E-Technology

Crowley and Aziraphale standing together in Soho.Image: Amazon StudiosThough the first season of Amazon’s adaptation of Good Omens covered all of the beats from Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s original novel and then some, there were so many interesting details about the series’ world that were begging for more exploration, like Aziraphale and Crowley’s millenia-spanning…

Get ready for more underwater adventure.Image: Warner Bros.The Rock’s got his eyes set on Santa Claus for a new project. The Dexter continuation is somehow picking up a very familiar face. Korean webtoon Deep is coming to TV. Plus, Rick & Morty takes on a Captain Planet riff, and what’s next on Tuca & Bertie.…

Photo: Igor Golovniov (Getty Images)Soon you won’t have to set up a separate profile just to sell stuff through Venmo, though you’ll still be on the hook for the same transaction fee that business profiles already pay. The new policy will take effect on July 20, according to a Sunday email to users announcing the…

Photo: Justin Sullivan (Getty Images)Apple has expanded its guidance on the potential magnetic interference of its gadgets with medical devices. In recent days, it released a long and detailed list of products that it says should be kept a “safe distance away” from medical devices.In a support article, Apple acknowledged that under certain conditions, magnets…

Photo: Lionel Bonaventure / AFP (Getty Images)The day that Telegram gets into group video calling has finally arrived. In case you forgot, that’s OK. It has been more than a year since the company announced it was working on the feature. But hey, better late than never, right? In its newest blog, Telegram said that…

File photo of a lobster in Bar Harbor, Maine, something that would not be allowed in Maine’s Tricentennial Time Capsule because it’s perishable.Photo: Joe Raedle (Getty Images)Maine is creating a 99-year time capsule to mark the state’s bicentennial celebrations. And organizers are looking for ideas from the public on what to include inside the capsule…

The Lenovo Yoga Tab 13 features a micro HDMI port for converting to a monitor. Photo: Sam Rutherford / GizmodoFor anyone asking themselves about who is still making Android tablets look no further than Lenovo. The company introduced various new Android tablets, one of which features the famed HDMI port that was rumored a while…

Photo: Nicolas Asfouri (Getty Images)Tesla has already chalked up plenty of bad press in China this year, with officials scrutinizing its handling of customer data and protests claiming that Chinese customer complaints are going ignored. The electric car manufacturer added another controversy to the list this weekend: China’s market regulator says Tesla is recalling nearly…

Photo: Alastair Pike (Getty Images)Google said Friday it will notify people when they look up breaking news or other “rapidly evolving” issues that their search results may be unreliable. It’s one of several fact-checking measures the tech giant has incorporated in recent years to curb the spread of misinformation and provide important context to topics…

Ann Dowd in The Handmaid’s TaleImage: HuluAnn Dowd is one of the best, underrated actresses working right now. She has experience with every genre but is often cast as cold and stoic characters—much like her role as Aunt Lydia in Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale.Season four saw a reckoning for several characters, including Lydia. When viewers…

Gif: Device Orchestra (YouTube) / GizmodoIf, unlike me, you don’t spend an embarrassing number of hours scrolling through TikTok each week, you may be wondering why the campy disco hit “Rasputin” is climbing the charts more than four decades after its original release. Boney M.’s ‘70s ode to “Russia’s greatest love machine” is having one…

Jordana Brewster in F9Image: UniversalUnfortunately, riding the wave of Scream and subsequent teen horror film successes’ doomed The Faculty to failure. With a poorly timed Christmas release, the film became an unexpected flop.The Faculty is a teenage take on Alien invasion and how a group of high school students try to survive the faculty and…

Photo: Neilson Barnard (Getty Images)Someone is using cracked copies of top video game titles to install crypto-mining malware on PCs belonging to hundreds of thousands of unsuspecting victims—a ploy that’s netted the criminals a hefty $2 million so far.Researchers at Avast this week said newly discovered malware dubbed Crackonosh had been detected in pirated copies…

Part of the cover for Madame X Vol. 11.Image: DC ComicsWe might not be getting a Gambit movie anytime soon, but at least we’ve got another card-wielding superhuman on the way: DC Comics’ Madame Xanadu. True Blood writer and executive producer Angela Robinson is heading to HBO Max with a new TV series based on…

Photo: Graeme Jennings (Getty Images)After two years of investigations and a 30-hour debating session on the House floor, the US House Judiciary Committee voted on Thursday to pass a sweeping six-bill package collectively meant to reign in Big Tech’s massive market power. Even though there’s been a recent bipartisan push for a major tech crackdown,…

Image: MozillaIt’s no secret that companies are quietly siphoning your data whenever you go online. Mozilla believes that people should have more control over their data. That’s why it’s launching Rally, a “privacy-first” data sharing platform designed to provide users with more agency over how their data is collected, used, and shared, the company announced…

Image: Hasbro, McFarlane, and LegoWelcome back to Toy Aisle, io9’s regular round-up of the newest and greatest plastic-based news. This week: Loki brings its latest mystery to the toy shelf, McFarlane goes retro with the Bright Knight, and Donald Duck (and his nephews) get some adorably animated figures. Check it out!Image: Beast KingdomBeast Kingdom Dynamic…

Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) does something shitty.Screenshot: HBOAs we’ve learned, the torture on Game of Thrones wasn’t all fake. Actress Hannah Waddingham, who played Septa Unella, recently shared a horrible experience on the HBO show while shooting her final scene with Cersei Lannister. She said, “I’ve basically just been waterboarded for 10 hours.” Now, Lena…

The excavation at Nesher Ramla in Israel.Image: Tel Aviv UniversityAnother wrench has been thrown into our understanding of human origins, thanks to recently discovered remains of an archaic hominin in the Levant. The person or people who left these bones behind over 120,000 years ago may have coexisted with Homo sapiens, according to new research.Most…

Photo: Manan Vatsyayana (Getty Images)A new report out from the University of Cambridge confirmed what many of us have known for years: being a contrarian asshole on social media is a great way to get people clicking on your posts.The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS) this week…

Our favorite creepy vampire family is at it again.Screenshot: Warner Bros.We’ve got a new Lestat-us update, and it’s a good one. After years of trying to bring Anne Rice’s vampire franchise to the small screen, AMC has greenlit a new adaptation of Interview with the Vampire. And it looks like this is just the beginning…

A flag at the Line 3 pipeline pumping station near the Itasca State Park, Minnesota on June 7, 2021. Photo: Kerem Yucel/AFP (Getty Images)The Biden administration has been outspoken about its commitments to climate action and environmental justice. But, in the legal arena, it keeps falling down on the job. The latest disappointment came Wednesday,…

Image: NetflixI was going about my morning routine, just another normal Wednesday, when lo, the world’s most cursed tweet blessed my timeline from the @NetflixUK account. Behold.What.Apparently, this is sort of like The Masked Singer meets Love Is Blind (another Netflix reality dating show). Singles will go on three dates with potential love interests, all…

Image: GizmodoIt feels like every week a new streaming video service enters the market, and at this point, it’s almost impossible to keep track of them all. In 2020, a number of major players made their debuts to compete with mainstays like Netflix, Hulu, and Disney+. The frustratingly stubborn mobile-first service Quibi officially launched in…

Photo: Lynne Sladky (AP)The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that a Pennsylvania high school violated the First Amendment rights of a former cheerleader by punishing her for saying “fuck school” on Snapchat. The decision potentially restricts schools’ ability to regulate students’ off-campus speech.In an 8-1 decision upholding a lower court’s ruling, the Supreme Court…

A rendering of Earth and the Sun, viewed from thousands of miles above our planet.Image: OpenSpace/American Museum of Natural HistoryAstronomers on Earth have spotted thousands of exoplanets since the 1990s, so it’s not unreasonable to assume that aliens, should they exist, would be capable of the same feat. Working under this assumption, astronomers have identified…

Picture quality isn’t the best, but it’s good enough for the Apple Watch’s screen.Photo: Victoria Song/GizmodoThe $300 Wristcam is a futuristic Apple Watch accessory that asks the question: What if you put a camera on your smartwatch? When we first heard about it, it seemed like the band was teetering on the edge between genius…

Sylvie and Loki get some important bonding time.Image: Marvel StudiosAfter Marvel and Disney+’s Loki presented its audience with a twist on a twist last week, the time-bending series put the breaks on (albeit only figuratively) to turn once more to a question the show’s premiere was fascinated with: what makes Loki—what makes a Loki—Loki? The…

Gif: U.S. Navy/DVIDSThe U.S. Navy has released video of its tests of the new USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier, blasting an area near the ship with thousands of pounds of explosives in tests that are known as “full ship shock trials.” One explosion was so powerful it registered as a 3.9 earthquake, according to…

Minogue, Sergeant Maaka, and O’Leary in the Wellington Paranormal office.Image: Stan Alley/The CWIf The X-Files tossed aside all the government-conspiracy stuff and just concentrated on wacky monsters—and injected everything with the driest, most deadpan humor imaginable, and a bit more bumbling—that’s kind of exactly what Wellington Paranormal looks like. The New Zealand series, a spin-off…

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713.Photo: Florence Ion/GizmodoChromebooks had a big moment when the pandemic hit due in part to the searing desperation of parents looking for a computer so their kids could do school from home. But before the chaos, Chromebooks were regarded mostly as an enthusiast’s device, or perhaps as a secondary companion to…

Bloodsport and King Shark.Screenshot: Warner Bros.What binds each incarnation of the Suicide Squad together? The tiny bombs Amanda Waller implants in each member’s head to ensure that they don’t run away and escape while embarking on whatever insane missions she’s concocted for them. Longtimers like Harley Quinn and Rick Flagg might wax poetic and say…

Promo image for Angel CopImage: Discotek MediaTo me, Angel Cop is a classic among vintage Japanese anime. However, anime fans remain divided on it, with some calling it boring and others calling it a staple of 80s Japanese animation. One thing everyone agrees on about Angel Cop is the English dubbed version dialogue is bad.…

King Shark Image: Warner Bros.James Gunn knows how to make VFX look realistic. His work on Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy with creating Rocket Raccoon and Groot has made the characters a staple of the MCU.However, his most challenging creation is King Shark from the new DC comics movie The Suicide Squad, which Gunn is…

Stickers for the clergy to wear after they receive the vaccine sit on a table at Hartford HealthCare St. Vincents Medical Center in Bridgeport, Connecticut on February 26, 2021. Photo: Joseph Prezioso/AFP (Getty Images)A new website in California will give the public a way to access their digital covid-19 vaccine record and share their proof…

Photo: Tomohiro Ohsumi (Getty Images)If you have an iPhone, beware of a strange wifi network with the name “%p%s%s%s%s%n.” This name causes a burdensome bug. Do not connect to this network unless you want your phone’s wifi functionality to break. The bug was found by security researcher Carl Schou, who shared the problem on Twitter.…

Kamala Khan aka Ms. MarvelImage: Marvel ComicsKamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, is the hero we need right now! It’s exciting to see her a part of the MCU with the new Disney+ show, but don’t forget the comics because a new series of books is upon us. Samira Ahmed, who is the first South Asian writer…

In an aerial view, houseboats float at a water level nearly 200 feet below normal at the Lime Saddle Marina for Lake Oroville near Paradise, California, on Tuesday, June 8, 2021. Photo: Justin Sullivan (Getty Images) The record heat wave searing the West Coast has drained one of California’s largest reservoirs so much that its…

Temuera Morrison in The MandalorianImage: Disney+Temuera Morrison (Aquaman) is cast in the role of Boba Fett and had a recurring role on Disney+ show The Mandalorian. Since then, the first season of Mandalorian spin-off, The Book of Boba Fett has wrapped production.Gamesradar shared that when Morrison spoke with SFX Magazine, he couldn’t reveal many details…

Photo: Robyn Beck / AFP (Getty Images)With the release of Apple’s AirTags, we’ve all seen just how powerful and useful the company’s Find My network can be to find misplaced items around our homes or lost items out in the world. Google apparently also took notice and appears to be cooking up its own version…

Photo: Josh Edelson/AFP (Getty Images)Facebook announced that it would add information to its community standards about its so-called satire exception when moderating content. The change was made in response to a recent decision by its Oversight Board that required it to reinstate a comment with an adaption of the “two buttons” meme commenting on Turkey’s…

The facial recognition program used by 22 U.S. states to reduce unemployment fraud has been failing to correctly identify recipients, causing dozens of people to be denied benefits or have their applications put on hold, Motherboard reports. Unemployment recipients have been sharing complaints online for months about the identity verification software ID.me, but the outrage…

Crosshair is back on Star Wars; The Bad Batch.Image: LucasfilmYou know the phrase “Stuck between a rock and a hard place?” Well, that was the latest episode of Star Wars: The Bad Batch. Except this time there were several rocks, several hard places, and in the middle? Clone Force 99, aka, The Bad Batch.The eighth…

Now that’s teamwork.Screenshot: TohoIn just a few more weeks, Godzilla Singular Point is finally hitting Netflix, and that means we’re getting a brand new version of one of our favorite super robot pals, Jet Jaguar. To celebrate, we’re looking back at his origin story in Godzilla vs. Megalon, and finding a movie that is, for…

Two guys, being dudes, hanging out and throwing shields.Image: Marvel StudiosFalcon and The Winter Soldier might be in the rear-view mirror for Marvel and Disney as the company turns its eyes to Loki, but the discourse around the show returned to the forefront of fandom last night in the wake of a new interview with…

Image: Hot Toys, Hasbro, Mezco ToyzWelcome back to Toy Aisle, io9’s regular round up of all things good and plastic. This week, another Into the Spider-Verse Spidey swings into action, Hasbro now deems ‘90s kids old enough to be retro-targeted with Star Wars packaging, and… how do you feel about building a Lego shoe? Check…

Illustration: Lionel Bonaventure / AFP (Getty Images)Finding a new podcast you actually like is easier said than done. It’s a task that requires time, effort, and a good chunk of your attention. Spotify wants to make this tedious process easier and is betting that podcast discovery technology developed by a startup will help its users…

Katrina Spade, the founder and CEO of Recompose, displays a sample of the compost material left from the decomposition of a cow, left, and some of the combination of wood chips, alfalfa, and straw used in the process.Photo: Elaine Thompson (AP)If you’re freaked out by funerals and would rather be gardening instead, you’re in luck.…

Photo: Kirill Kudryavtsev (Getty Images)The EU data protection laws that passed back in 2018 have done a world of good when it comes to reigning in the shitty data-ming tactics of companies like Facebook and Google. At the same time, they’ve also transformed the web into a place where almost every site bombards visitors with…

Loki holding one of the TVA’s instances of the Tesseract.Screenshot: Disney+/MarvelIn each of Marvel’s films that Loki’s appeared in, the Asgardian trickster god’s gotten into all sorts of chaotic mischief using his intellect and an array of ill-defined mystical powers that allow him to conjure illusions. Though Loki’s copies have typically been convincing enough to…