Thursday, September 15, 2022

Technology News and More-Friday Edition

Technology News and More..





Big news in the world of digital creative technology: Adobe today announced that it would acquire Figma for $20 billion, taking out one of its biggest rivals in the realm of digital design. Both the WSJ and Bloomberg reported earlier this morning that Adobe was close to announcing the deal to acquire Figma. In the end, Adobe confirmed the news to coincide with its quarterly earnings . Those Q3 ea



Editor’s note: This post was last updated on Sept. 15 with new information. Evolving testing and vaccination requirements for international travel continue to make it confusing for Americans to figure out what’s required for entry into specific countries. Some of the most restrictive nations have finally opened to tourists again, including Australia, which opened to tourists on Feb. 21 for the fi



1KGizmodo / 13h
The Blade Runner -aissance is nigh, especially now that we’re getting a new live-action series from Prime Video . After Denis Villeneuve’s 2017 film Blade Runner 2049 , starring Harrison Ford and Ryan Gosling, brought replicants back onto the big screen, it was only a matter of time before a TV show came on the horizon.… Read more...




Welcome to Chain Reaction , where we unpack and explain the latest in crypto news, drama and trends, breaking things down block by block for the crypto curious. For our Thursday episode this week, we dug into the institutional embrace of blockchain by stodgy financial powerhouses including mega PE firm KKR which announced this week that they were tokenizing one of their latest funds to provide ac



Episode 4 of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power finally reveals what the dwarves of Khazad-dûm have been mining in secret: mithril! A precious metal invented by J.R.R. Tolkien for his novels, mithril is both incredibly light and impossibly strong. Plus, its beauty never fades. If it sounds familiar, that's because mithril plays a key role in the Third Age of Middle-earth. Thorin gifts Bilb



The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power 's fourth episode opens with a terrifying and deeply important vision. Númenor's Queen-Regent Míriel (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) dreams that a great wave crashes over Númenor and destroys everything in its path. As the episode — aptly titled "The Great Wave" — reveals, this was no run-of-the-mill nightmare. This was a vision of Númenor's future, passed down



Brace yourselves. Today's Wordle solution is a hard one, and according to WordleBot, many players failed to figure it out. That's why we have these hints.



Uber was hacked, and it had to take its internal messaging service and engineering systems offline to investigate the incident, according to The New York Times . Sources who talked to the publication said employees were instructed not to go on Slack, where the bad actor had posted a message that read "I announce I am a hacker and Uber has suffered a data breach" (along with a bunch of emoji) befo



Walmart is upgrading its virtual fitting room service by now allowing people to upload pictures of themselves and see how clothes fit on their bodies. The new tool is called Be Your Own Model , a follow-up to Choose My Model. The old version had you choose a body that's similar to yours from a selection of 50 models to see how clothes may fit on you. It was a cool concept, but with notable limita



How did Cassian Andor become the brash, rogueish leader who helped steal the Death Star plans and ultimately destroy the Empire? Next week, we begin to find out and it sounds like it’ll be worth the wait . Read more...



TL;DR: The 2022 All-in-One Learn to Code Certification Bundle is on sale for £39.03, saving you 98% on list price. When you’re first learning to code, it might be overwhelming to see just how much there is to discover. Just picking a language could be difficult, let alone finding a place to start with it. The 2022 All-in-One Learn to Code Certification Bundle may be a helpful starting point if yo



Uber has suffered a significant data breach, with the New York Times reporting the rideshare company took several of its internal systems offline on Thursday while attempting to assess the damage. It's currently unclear how many people were impacted by the security breach, whether they were customers or employees, or specifically what information was compromised. However, it reportedly prompted U



TL;DR: Pre-order the Nintendo Switch OLED Model Pokémon Scarlet and Violet limited-edition console for £319.99 at Amazon, before its release on Nov. 4. Please form an orderly queue Pokémon fans. There's no need to rush. No pushing in the back. Everyone will get their chance to pre-order Nintendo Switch OLED Model Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet limited-edition console. Stop panicking. This OLE



Ladies and gentlemen (and everyone who's neither): The weekend. Or at least the weekend's delicious appetizer, Friday — and what better way to celebrate than with a fresh Wordle ? Whether you're smashing it or struggling, we're here to help every day . If you just want the answer, you can jump straight to the end of this article for September 16's Wordle solution. If you'd rather work through it



wingedjewels : Making life easier… by Marjorie Morrison Via Flickr: juvenile hummingbird feeding from its perch. Lowell Township, Michigan



heaveninawildflower : Page from a manuscript in Nasta'liq with an illuminated border (1501-1600). Ink, opaque watercolour, and gold on paper. Image and text information courtesy The Art Institute of Chicago.



The video platform will let more creators earn payments and place ads in Shorts, its TikTok competitor, according to audio from an internal meeting.



If you're one of the many people who plan to pay their respects during the queen's lying in state, you'll want to check out this tracker to see the wait time.



One of the most common arguments against EVs is that they don't start their lives as green options. How long does it take them to beat gas cars?



EcoFlow is back with another portable power station for consumers who want a way to keep their devices running when the power is out, but without using gas.



Researchers in Japan are teaching robots how to laugh in a natural way, paving the way for life-like conversations between machines and humans.



Enlarge (credit: Getty Images ) Researchers believe hackers with connections to the North Korean government have been pushing a Trojanized version of the PuTTY networking utility in an attempt to backdoor the network of organizations they want to spy on. Researchers from security firm Mandiant said on Thursday that at least one customer it serves had an employee who installed the fake network uti



The company said on Thursday that it was looking into the scope of the apparent hack.




The first rule of conducting layoffs is to not be a jerk about it. The second rule is to make sure the social media manager you just laid off doesn’t still have access to your accounts. Today, Tencent violated both of those rules as it laid off nearly all of the editorial staff at Fanbyte, an online gaming publication. Tencent is the world’s biggest gaming company and the most valuable company in



Lazydocker is an open-source terminal interface for managing your Docker environment. It gives you a powerful control surface for interacting with containers, images, and volumes. Lazydocker makes it quick and easy to inspect Docker objects without repeating lengthy terminal commands. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



Save your tears and face your fears during Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood by knowing exactly what you’re going to want to hit before attending the hot haunt ticket. Read more...



HBO's Avenue 5 returns next month for its second and final season. We'd almost forgotten about HBO's dark comedy Avenue 5, which debuted right before the world shut down in response to a global pandemic. But the series, which stars Hugh Laurie as the captain of a luxury cruise spaceship touring the solar system, was renewed for a second and final season. And now we have an official trailer to giv



Enlarge / A nurse uses a pulse oximeter on a patient in Plainfield, New Jersey, on October 26, 2016. (credit: Getty | Bloomberg ) For years, studies have found racial bias in common oxygen measuring devices called pulse oximeters, as well as alarming dangers from inaccurate blood oxygen measurements in dark-skinned patients. Now, the US Food and Drug Administration is summoning its expert advisor



200+Futurism / 6h
Secret Moon A team of astronomers at MIT suspect Saturn may be hiding the remains of an ancient moon in its rings — which could explain the planet's unusual tilt. In a new paper published in the journal Science this week, the team suggests there may have been a sizable satellite dubbed Chrysalis orbiting the gas giant for several billion years, a tantalizing new theory that could explain why the



Today’s launch by Rocket Lab, “The Owl Spreads Its Wings,” was as unremarkable as a rocket going to orbit can be, but it also marked a few milestones for the growing space company: 30 launches and 150 satellites taken to space. The company’s first trip to orbit was in January of 2018 , technically Electron’s second test flight but the first successful delivery of a payload to space. That was afte



Another Buzz Lightyear toy is destined for the market, but this model is far more advanced than the one released back in the 1990s... and far more expensive.



23Gizmodo / 7h
Quantum Leap is back —or at least, a reboot-sequel that introduces a whole new cast into the show’s preexisting time-travel set-up. Rather than Scott Bakula ’s Dr. Sam Beckett, the new series follows Dr. Ben Song (Raymond Lee) as he leaps between decades, helping out people in need, while his lab team back in 2022 tries… Read more...



Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Bungie) Last week, the Halo Infinite development team announced that it was walking back a years-old pledge to support split-screen co-op for the game's campaign mode. The feature had been delayed multiple times before being tossed into the bin , and the decision dashed the hopes of anyone who hoped to enjoy the game's campaign with at least one friend on a single



Enlarge / The Ig Nobel Prizes honor "achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think." (credit: Aurich Lawson / Getty Images) Would you give yourself an alcohol enema for science? Test the running speed of constipated scorpions in the lab? Build your very own moose crash test dummy? Or maybe you'd like to tackle the thorny question of why legal documents are so relentlessly inc



Enlarge (credit: Getty Images ) On Thursday, the Biden administration announced the latest in its renewable energy efforts, this time focused on a technology that hasn't really arrived yet: floating offshore wind turbines. Compared to turbines directly anchored on the seafloor, floating versions are estimated to cost about 50 percent more, placing large ocean areas off-limits to economic energy d



California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed into law a new bill that could upend how social media platforms deal with underage users. The bill, known as AB 2273, “requires online platforms to consider the best interest of child users and to default to privacy and safety settings that protect children’s mental and physical health and wellbeing,” according to a press release from Newsom’s office. T



Good therapists are out there, and we have some advice on how to find one . You’ll also want to feel out whether the type of therapy your therapist offers is appropriate for the issues you’re going through. But once you’ve gotten through the stage of getting to know each other, you may find yourself wondering: How do I … Read more...



When Square-Enix, one of the most famous games publishers in the world, announced that it was going to be delving into the world of NFTs—even as the world of NFTs crashed and burned around it—gamers were concerned about just how their games, everything from Final Fantasy to, uh, *checks notes* Various Daylife , could… Read more...



Coming to a port near you in the next few years: Cruise ships topped with giant glass domes. That’s the word from Princess Cruises , which is unveiling the first details of a new, bigger class of vessels that it plans to start rolling out in 2024. Princess says the first ship in the series, to be called Sun Princess, will have a giant geodesic dome at its top that covers a multideck pool and loun



To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here . Happy Thursday! Has everyone recovered from Zoom going down this morning ? Don’t worry, Zoom is back up, but if anything, we hope it helped you have a quieter day…for a while at least. — Christine and Haje The TechCrunch Top 3 One rival at a time : The digital desi



29Gizmodo / 8h
It appears that the International Space Station will welcome more amateur astronauts who are willing to pay a hefty price for trips to space. NASA is requesting proposals for two more private astronaut missions to the ISS that could fly to low Earth orbit as early as late 2023. Read more...



Unpredictability is one of the core challenges of shopping for cannabis. It’s incredibly rare to have a completely custom, controlled experience with weed, and even tougher to duplicate it. To people who don’t already enjoy the herb, these variables can seem too great to navigate, which is why marketing has tried to… Read more...



Hotel chains aren't pushing guests to tip out of affection for their lowest-paid employees. They're doing it as a way of controlling owner costs. The CEO of one hotel group even says they need guests to tip more - so they don't have to raise wages. Continue reading ...




In a shot across the bow to the buy now, pay later (BNPL) industry, the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) today issued a report suggesting that companies like Klarna and Afterpay, which allow customers to pay for products and services in installments, must be subjected to stricter oversight. The CFPB — in a step toward regulation — plans to issue guidance to oversee BNPL vendors an



The Federal Trade Commission is looking into the complex and potentially unfair economics and policies of the gig economy for “deceptive, unfair, and otherwise unlawful acts and practices.” Whether it’s forced arbitration, labor misclassification, or algorithmic pay and job distribution, the agency says it will go after any dubious tactics that hurt workers. To be clear, a “statement of policy” l



Like a number of attendees, I was taken with ClicBot when I first saw it a few CESes ago. We’re all up to our ears in “educational” robotics kits. STEM learning is important, of course, but the last several years have seen a veritable explosion in these sorts of toys, and your mileage is going to vary a good bit, based on the line. What really caught my eye, however, what the robot’s expressivene



82Futurism / 9h
Pure Optimism It's no secret that US president Joe Biden is prone to gaffes . But confusing a gas-guzzling Corvette sports car for an electric vehicle has us stumped. "You all know I'm a car guy," Biden tweeted this week . "Today I visited the Detroit Auto Show and saw firsthand the electric vehicles that give me so many reasons to be optimistic about our future." Confoundingly, though, the image



500+Futurism / 9h
Some short men are so insecure about their height that they're quite literally allowing doctors to break their bones during surgical leg-lengthening procedures. As GQ reports , the excruciating surgery can involve a year of "relentless, ambient" pain during healing — though the orthopedic surgeons who do the leg-lengthening often give their patients pain medicine, per a man who got it done, which



There’s no such thing as a free lunch, but there is such thing as a free smart thermostat. Energy companies all over the country are offering rebates to customers that can lower the price of a smart thermostat all the way down to zero, so before you buy an EccoBee on Amazon, check whether you qualify. Read more...



Although 345 backers dug into their pockets to the tune of more than $700,000, the scooter they backed — the Model Eleven — will never see the light of day. The company is offering its backers three options to make up for it, including a full refund, or a different model electric scooter. Hardware can be excruciatingly hard — I should know, I ran a $500,000 Kickstarter project I very publically f



Unagi is perhaps best known for its Model One and its ( now cancelled ) Model Eleven scooter. Today, the company announced it has a new micromobility transportation tool in the works, the Voyager. It packs significantly more range, power, acceleration and smart mobile app features while keeping the lightweight and portable design of its predecessor. The company is embracing a subscription model t



It may surprise the casual reader to learn that I don’t run a trillion-dollar multinational corporation. Like any decent tech writer, however, I’m more than happy to offer all my opinions on the matter in a very public forum. Having most closely followed hardware makers over the years, I’m often struck by one specific subject in particular: choice. I’m generally of the opinion that more choice is



It’s well established that, if a major tech company sees another platform succeeding based on a (relatively) original idea, it’s going to want to shamelessly copy that idea. And it’s probably also going to want some upgraded ad-tech to go with it. Read more...



45Wired / 9h
A preliminary agreement prevented a total shutdown, but many supply chains still face delays and disruption caused by staff shortages.



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Enlarge / An image of the "Have I Been Trained?" website featuring a search for one of its creators, Holly Herndon. (credit: Holly Herndon ) In response to controversy over image synthesis models learning from artists' images scraped from the Internet without consent—and potentially replicating their artistic styles—a group of artists has released a new website that allows anyone to see if their



Enlarge (credit: Bloomberg / Contributor | Bloomberg ) After a TikTok accusing Patreon of ignoring reports and knowingly profiting off accounts posting child sexual abuse materials (CSAM) attracted hundreds of thousands of views, more TikTokers piled on, generating more interest . Patreon immediately responded by branding the TikToks as disinformation. In a blog , Patreon denied allegations, accu



A proof of concept shows mast1core being used to load an external PS2 ISO into the system's emulator. Longtime console hacker CTurt has blasted what he calls an "essentially unpatchable" hole in the security of the PS4 and PS5, detailing a proof-of-concept method that should allow for the installation of arbitrary homebrew applications on the consoles. CTurt says he disclosed his exploit, dubbed



No one wants to get stranded with a dead battery and a car that won’t start, then dig out the jumper cables and find another vehicle to give you a jump start. And you don’t have to, as long as you own a portable jump starter. Read This Article on Review Geek ›



Climate change very likely intensified the South Asian monsoon that flooded Pakistan in recent weeks, killing more than 1,000 people and destroying nearly 2 million homes. That’s according to a new analysis by World Weather Attribution, a network of scientists who use climate models, weather observations, and other tools to determine whether global warming increased the likelihood or severity of



The Federal Trade Commission is making its own bid to protect gig workers against exploitation. The regulator has adopted a policy statement detailing how it will tackle gig workers' problems. The FTC plans to step in when there are misrepresentations about pay, costs, benefits and work terms. Officials also expect to intervene with "unfair or deceptive" algorithms, harsh contracts and anti-compe



21Gizmodo / 9h
As much as you think you have full control of you and your wallet, it’s getting increasingly difficult for anybody using an app or a website to avoid getting suckered into surrendering your money or personal information to misleading or tricky UI design. Read more...



31Gizmodo / 9h
Your TV brain might be completely hardwired into magical rings and lusty dragons these days, but there are so many more sci-fi, fantasy, and horror shows—both returning and new—coming to screens this season. Read more...




Apple has four new iPhone models, including two Pro options with their own special features. Which ones do consumers like best? We asked around to find out.



The Amazon Fire 7 tablet fills a gap in the low-tier tablet category, but our reviewer found several things that could be improved.



In 2008, an amusing story about Queen Elizabeth playing Wii games surfaced, and it wasn't too long after that when a gold-plated console for her was revealed.



200+Futurism / 9h
Fly-By On Wednesday night, thousands of onlookers in Ireland and the UK watched in awe as the green fireball of a low flying meteor streaked across the night sky of residential areas. First spotted after nightfall, the fireball spurned over 1,000 reports to the International Meteor Organization. In other words, there were a lot of eyeballs on this burning space debris. And luckily for all of us a



Home theater sound systems with sound bars have succeeded in creating immersive audio that transformed our living rooms into personal cinemas. Suddenly, the nightly news and the big game had the same booming, dramatic sound reproduction as blockbuster action movies. But sound bars aren’t simply a way to recreate a cinema sound experience in the home. As audio technologies have leapt forward — to



See something you like? Just click on the product links to shop directly from the video, and check out the full recipes below! Credit: Mashable Credit: Mashable



500+Wired / 9h
These are tantalizing hints that microbes might have lived on Mars billions of years ago, but scientists need to study the rocks back on Earth to be sure.



One thing that sets Wordle apart from other games is that you face a grid with no clues whatsoever at the start. You get to make the first move, and gameplay follows from your choices. Your starting word matters—so what do you choose? Read more...



A series of technical issues following a third successful course correction maneuver are threatening to sideline NASA’s CAPSTONE mission. Controllers say they’re making progress with the tiny cubesat, but they’re not ready to attempt a recovery operation just yet. Read more...



400+Gizmodo / 10h
Scientists in Germany may have demonstrated a new way to treat and possibly even cure the chronic condition lupus. In a study out Thursday, the team describes how patients given a form of immunotherapy currently used to treat certain cancers have experienced a sustained remission of their symptoms, along with the… Read more...



Ethereum has successfully completed its highly anticipated shift from proof-of-work (PoW) into proof-of-stake (PoS) in a process known as the Merge. The plan was years in the making and has undergone a seemingly endless series of tests and tinkering. It finally happened after being one of the most anticipated and talked-about events in the crypto world this year. But now the event has passed, wit



Sept. 15 marks the start of National Hispanic Heritage Month here in the U.S., commemorating a Hispanic heritage dating to the 1400s, when explorers from Spain and Portugal began colonizing the New World. Today, many sites from that significant and often violent era — and the centuries that followed — still survive. While these can be illuminating, enriching focal points for an exploration of thi



200+Futurism / 10h
Fact-Checkmate Before you say anything: yes, this is beneath us. But news is news, and this ongoing chess drama demands to be unpacked. And so it's with great regret that we break down why, exactly, Elon Musk accused a young chess player of using vibrating, remote-controlled anal beads to beat the game's current No. 1 star. "If they want me to strip fully naked, I will do it," the young champion



Summer is finally winding down, and there are few things as satisfying as gaming during “pumpkin spice” months. The temperatures cooling off mean you can finally game on your PC without the fear of your desktop overheating. Still, if your go-to device is a little less than powerful, there’s a sale on tower gaming PCs going on right now so you can be ready for all the fun the season has to offer.



98Futurism / 10h
Post-Merge The Ethereum blockchain has finally completed its long-awaited "Merge ," switching from a proof-of-work to proof-of-stake system, a change that has allowed it to become substantially more environmentally friendly. It's a pivotal moment in the history of the tech, with experts hailing it as the "biggest event in crypto since the creation of bitcoin and Ethereum," as Jon Charbonneau, a r



100+Gizmodo / 10h
While the utterly bonkers TV series Riverdale is how most people know the venerable Archie Comics franchise nowadays, the publisher hasn’t just been riding the show’s coattails. Between bizarre mash-ups like Archie Meets Pretty Little Liars and horror comics like Jughead: The Hunger (where he becomes a werewolf), … Read more...



36Gizmodo / 10h
The Apple Watch and iPhone 14/14 Pro’s new Emergency SOS feature, which allows you to call for emergency help via satellite, is one of the more compelling additions to the company’s latest devices. It offers a way for users to get help in dire situations without cellular service or WiFi. Apple said the service would… Read more...



The meals are “presented on tableware from Singapore luxury brand Luzerne, elegantly plated and accompanied by appetizers, breads and desserts” – even for those traveling in economy! Continue reading ...



Space junk is a growing problem in the skies around Earth. In July 2019, it almost turned into a huge issue for the International Space Station.




Nothing Phone 1 presents an interesting conundrum for consumers: Buy now for the thrill, or wait for a device that has more than a unique set of lights?



Android phones are known to get slower with time. Here are some of the causes for your Android phone to be slow and how you can fix them.



Tesla is once again in the headlines over its Autopilot features, this time due to a proposed class action lawsuit that lobs accusations at the automaker.



South Korean cinema is phenomenal. And if you’re an aficionado familiar with Park Chan-wook’s work ( Oldboy , The Handmaiden ), you’ll know that Decision to Leave is going to be a must-see. South Korea’s official submission for Best International Feature Film at the Academy Awards, and winner of Cannes’ 2022 Best Director award, Decision to Leave reveals a detective and his prime suspect entangle



The sneaker world has a dirty secret — the carbon footprint of just about every shoe out there weighs more than the shoe itself. Then there’s the extensive use of plastics and polyesters, foam and rubber, nearly all of which is derived from fossil fuels. Those clean kicks might not be so clean after all. Recently, though, sneaker companies have started to wake up and address the issue. Some, like



that is designed to reward creators who create engaging shows and build loyal audiences. A spokesperson from Amazon told TechCrunch that Amp has allocated “millions of dollars” to pay creators through monthly rewards but didn’t provide an exact figure. The company says the range of payments for each creator varies based on different factors and that the number of creators it rewards each month m



The long-teased Blade Runner sequel series is real. Variety has confirmed Amazon has ordered production of Blade Runner 2099 for Prime Video. Original movie director Ridley Scott will serve as an executive producer alongside Silka Luisa ( Halo and Shining Girls ), who will also be the showrunner. The premise of 2099 isn't yet clear beyond its setting 50 years after Blade Runner 2049 , but Amazon'



I am a fashion-challenged person. My parents trained me to put on pants before leaving the house, but that’s pretty much where my sartorial education stopped. For most of my adult life I have wallowed in fashion confusion, unable to keep track of the rules governing when and where I was allowed to dress a certain way. Read more...



Four in five companies have had at least one serious cloud security incident in the past 12 months, a new report from Snyk has found, with data breaches, data leaks, and perimeter breaches all sadly increasingly common. The attacks occur for a number of reasons: either because a company's current security solutions don’t work properly, or have limited functionality in the cloud (78%), or the orga



A known Chinese threat actor is recycling old malware , in an attempt to evade detection, cut down on costs, and send researchers on a wild goose chase. A report from Symantec says the group, known as Webworm, has used at least three ancient malware variants (and by “ancient”, we mean from 2008 - 2017), modified them a little bit, and then tested them out against IT service providers in Asia to s



Read more...



There are pros and cons to each major hotel loyalty program , especially when it comes to elite perks. Personally World of Hyatt Globalist status is my favorite hotel loyalty status that I have, and that goes beyond Hyatt having the best suite upgrade policy for Globalist members. World of Hyatt unarguably has the most generous elite breakfast benefit of any major hotel loyalty program (okay, may



The Windows Subsystem for Android is a feature in Windows 11 for running Android applications and games on your PC. Microsoft has rolled out many improvements since launch, and now another update is in the works. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



90Mashable / 10h
Facebook's content moderation systems are clearly in need of repair. On Thursday, Meta's Oversight Board announced that it had reversed two of Facebook's decisions to remove content from its platform. The independent group's conclusions point to major flaws in Facebook's content moderation protocols in two major areas: the platform's use of automated systems to take down content and the removal o



See, the problem is that people simply aren't buying enough. To rectify this issue, Amazon announced on Thursday that it is introducing a new Alexa feature , dubbed "Customers Ask Alexa," wherein "expert brands" provide answers to customer questions like “How can I remove pet hair from my carpet?” that also just so happen to prominently feature that brand's particular product. Per the company, br



66Gizmodo / 11h
Star Trek: Lower Decks ’ third season has opened in a funny way . Not “ha-ha” funny, although there’s still plenty of that to be had. Instead, it’s of a more peculiar sort—the inescapable feeling that, no matter how good the gags remain, the show is unsure what steps forward it wants to take with its main characters . Read more...



Being a ski bum on the East Coast is no easy feat. To get some good vertical every year requires being strategic about booking ski trips — especially for those popular three-day holiday weekends. With the ever-rising costs of lift tickets, flights, lodging, rental cars and sometimes ski rentals, one quick weekend can easily turn into a multi-thousand dollar adventure. That’s why it is so importan



The only small physical space people like to spend less time in than a change room is a portable toilet, and even then, it’s close. We tend to approach trying on pants in a department store like defusing a bomb. If it doesn’t look good, just quickly evacuate the building. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



Thursday, September 15 marks the kickoff of the seventh year of Game Devs of Color Expo, which is a weekend-long event that celebrates games developed by game developers of color from around the world. You can watch the hour-long direct, which highlights some of the many titles that are featured on the official page, on both YouTube and Twitch . And be sure to check out the Gradient Convergence p



Snapchat is the rare social media app that never made the jump from mobile to desktop. Instagram has a web app, WhatsApp has a desktop app, but, until now, you always needed your phone by your side if you wanted to Snap. Starting today, though, you can pick up those conversations on your Mac or PC, whether you’re… Read more...




Institutions are unbothered by crypto assets continuing to trade far below all-time highs, LMAX Group CEO David Mercer told TechCrunch. Even though the total crypto market capitalization has fallen from over $2 trillion at the beginning of the year to about $1 trillion today, institutional investors “haven’t wavered one inch,” Mercer said. “It hasn’t gone backward,” Mercer said. After the chaos s



Splatoon is a simple game: You’re a squid- or octopus-like humanoid in a post-apocalyptic world, and all you wanna do is shoot people with colorful ink and buy cute outfits. I had never played a Splatoon game before Splatoon 3 was released last week, but my friends were all hyping it up, so I jumped in. There’s not a ton of backstory to catch up on in this third installment — just accept that you



As iOS 16 Lock Screen customization takes off, an iPhone personalization app called Top Widgets has soared to the No. 1 spot on the U.S. App Store’s top free apps list, displacing BeReal. The Sichuan, China-based app maker first introduced Top Widgets in August 2020 to capitalize on the introduction of Home Screen widgets with the release of iOS 14. With its newly added support for iOS 16’s Lock



Stop trying to make Polywork happen. It’s already happening. You may even be polyworking as you read this. Polywork is a venture-backed startup that is building a professional network to help people express their multihyphenated work lives. In other words, if you’re a reporter, who also podcasts, wants to write a book and would love to one day help teach at a university, Polywork wants to give yo



100+Gizmodo / 11h
Besides the design you chose, another part of proudly showing off a tattoo is reminding others of all the pain you endured to get it. But that might not always be the case, as researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology have found a way to borrow a new medical technology to create self-applied tattoos that… Read more...



100+Gizmodo / 11h
The Marvel Cinematic Universe has seen its heroes battle hyper-intelligent AIs , evil aliens with infinite powers, multiverse-traveling witches , butchers of gods, and so much more. But no one has ever had a battle like She-Hulk just had—in a courtroom, with her literal identity on the line. By doing so, the audience… Read more...



As expected, the weeks leading up to Apple's September event were filled with leaks about the new Series 8 smartwatches, and some of them were proven accurate.



The Hennessey Venom F5 is intended to set world records -- and so far, all indicators point to this supercar's ability to do just that.



100+Wired / 11h
The Russian blockade and bombardments are cutting off thousands of tons of grain, threatening the food supply in countries that rely on wheat exports.



Partiful wants to be the go-to option for sending online invitations. Facebook events, we hardly knew ye.



After grounding flights to clear the skies for the procession of Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin between Buckingham Palace and Westminster Hall on Wednesday, speculation has been rife as to what effect Monday’s state funeral could have on air travel. Heathrow Airport (LHR) has provided a full scope of its plans for Sept. 19 in the most minute detail, revealing that around 15% of scheduled flights wil



Call of Duty Warzone 2 is rolling out some major changes to the battle royale’s circles. While the original Warzone followed the standard battle royale formula – in which players are penned in to an ever-shrinking area, forcing them to bunch up – Warzone 2 is taking a different approach. As revealed during Call of Duty Next , players won’t just be funneled into a single circle, but multiple areas



Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0 has finally been revealed and it's set to shake things up as promised. Today's Call of Duty Next delved into Modern Warfare 2 , Warzone 2 , and Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile. We were treated to a new trailer for the Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer reveal , and the news that Call of Duty is getting a third-person mode when Modern Warfare 2 launches later this year. And battle



There is a security flaw in Microsoft Teams that allows threat actors to log into other people’s accounts, even if those accounts are protected with multi-factor authentication, researchers have claimed. Cybersecurity analysts from Vectra say the Teams desktop application for Windows, Linux, and Mac, stores user authentication tokens in cleartext, without any locks guarding the access. Anyone wit



When shooting in 16:9 with the iPhone camera, you may notice part of the viewfinder is covered by translucent black bars. That area will appear in the final shot, so let’s make it easier to see. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



100+Lifehacker / 11h
You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain, and I fear I am entering my villain era. Not intentionally, but my brain seems to be gravitating towards stranger and stranger things. Take this dish, which would be considered “a big crime” both by people from the American South and… Read more...



Southern California is cleaning up after massive landslides this past weekend destroyed homes and washed away cars in small mountain communities. Read more...



25Gizmodo / 11h
AST SpaceMobile has established communications with its prototype satellite, BlueWalker 3, confirming its successful arrival in Earth orbit. The company will soon unfurl the satellite’s massive antenna array, which has astronomers worried that it could block their views of celestial objects in the sky. Read more...



4KFuturism / 11h
Climate Control A group of scientists propose unleashing huge amounts of microscopic aerosol chemicals from 125 massive military jets over the Earth's North and South Poles, in a desperate bid to refreeze the melting ice caps, Sky News reports — a plan that's already proving highly controversial among experts. To make a sizeable dent in the accelerating decline in ice shelves, we'd have to fly ro



We strongly recommend checkups with your eye doctor and a regular updating of your prescription, but sometimes life gets in the way. You might break or lose your glasses just weeks after your old prescription expired, or you might just want spare glasses or contacts. But to get new glasses or contacts, you usually… Read more...




Coinbase wants to talk politics again. The cryptocurrency platform has launched a tool to inform its users on where their representatives stand on crypto. This week, Coinbase began integrating the company’s crypto policy efforts into its app. The company’s CEO, Brian Armstrong , said on Twitter the move will “help our… Read more...



47Mashable / 12h
The NFL week 2 clash between Los Angeles Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs will kick off an 11-year partnership which will see Amazon Prime Video become the new home of Thursday Night Football . It’s the first time a streaming service has secured exclusive, season-long streaming rights to NFL games in the US. The $1.2 billion-per-year contract will kickstart on Thursday, September 15 as The Charger



Hyatt is offering triple points on spending at their hotel restaurants when you are not staying as a guest through December 20, 2022. You can earn points on dine-in, delivery and takeout as long as the charge is made by hotels set up to award points, and you provide them with your Hyatt account number. Continue reading ...



The leader of the Federal Aviation Administration thinks things have turned a corner after a summer of delays. Billy Nolen, the agency’s acting administrator, told reporters Thursday that he felt the worst of the air traffic control delays were likely in the past. “I’m guardedly optimistic that the rest of this year should be good,” Nolen said following an appearance at the U.S. Chamber of Commer



At 1.8 cents per mile, Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles routinely top TPG’s list of most valuable airline miles . Unfortunately, Mileage Plan miles are also among the hardest to earn as Alaska doesn’t partner with any major transferable points currencies other than Marriott Bonvoy . If you’re trying to top up your account balance and have already exhausted all the easy ways to earn Alaska Airli



Hey, all, greetings from Queens. I’m back home from Apple and happy to be back from the high double-digit heat (but it was a dry heat!). I got a strong response from last week’s newsletter, wherein we discussed questions around robotic delivery. Always nice to be reminded that people are, in fact, reading this thing we put out into the world every week. One reader brought up the question of safet



33Gizmodo / 12h
There’s unfortunate news today for electric scooter fans who were excited about taking one of the internet’s most promising prospective models for a test drive one day. Today, Unagi revealed that it’s cancelling its Indiegogo-funded Model Eleven scooter , and will be offering backers full refunds or compensation with… Read more...



500+Gizmodo / 12h
There will be no Star Wars movie released in 2023. Rogue Squadron , the Patty Jenkins-directed Star Wars film about pilots , has long been scheduled for December 2023, but late last year news broke it was likely to be delayed . Disney kept the film on the schedule for nine months since—but today, finally took it off. Read more...



200+Futurism / 12h
Duke Nukem In October 2021, months before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, YouTuber Kyle Hill got a rare glimpse inside the New Safe Confinement (NSC) "sarcophagus" at the Chernobyl nuclear plant. It's a fascinating glimpse behind the scenes, a rare tour of the ground zero of one of the worst nuclear disaster in human history — and a terrifying reminder of what is at stake given the ongoing war in t



A new AI tool could help researchers discover previously unknown proteins and design entirely new ones. When harnessed, it could help unlock the development of more efficient vaccines, speed up research for the cure to cancer, or lead to completely new materials. Alphabet-owned AI lab DeepMind took the world by surprise in 2020 when it announced AlphaFold, an AI tool that used deep learning to so



Much-anticipated battle royale sequel Call of Duty: Warzone 2 finally has a release date. Announced during the Call of Duty Next livestream, Warzone 2 is set to release on November 16. That’ll bring it into players’ hands only a couple of weeks after Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 launches in October. It’ll release alongside its first multiplayer season. Like the original Warzone , each seasonal



Arm has lifted the lid on a new generation of Neoverse cores designed to deliver maximal performance and power efficiency in the data center. The new flagship core, Neoverse V2 (codenamed Demeter), is said to offer “market-leading integer performance” across cloud and HPC workloads, in addition to advances in hardware-based security. Neoverse V2 will feature imminently inside the hotly anticipate



81Gizmodo / 12h
U.S. Senator Ron Wyden says his office was informed this summer that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is building a massive database with content seized from Americans’ cellphones at the border. Without warrants, the agency permits thousands of employees to search the database “for any reason,” the Oregon senator… Read more...



Windows Terminal is a great addition to Windows 10 and Windows 11, and it offers numerous improvements over the old Windows Console Host. Here are the best ways to open Windows Terminal on Windows 11. Read This Article on How-To Geek ›



From the topping on a sandwich to an ingredient in omelets, swiss cheese is a favorite among many cheese lovers. The food is also different than a lot of other cheese thanks to its holes, but why exactly does Swiss cheese have holes? Read This Article on LifeSavvy ›



Rumors indicate that Google will debut a budget version of its Chromecast with Google TV alongside the Pixel 7 on October 6th. And it may cost $20 less than the original model, according to a new leak. Read This Article on Review Geek ›



GM’s self-driving company Cruise offers robotaxi rides in California with no human driver present. After years of working on its self-driving fleet vehicles, Cruise received regulatory approval back in June. Now, the CEO confirmed its service is quickly expanding to Austin and Phoenix. Read This Article on Review Geek ›



For elite AAdvantage members, I think changes to how status is earned at American Airlines beginning next year mean that this card makes more sense than ever. It makes more sense than the main consumer AAdvantage card with its $99 annual fee. And it finally makes sense to spend on the card, too. Continue reading ...



You know what’s a huge pain where the =sum() don’t shine? Financial reporting, planning and analysis. I often go on and on ( and on and on ) about startups not getting their financials and operating plans right in their startup pitch decks, so … not gonna lie, I picked Austrian startup Helu.io , which completed a €9.8 million round in July, in the hope that a company that focuses exclusively on F



Opal , a “digital well-being assistant,” is updating its app today to help individuals better monitor and manage their screen time usage. While most screen time apps are focused on helping parents manage their children’s screen time, Opal’s goal has been to help anyone — yes, even adults — develop their own healthier habits around their use of distracting websites and apps. With its latest releas




This year marks the beginning of Amazon’s multibillion dollar 11-year deal with the National Football League, making Prime Video the first streamer to have exclusive rights to an NFL package. Previously, Amazon shared the games with Fox and the NFL Network. Tonight, September 15, 2022, is Prime Video’s first exclusive “Thursday Night Football” game, and Amazon is pulling out all the stops to give



Building a startup is no simple task regardless of the vertical you claim as your own. The reality, though, is that some startups — think robotics or climate tech — require a lot more time in the oven before they’re fully baked revenue generators. A longer building time affects both startups and investors alike, which is why we’re thrilled that Gene Berdichevsky, CEO and co-founder of Sila; Erin



100+TechCrunch / 12h
Another day, another lawsuit against Tesla and its advanced driver assistance systems. A lawsuit was filed Wednesday in the California Northern District Court alleging that Tesla’s ADAS systems cause vehicles to run red lights, miss turns and veer into traffic, all the while costing Tesla owners thousands of dollars. Tesla vehicles come standard with an ADAS known as Autopilot. However, owners ha



Escend is a U.K.-based startup that must have figured that scooters were too big, instead deciding to shrink micromobility even further (what are we calling this — picomobility?), adding a battery pack and motors to rollerblades. The company started selling its ‘blades today. The blades use regenerative braking, and have been designed to last; between a sturdy-looking chassis and a modular design



Call of Duty is doubling down on mobile play with Warzone Mobile , a battle royale heading to Android and iOS devices in 2023. Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile will feature 120-player matches with operators, weapons, locations and combat familiar to existing Warzone fans. The game will support a shared Battle Pass, social features and cross-progression with Modern Warfare II and Warzone 2.0 , both of



Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0 will officially land on November 16th, bringing Modern Warfare II environments, gameplay and technology to a large-scale battlefield. This release date has been floating around the internet for a few months now, and Activision confirmed it today during a showcase about the new, connected future of Call of Duty . Modern Warfare II and Warzone 2.0 will mark a turning point



Gone are the days when having a professional clean your home was a sign that you were rich—like really well-off. With new apps, affordable prices, and so many of us working multiple jobs , hiring a house-cleaner is not only doable, but often necessary. Still, if you’ve never done it, it can be intimidating. What is the… Read more...



Your outfits are awesome. Too awesome, in fact, to hold knowledge of them all inside your head. Posting your OOTDs (outfit of the day) on Insta and TikTok is the traditional way to catalog your daily looks, but, if you have an iPhone running iOS 16, there’s a more effective—not to mention cooler—method you could be… Read more...



Picture perfect apples are tumbling into grocery stores with no sign of stopping, and will continue to do so for the next month or so. Make the most of this bounty by cooking up one of the more concentrated iterations of apple—apple butter, with a twist. It’s always been a dippable, spreadable, velvety smooth fall… Read more...



New details have dropped for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 including a brand new third-person mode. Call of Duty has historically been a first-person series. That's part of what made it difficult to get the hang of it when I first dabbled in the franchise all those years ago. But if you have a friend who's first-person challenged, then the Modern Warfare 2 's new third-person mode could be just



Activision has given us our first look at Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2’s multiplayer in a fresh trailer. Revealed during the Call of Duty Next livestream, the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 clip gives us our first look at several of the game’s new features in action. The game’s Gunsmith weapon customizer has been revamped, water is now a focus of the game, and even player movement has been



Hackers are stealing healthcare payments, by diverting them to bank accounts under their control, the FBI is warning. The Bureau was forced to issue a warning after more than $4.6 million was stolen in three separate incidents where criminals would send out phishing emails, or reach out to people working at payment processors and financial departments, pretending to be support center employees. T



The long anticipated "merge" event for the Ethereum blockchain is finally happening, and it's a great day for any gamers out there looking to get the next-gen Nvidia Lovelace graphics cards (such as the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 ) that we're anticipating in the next few weeks. Ethereum is the world's second-largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin, and it has been an especially troublesome one for PC g



Busy PC gamers can now get an accurate rundown of how long it takes to complete a Game Pass game before booting it up. Xbox Game Pass has tons of cool features for console gamers on Xbox Series X |S, like the recent Discord integration . But its latest update is one for PC Game Pass, and sees Xbox partner up with HowLongToBeat to let you know how long it will take to complete a title in your PC G



200+Gizmodo / 12h
Breakout star of one of television’s best comedy’s of the last decade The Good Place, Manny Jacinto has recently been popping up in major properties like Top Gun: Maverick and a favorite to be primed to be snatched up by a franchise. And now according to Deadline , he’s joining the Star Wars universe in Leslye… Read more...



39Gizmodo / 12h
A NASA spacecraft called DART is set to deliberately crash into a small asteroid as part of a planetary defense test. While this space rock isn’t of concern, what we learn from the mission could help us if ever an asteroid does head our way. Read more...



Originality is a dead language, at least in the world of social media apps. TikTok’s held up as the most popular app for its curated, AI-based content feed, but it’s realized there is a growing market of young people who are tired of scrolling through celebrities’ incoherent buzzing and algorithm-based feeds.… Read more...



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Enlarge / Using Teams in a browser is actually safer than using Microsoft's desktop apps, which are wrapped around a browser. It's a lot to work through. (credit: Jernej Furman / Flickr ) Microsoft's Teams client stores users' authentication tokens in an unprotected text format, potentially allowing attackers with local access to post messages and move laterally through an organization, even with



Discord's Forum Channels feature. [credit: Discord ] Discord announced a new feature on Wednesday called "Forum Channels" to allow for more organized and asynchronous discussions within servers. The intent with Forum Channels seems to be to make it easier for specific conversations to continue for extended periods without the worry that a topic change or another simultaneous conversation will bur




Enlarge (credit: Google) Google CEO Sundar Pichai seems to be on a cost-cutting mission. After he said that the company's productivity was "not where it needs to be" in July, Google axed the Google Hardware laptop division and spun off what was left of Project Loon to try to survive as an independent company. The latest move is aimed at Google Area 120 "idea incubator" group, which Bloomberg repo



Enlarge / Still from a demo video showing ACT-1 performing a search on Redfin.com in a browser when asked to "find me a house." (credit: Adept) Yesterday, California-based AI firm Adept announced Action Transformer (ACT-1) , an AI model that can perform actions in software like a human assistant when given high-level written or verbal commands. It can reportedly operate web apps and perform intel



Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Yuichiro Chino) Ethereum developers today executed the "Merge," an upgrade that eliminates mining and dramatically reduces the energy consumption of the world's second-biggest cryptocurrency. Today's action "completed Ethereum's transition to proof-of-stake consensus, officially deprecating proof-of-work and reducing energy consumption by ~99.95 percent," the Ether



Enlarge (credit: Evgen Kotenko/Getty Images) Yurii Shchyhol doesn’t have a lot of time to spare. The head of the Derzhspetszviazok, Ukraine’s version of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, can be forgiven for working speedily. His country is under attack—and with it, the world order. “This is the first time ever in history that we’ve had such a full-fledged cyberwar happening



Enlarge (credit: Adrienne Bresnahan ) The research community is excited about the potential of DNA to function as long-term archival storage. That's largely because it's extremely dense, chemically stable for tens of thousands of years, and comes in a format we're unlikely to forget how to read. While there has been some interesting progress , efforts have mostly stayed in the research community



Enlarge (credit: Ernst Haas / Contributor | Ernst Haas ) [ Update: Seesaw told Ars that "less than 0.5 percent of Seesaw users were affected. Seesaw blocked the attack swiftly to prevent the message from being distributed widely." Although it "can't discuss the specifics of additional steps" taken to enhance security so far, some of the "additional mitigation steps to prevent an attack from achie



Enlarge / A rendering of a public wireless charging station. In fact, WiTricity expects most wireless chargers to be installed in homes. (credit: WiTricity) In our recent explainer on electric vehicle charging , you might have noticed that we didn't mention wireless EV charging. Now common on smartphon


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