Technology news

Like the rest of us, Siri is obsessed with Game of Thrones. In the lead-up to the season 6 GoT finale, Siri is offering some fun comments you can enjoy whether you're a denizen of Westeros or someplace else.
SEE ALSO: The 'Game of Thrones' Season 6 finale looks set to be an epic one
Ask Siri on the iPhone, iPad or Apple TV some Game of Thrones related queries and see what pops up.Siri answers Game of Thrones queriesTry asking Siri "Are you watching Game of Thrones" or "Have you been w

The Neon Demon is a spectacularly beautiful and superficial movie about absolutely nothing
On the surface, which is all there really is, it’s about a delicate teenager named Jesse (a pure-hearted Elle Fanning) who moves to Los Angeles to become a model. Once there, she happens into a frenemy-ship with a smirky makeup artist named Ruby (Jena Malone) and her model friends Sarah (Abbey Lee) and Gigi (Bella Heathcote). 
As Jesse rises in the fashion world, Ruby and her beautiful cohorts

ANAHEIM, California — Apparently, Facebook wants to be a little more like Snapchat. 
At VidCon on Thursday, Facebook announced that people using the face filters on the MSQRD app will be able to go live on Facebook directly from within the app. 
Facebook acquired MSQRD — which is a "masquerade" face-tracking and 3D face-placement app — in March.
Since then, they have been working to build their imaging technology to Live, Facebook’s director

Semi trucks are a fixture on the world's highways, transporting a significant portion of the world's cargo — and that's leading to a rash of innovation in the space that mirrors what's happening in the automotive world. Self-driving trucks, electric powertrains; you name it, someone's working on it. Siemens is working on something interesting, too: a pantograph system that would let big rigs drive for miles without sipping a single drop of diesel.
The system, which Siemens c

What do you get when you combine Escape the Room with a vehicle test drive? It turns out, a lot of fun.
If you’re not familiar, Escape the Room is a real-world puzzle game where teams of users have to follow clues to (surprise) escape a room. It’s fantastic.
This weekend, Ford has partnered with Escape the Room creator Victor Blake to set up an Escape the Room scenario that also acts as a soft sales pitch/test drive for the Ford Escape.
A few colleagues and I partook in the experien

PC makers have been trying to replicate the MacBook Air for years with little success.
Alternatives — including 2-in-1 convertibles, transformers and touchscreens — have intrigued customers, but none have been as popular Apple's laptop. 
So HP decided on another strategy to compete with the MacBook Air: just get the basics right, with no gimmicky tricks.
SEE ALSO: HP's gorgeous Chromebook 13 is thinner, lighter than MacBook Pro
HP's new Spectre isn't just the cur

Despite reports that say millennials believe "phone calls can be burdensome," users of the very popular messaging service WhatsApp are making over 100 million voice calls every day, taking that oh-so-heavy burden head on. With over 1 billion users, WhatsApp is one of the biggest communication platforms in the world, thriving in Europe and Asia where growth has far outpaced growth within the United States.
As The Next Web pointed out, in just over a year of availability with iOS an

Swee' Pea. Hook Mitchell. Earl Manigault. 
For the hardcore basketball-addicted among us, the names are as familiar as Jordan, Kareem and Magic. 
SEE ALSO: Cliff Alexander and the NBA Draft heartbreak you never hear about
They're the other side of the coin, the ones who never made it. They're proof — proof of how fragile these hoop dreams are. They're proof of how easily NBA aspirations can be subsumed by personal demons and awful circumstance.
Derrick Rose is one who made it. H

Facebook has grand plans to continue expanding and improving its live video platform this year, starting with support for face-swapping app MSQRD. In the coming weeks, you can go live on Facebook from the MSQRD app and utilize its many different Snapchat-like masks and filters while the video is running. Facebook first acquired Masquerade, the Belarusian startup behind MSQRD, back in March with the intention to "continue enhancing the Facebook video experience," a spokesperson for the socia

The "Subway Idiot" is back, baby. And this time, he's making babies.
Comedian Arthur Meyer can't seem to stop missing the subway and hopelessly chasing after it, but luckily it's not affecting his love life. 
Enjoy as he experiences a rollercoaster ride of a relationship, all while just trying to get to wherever the heck he's going.
Side note: dude's got speed. New Boston Dynamics robot is adorable or terrifying or both
Corgi and human in corgi shirt are ecstatic to be reunited
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Volkswagen will pay between $1,000 and $7,000, and in some cases as much as $10,000, to owners of cars that were affected by the diesel emissions scandal, according to reports from Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal. The reports state that the payouts will vary depending on factors like the age of each vehicle, and each attributes the information to unnamed sources close to the ongoing talks — no surprise, considering that a gag order has been issued by the US District Judge who is

Poor SpotMini. In its first appearance on Boston Dynamics' wildly entertaining YouTube channel, it's subjected to a total wipe-out courtesy of a pile of banana peels. 
But nothing seems to phase the Google-owned robotics lab's teeny new addition. SpotMini is a smaller version of Spot, the company's famous robot dog.
According to the video's description, the all-electric robot weighs 65 pounds with its arm attached. And if you're freaked out by the headless version seen in the clip's opening

Look! It's Kit Harington, aka Jon Snow, aka Admiral Salen Kotch, the villain of the upcoming Call of Duty game!
Kit has been doing motion capture in London for the last week, according to a press release. Sherlock Holmes director Guy Ritchie directed the shoot, but I don't know who took these photos of Kit or whether Kit was informed that they would be shared with the world. They are not flattering; in fact, they are sort of terrifying. Harington looks at least 800 times more frightening than he

Remember when Beyoncé dropped a visual album out of nowhere on HBO?
This is kind of like that, but with Snapchat, and Kylie Jenner. She stars in the video for her rumored beau PARTYNEXTDOOR's "Come and See Me." The video premiered exclusively on Snapchat on Thursday, and can be found on the platform's Discovery page.
SEE ALSO: A brief introduction to Kylie Jenner's new boyfriend, PartyNextDoor
The video chronicles a sad Kylie who is trying to reach her boyfriend PARTYNEXTDOOR (

Sounds like this '90s Hanson classic was made for doo-wop.
Postmodern Jukebox presents a rhythm and blues '50s style cover of "MMMBop" that you never knew you were missing. It features powerhouse quartet harmonies from Kenton Chen, Luke Edgemon, Matt Bloyd and Mario Jose.
All aboard the nostalgia train as PMJ takes this catchy tune to a whole new level.
Taylor Swift covered for Dave Grohl when he was too high to play for Paul McCartney
Corgi and human in corgi shirt are ecstatic t

Warning: Looking at your smartphone while lying in bed at night could wreak havoc on your vision.
Two women went temporarily blind from constantly checking their phones in the dark, say doctors who are now alerting others to the unusual phenomenon.
The solution: Make sure to use both eyes when looking at your smartphone screen in the dark.
SEE ALSO: Who cares if cellphones might cause cancer? They’re already the worst.
In Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine, doctors detailed the ca

"We have other battles to fight." 
True as that may be, the team at fsociety is having a hard time picking up the pieces from the last battle they waged as Season 2 of Mr. Robot begins.  
SEE ALSO: Hackers, experts decode the magic of 'Mr. Robot' ahead of Season 2
The new trailer, released today, shows a team in turmoil as angry officials zero in on them and little seems to have changed. You can watch it above.
Season 2 of Mr. Robot, which just received an additional two episodes for a

As Democrats began a sit-in Wednesday morning to protest the lack of action on gun control legislation, the House of Representatives went into recess. Recess means no TV cameras allowed in the chamber, which in turn meant no cable news coverage of the historic sit-in still occurring in the House.And yet without media access, the story exploded. As C-Span was forced to stop rolling its cameras, the story quickly moved to social media with the hashtag #NoBillNoBreak and later #Demo

Awkward Black Girl star Issa Rae has spent the last few years working on a new comedy for HBO, and it's just around the corner after suffering through its fair share of development hell. Insecure's eight-episode first season is premiering this fall, and the network released its first short trailer this afternoon. Rae's character works for an outreach program, a gig that forces her to ping back and forth between her clueless white coworkers and the mostly black children insistent on clowning

When I get a pitch about a new gadget, my first reaction is typically skepticism coupled with severe doubt that the product actually does what it promises. My skepticism is amplified even further when that gadget is considered an Internet of Things device. Now, with that in mind, today I received news of the Oticon Opn hearing aid, which its manufacturer Oticon bills as the "world’s first Internet of Things hearing aid."
The device connects to a user's smartphone and can be controlled thro

They say the best investors know how an event in one corner of the market impacts a company in another. New mining laws in Colorado require thousands of workers to wear a certain type of hardhat, and suddenly a plastics company in Norway quadruples its business to meet the increased demand. That sort of thing. Look, if I knew a current example, I’d be too busy making billions to write this story.
In some fashion, I see David Moreno and his company 232Tech as similar investors, but in

A New York-based graffiti artist was banished from national parks throughout the United States earlier this month, after a month-long spree in 2014 during which she drew paintings on protected rock formations. 
The artist, Casey Nocket, won't be allowed inside any national park for two years, and was given 200 hours of community service. She's also been ordered to pay a fine, though the amount won't be set until December.
SEE ALSO: Black rhino charges at its greatest foe, the automobile
No

Companies aren't just tapping into sustainability initiatives to save face anymore — they're looking to change the world. 
A new study from the United Nations Global Compact, a voluntary initiative based on CEO commitments to sustainability and other U.N. goals, found that CEOs across the globe see the Sustainable Development Goals as a critical way to address the world's most pressing issues — and transform their own businesses.
SEE ALSO: New 'world's to-do list' will ask for

 Back in November, TechCrunch took a look at former Startup Battlefield competitor Satago, a U.K. fintech startup that was looking to help freelancers and other small business owners get paid on time. Satago started an automated database that lets users see how well (or poorly) companies are at paying invoices in a timely fashion, and has tools such as automated invoices, reminders,… Read More

There are few things more enjoyable in this world than watching this cheery man wearing a corgi shirt and his ecstatic corgi.
In the YouTube comments, Rumble Viral explains that the dog and his human were separated for two painstaking weeks, and this dramatic moment is their loving reunion.
Reunited and it feels so good, indeed.
Taylor Swift covered for Dave Grohl when he was too high to play for Paul McCartney
Baby camel's first steps are as wobbly and wonderful as you'd expect
Two brother

It was history and I was struggling to find a place to see it unfold. 
The U.S. House of Representative's Democrats were staging a sit-in—the first of its kind in this video-driven digital age— trying to force House Republicans to vote on a pair of gun control bills.
SEE ALSO: Up Periscope: Inside Twitter’s one-year-old broadcast startup
Whatever side of the aisle you're on, this was (and is) must-see TV. Except it wasn't on TV. On Wednesday morning, as Rep. John Lewis of

Columbus, Ohio, is the winner of the US Department of Transportation’s “Smart City” challenge, a competition for mid-sized cities to rethink urban transportation using technology like self-driving cars and smart street lights. Columbus edged out six other finalists, which were winnowed down from 78 submissions, to win $40 million in federal grant money to enact its proposal.The city proposed to deploy three electric self-driving shuttles to link a new bus rapid transit center t

Are you familiar with the highly influential piece for programmers by Herb Sutter called "The Free Lunch Is Over"? He wrote it in 2004, just when CPU clock speeds were at a zenith. Back in those days, software developers could count on Moore's Law double the speed of their software every couple years. They could write something, wait a little while, and all of a sudden it was blazing fast. But Herb Sutter correctly predicted the end of this performance gain. The technical definition of Moore's L

This baby camel is finally mobile.
The little champ, who lives at the Sóstó Zoo in Hungary, recently took its first steps, and we would like to extend our congratulations. We hope it received a medal, or whatever the camel equivalent of a medal is. (A pat on the back? Oats?)
Next up: running.
Taylor Swift covered for Dave Grohl when he was too high to play for Paul McCartney
Two brothers are brought to tears after seeing colors for the first time
Cockatoo can't resist the char

When a dog wreaks havoc on your wardrobe, it helps to have a blacksmith around.
Alan Padzinski returned home from his workshop one day to find his girlfriend mourning a pair of destroyed $500 heels — heels unfairly targeted by their remorseless pup, Caliph.
SEE ALSO: This dog just discovered Crocs and is pulling them off nicelyHe knows what he did.Image:imgur/othiencosplay"Oh doge, what have your teeth wrought," wrote Padzinski.Image:imgur/othiencosplayPadzinski was able to repair the hol

Kit Harington is going from one war zone to another.
It was announced recently that Harington, known for playing Jon Snow in Game of Thrones, will be taking a step toward the dark side to play the villain in Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, and now we finally have some on-set photos to tide us over until the game's release.
SEE ALSO: Board and destroy enemy spaceships in 'Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare'Kit Harington acts in a scene for Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare in London. Jun

Mr. Robot's second season is getting a two-episode extension, bringing it from 10 episodes to 12, USA announced today. That's great news for fans of the Sam Esmail drama that's become of the most daring and frenetic TV shows about modern technology to date. Mr. Robot's mix of believable cybersecurity narratives, nihilistic social commentary, and paranoia-fueled psychosis has been a huge hit, earning it a slew of awards and thrusting Esmail and star Rami Malek to newfound fame.
Because

And I keep hitting repeat-peat-peat-peat-peat-peat on this video.
Six-year-old Audrey Nethery recently got to meet Selena Gomez during her Revival Tour – and Gomez shared an adorable video of her and the little girl singing and dancing.
SEE ALSO: Selena Gomez takes Carpool Karaoke to a roller coaster and drive-thruNot only was the adorable Nethery excited to meet Selena Gomez, but the singer was excited to meet her too.
"Finally got to meet this sweetheart -she owned it fully," Gomez

Dave Grohl once had the totally normal problem of not being able to figure out how to play any of his songs while being at a party when Paul McCartney wanted him to jam.
Fortunately, there was a totally normal solution for the problem — Taylor Swift swooped in "like fuckin' Batman" to save the day and began playing the Foo Fighters song "Best of You" as a piano ballad. 
Two brothers are brought to tears after seeing colors for the first time
Cockatoo can't resist the charm o

A Los Angeles jury has ruled that Led Zeppelin didn't copy a riff from Spirit's 1968 instrumental "Taurus" for their own 1971 hit "Stairway to Heaven," according to The Hollywood Reporter. While the jury agreed that Jimmy Page and Robert Plant (the song's co-writers) had heard "Taurus" before writing "Stairway to Heaven," they didn't find the two songs similar enough to constitute a copyright infringement on Page and Plant's part.
The song's legal journey began in May 2014, when Michae

Adele's 25 — the album that many music industry insiders called a miracle for rejecting streaming and encouraging consumers to buy music again — is coming to streaming services after all.
SEE ALSO: Adele '25' review: Gorgeously crafted pop that gives fans what they want
At the time of 25's release, Adele expressed a distrust of streaming, saying "I know that streaming is the future but it's not the only way to consume music."
“I believe music should be an event,” sh

Her cousin, Sen. Chuck Schumer, may have spent the night supporting his colleagues on the floor of the House, and now Amy Schumer is also doing her part by highlighting the flawed legal system that makes it hard for gun violence victims to receive justice. 
In a just-released sketch from an earlier episode of her show, Inside Amy Schumer, comedian Jon Benjamin plays a lawyer who claims he can help people get justice — as long as they're not victims of gun violence. 
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Imagine this scenario: You’re driving down the road when suddenly, out of nowhere, a lone pedestrian jumps into your path. The road is narrow and walled in by a barrier on either side, so your options are limited. You can either keep driving straight ahead and hit the pedestrian, or you can save the pedestrian by swerving into one of the barriers. What do you choose?
Now imagine a scenario in which it’s five pedestrians in the road instead of one. Now 10. Does your answer change?
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How do you teach a car when to self-destruct? As engineers develop and refine the algorithms of autonomous vehicles that are coming in the not-so-distant future, an ethical debate is brewing on what happens in extreme situations — situations where a crash and injury or death are unavoidable.
A new study in Science,"The Social Dilemma of Autonomous Vehicles," attempts to understand how people want their self-driving cars to behave when faced with moral decisions that could result in death.

Georgia Rep. John Lewis and other Democrats ended their sit-in on the House floor on Thursday around 25 hours after it began. 
Representatives began the sit-in after 11 a.m. on Wednesday, demanding that the House call a vote on two gun control measures — one that would prevent those on terrorist watch lists from purchasing a gun, and another that would expand and bolster universal background checks. 
SEE ALSO: Senator ends gun control filibuster with heart-wrenching story
All th

LOS ANGELES — Ahead of VidCon, tech company Zefr compiled a list of the top 100 digital video influencers of 2016, with popular acts such as Cameron Dallas scoring high. 
But unlike other rankings, the list isn't just based on the number of followers or video views.
Instead, the company broke the list into categories — including digital A-list, gaming, kids & toys, Spanish language, and best all around — based on trends they saw in e

When Beyoncé told the world to get in formation in February, this teenager took the instructions to heart and had her sights set on prom.
With the help of two dancers and the track off of Lemonade, this prom attendee might have orchestrated the best pre-prom entrance the world has ever seen: Black and yellow #BeyHive inspired balloons, a smoke machine, red carpet—and an unfazed prom date to boot. 
SEE ALSO: Hold up, Beyoncé complimented two fans' afros during

The American Kennel Club introduced the 190th dog breed this week: a whimsical, hard-working herding pooch called the Pumi.
The Pumi comes to us all the way from Hungary, and will be eligible to compete at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show next February.
Just look at this floppy-eared guy: Getty
He looks trustworthy! I'd tell him my secrets.
So how does a dog breed get recognized by the AKC? It was a long process to get the Pumi the recognition it deserves — an achievement 17