A second fueling test on NASA’s Space Launch System rocket ended Thursday night, giving senior managers enough confidence to move forward with plans to launch four astronauts around the Moon...
Microsoft gaming chief Phil Spencer steps down after 38 years with company
Microsoft Executive Vice President for Gaming Phil Spencer announced he will retire after 38 years at Microsoft and 12 years leading the company’s video game efforts. Asha Sharma, an executive...
MAHA moms threaten to turn this car around as RFK Jr. flips on pesticide
“We must safeguard America’s national security first, because all of our priorities depend on it. When hostile actors control critical inputs, they weaken our security. By expanding domestic production, we...
Fury over Discord’s age checks explodes after shady Persona test in UK
Persona confirmed all age-check data from Discord’s UK test was deleted. Shortly after Discord announced that all users will soon be defaulted to teen experiences until their ages are verified,...
FCC asks stations for “pro-America” programming, like daily Pledge of Allegiance
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr today urged broadcasters to join a “Pledge America Campaign” that Carr established to support President Trump’s “Salute to America 250” project. Carr said in...
Meta’s flagship metaverse service leaves VR behind
Some of the changes—like the removal of individual worlds from the VR store—are presented by the company as efforts to make the store a better discovery platform for third-party developers....
Controversial NIH director now in charge of CDC, too, in RFK Jr. shake-up
Insiders report that, as NIH director, Bhattacharya delegates most of his responsibilities for running the $47 billion agency to two top officials. Instead of a hands-on leader, Bhattacharya has become...
Wikipedia blacklists Archive.today, starts removing 695,000 archive links
The English-language edition of Wikipedia is blacklisting Archive.today after the controversial archive site was used to direct a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack against a blog. In the course...
Why Final Fantasy is now targeting PC as its “lead platform”
For a long time now, PC gamers have been used to the Final Fantasy series treating their platform as somewhat secondary to the game’s core console versions. There are some...
“Million-year-old” fossil skulls from China are far older—and not Denisovans
careful with that, it’s an antique The revised age may help make sense of 2-million-year-old stone tools elsewhere in China. Two skulls from Yunxian, in northern China, aren’t ancestors of...
AI #156 Part 2: Errors in Rhetoric
Things that are being pushed into the future right now: Gemini 3.1 Pro and Gemini DeepThink V2. Claude Sonnet 4.6. Grok 4.20. Updates on Agentic Coding. Disagreement between Anthropic and...
Lawsuit: ChatGPT told student he was “meant for greatness”—then came psychosis
But by April 2025, things began to go awry. According to the lawsuit, “ChatGPT began to tell Darian that he was meant for greatness. That it was his destiny, and...
NASA chief classifies Starliner flight as “Type A” mishap, says agency made mistakes
Still, after astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams eventually docked at the station, Boeing officials declared success. “We accomplished a lot, and really more than expected,” said Mark Nappi, vice...
Rubik’s WOWCube adds complexity, possibility by reinventing the puzzle cube
Technology is a double-edged sword in the $399 Rubik’s Cube-inspired toy. There’s something special about the gadget that “just works.” Technology can open opportunities for those devices but also complicate...
Diablo II’s new Warlock is a great excuse to revisit a classic game
Of the Warlock’s three Demonic partner options, I found myself leaning most on the Tainted, which can stay out of harm’s way while harassing slower enemies from afar with fireballs....
From chickens to humans, animals think “bouba” sounds round
Does “bouba” sound round to you? How about “maluma”? Neither are real words, but we’ve known for decades that people who hear them tend to associate them with round objects....
F1: Preseason tests show how different 2026 will be
Sleek 2026 cars look good. Credit: Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images 2026 cars look good. Credit: Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images I’ll say this for the 2026 crop of cars:...
Google announces Gemini 3.1 Pro, says it’s better at complex problem-solving
Another day, another Google AI model. Google has really been pumping out new AI tools lately, having just released Gemini 3 in November. Today, it’s bumping the flagship model to...
Zero grip, maximum fun: A practical guide to getting into amateur ice racing
Where we’re racing, we don’t need roads. To drive on ice, you just need the right tires. Credit: Tim Stevens To drive on ice, you just need the right tires....
OpenClaw security fears lead Meta, other AI firms to restrict its use
“Our policy is, ‘mitigate first, investigate second’ when we come across anything that could be harmful to our company, users, or clients,” says Grad, who is cofounder and CEO of...
