re now three trading days into some frothy drama between Reddit and Wall Street over the rocketing price of GameStop stocks. Largely believed to be the result of the subreddit WallStreetBets, pseudonymous Redditors are claiming absolutely bonkers returns on their Robinhood accounts from a company that has been in…Read more...

Last week, 160 members of Congress sent a letter to the FCC raising concerns about some Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) winners’ ability to provide rural America with the broadband access they promised. The letter did not call out individual internet service providers or organizations by name, but it did call on…Read more...

Consulting is a lucrative business if you can get it. Doubly so if you can traffic in conspiracy theories with no public accountability.

The rollout of covid-19 vaccines in the U.S. is finally starting to pick up steam, but as vaccination becomes more common, the antivax movement is pulling its same old tricks. The latest disturbing trend: blaming the coronavirus vaccine for deaths, illnesses, or injuries without any solid evidence.Read more...

Say hello to Twubstack. Twitter announced on Tuesday it is buying one of newsletter service Substack’s competitors, the smaller Revue, in a deal with undisclosed terms.

So far, Marvel’s WandaVision has very much been Wanda Maximoff’s show and a testament to how the studio was sorely underutilizing her in its movies. But it’s also been a very quirky character study of Paul Bettany’s Vision, the increasingly human-like synthezoid who began his existence as a shared twinkle in Tony…Read more...

When a colossal plume of ash and lava exploded from Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in 1991, few people probably had their minds on the animal life in the area, much less one species of rodent. The Pinatubo mouse was feared extinct after the eruption, but 30 years later, it turns out that the scrappy critters are…Read more...

Well, here’s something you don’t see every day.Read more...

On Monday, Target became the latest retailer to stop selling Chaokoh coconut milk, according to a statement from PETA. In recent months, the animal rights organization has led a boycott campaign against Chaokoh claiming that it uses forced monkey labor to manufacture its product.Read more...

Plex just added a new subscription tier to its live TV and media streaming services: Plex Arcade, a cloud gaming service like Amazon Luna and Google Stadia, but focused entirely on retro arcade games.

Forty-eight years after its debut, despite its antiquated two-dimensional graphics and gameplay, Pong remains a fun and challenging video game. But what happens when you strip it down to just a single dimension? Mirko Pavleski still managed to come up with a way to make 1D Pong a challenge when battling someone head…Read more...

A recent phishing campaign by North Korean nation-state hackers successfully duped a number of security professionals who were involved in vulnerability research and development, according to a new report from Google’s Threat Analysis Group.Read more...

President Joe Biden is using one of the most powerful tools at his disposal to speed up the electric vehicle transition: the purchasing power of the federal government. On Monday, he announced he’s phasing out the federal government’s use of fossil fuel-powered cars, replacing them with an all-electric fleet, during a…Read more...

A strange outage is impacting internet users in the Northeast U.S. It’s not entirely clear what is going on, but it sure is annoying.

As early as next year, these four men could make history by becoming members of the the first commercial crew to visit the International Space Station.

The new normal for California is no normal.

Not content just to launch a new 5G phone aimed at photo and video pros, today Sony is launching its latest flagship mirrorless camera in the new Alpha 1.Read more...

Sexually transmitted infections continue to be a major headache for Americans and their wallets, according to a new report released Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About one in five Americans in the U.S. were thought to carry an STI in 2018, while there were 26 million new cases estimated…Read more...

There’s a famous story (also proven false) that NASA spent millions of dollars inventing a pressurized pen that could work in the zero gravity of space, while Soviet cosmonauts just used pencils. A new lens filter for cameras with a mirror finish allowing subjects to see themselves feels like the pencil, while cameras…Read more...

A lot of device makers like to throw the word “Pro” around to attract people looking for more premium devices, but when it comes to the $2,500 Xperia Pro, Sony really means it.Read more...