Technology news

Synthetic opioids are killing a skyrocketing number of people in the US, and the cause for the surging death rates is likely the growing trade in illegally manufactured fentanyl, according to new research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. With more people dying of fentanyl overdoses now than ever before, according to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), figuring out where that fentanyl is coming from will be critical to keeping people safe.
Fentanyl, which made headlines when Prin

LOS ANGELES — Chris Evans is one of those "get it right on the first take" kind of guys. Like that's a surprise.
In this exclusive clip from the DVD extras in the forthcoming Captain America: Civil War home video release, we learn that Evans doesn't need a lot of do-overs. Sometimes none. 
Actually, according to the Russo brothers, Anthony and Joe, it's often none. Such a try-hard, this guy.
"He's a crazy quick study," Anthony told Mashable during the directing duo's promotional run f

During the wee hours of Sunday morning this week, thieves broke into a Chevrolet dealership in Tyler, Texas and made off with $250,000 worth of brand-new wheels and tires.
They weren't stored in a parts room or the service center; they were bolted to assembly line-fresh cars and trucks — 48 of them to be exact.
SEE ALSO: At $13.75 million, this is now the most expensive American car ever sold
A yet-unknown number of thieves in a large box truck cut the locks on the dealership gates at arou

Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton has called out rival Donald Trump over his affinity with online fringe groups — or, as she puts it, people from "the far dark reaches of the internet." In a speech that was first previewed earlier this week, Clinton addressed Trump’s ties to the alt-right, a reactionary group that has propagated online over the past few years. It’s one of the most high-profile offline mentions of the movement so far, and a sign that it’s becoming increas

It's not pink and it's not rose gold. It's pink gold.
Previously an exclusive color to South Korea, Samsung's now launching its excellent Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge smartphones in pink gold in the U.S.
SEE ALSO: Samsung's Galaxy Note7 is the best smartphone on the planet, period
The two flagship Samsung phones will only be available at Best Buy. As a bonus, buyers will get a $150 Best Buy gift card with the phone. 
Not bad! Buy a high-capacity microSD card to expand 32GB of internal storage or p

Hillary Clinton is with her.
After Leslie Jones' personal information and photos were stolen and leaked by hackers, the Democratic presidential nominee tweeted her support for the Saturday Night Live star and national treasure.
SEE ALSO: Paul Feig and others call out hateful trolls who hacked Leslie JonesThe "-H" signature indicates that the tweet was written by Clinton personally. 
Jones and Clinton have crossed paths before — Clinton appeared in a Saturday Night Live sketch with Kat

In our CineFix series, Things You Didn't Know, we looked into the Oscar-winning horror-thriller Silence of the Lambs, and found nine things you might not have known about the film. 
While they gave Academy Award-winning performances, did you know that Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins were not the director's first pick for the roles? Did you catch the other familiar faces who made cameos throughout the movie as well? 
Subscribe to CineFix for more videos: https://www.youtube.com/c/cine

One of the most popular games available on a smartphone plays a bit like Tinder, though in Reigns, the stakes are higher than a hook-up. Entire kingdoms rise and fall with the familiar left and right swipes of the popular dating app.
Each session is a role-play as a different king, and is told through stack of cards that chronicle the ruler’s life and eventual death. An individual card contains a nugget of plot that culminates with a binary governing decision, which is decided upon by swip

8Bitdo is a company that specializes in game controllers, and now it’s trying out a bit of furniture design. This year at Gamescon the company unveiled its 8Bitdo Desktop Arcade Joy Stick, and the company's showing off the pretty arcade system on its Facebook. Check out that retro wooden design. We don’t know what games it can handle or even if the console will ever be available publicly, but 8BitDo does say it’ll release more details. For now, we can just look at photos. Yay:8

Like a rocket that touches the clouds before it floats down to Earth, chatbots started with a bang.
Gartner has chronicled this dramatic hype cycle many times, and it is starting to look like Moore’s Law in terms of how predictable it has become. There’s an initial trigger, the masses react and become disillusioned, and then the trend slowly builds through a state of enlightenment and finally productivity. When reality sets in, it often proves that the initial exciteme

 Songkick, which allows you to track the gigs of your favorite music artists and buy tickets to concerts, has raised a further $15 million in funding from Access Industries.
Songkick says it now plans to use the money to “enhance the connection between artists and fans,” increase ticket sales and prevent scalping.
Songkick’s app and web platform scans a user’s music… Read More

More video game-making talent is moving into full-time positions in the VR development.
Gears of War producer Tanya Watson and Rick and Morty co-creator Justin Roiland have formed the studio Squanchtendo to produce virtual reality experiences. The company hasn’t announced any active projects, but it promises to bring together “edgy” comedy and “refined” gameplay to produce content for VR. While devices like the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and Samsung Gear VR headset

Powerful telescopes have revealed that a nearby galaxy is 99.99 percent dark matter. That number is a new record and the galaxy’s existence could help us learn more about the properties of dark matter, which makes up about 27 percent of the universe but hasn’t been officially detected.
The galaxy, called Dragonfly 44, is 300 million light years away. It has the same mass as our own Milky Way but has a hundred times fewer stars. The lack of stars means that the galaxy is dim enough to

OnePlus has been making cheap and stylish accessories to go along with its cheap and stylish smartphones, and its latest addition is a pair of earbuds. They’re called the Bullets V2, and they’re the successor to 2014’s Silver Bullets earbuds.
The new model makes some small changes that give the earbuds a fuller, more polished look. They also switch over to a flat cord, which should limit tangling, and still include a mic and volume controls. Continue reading…

Uber lost $1.27 billion in the first half of 2016, according to Bloomberg, which on the surface seems like a lot of money. Okay, not just on the surface. It is a lot of money. But this is Uber we’re talking about! The most valuable startup in the world, most recently valued at $62.5 billion. So $1.27 billion in losses probably isn’t a big deal, right?
Well, yes and no. The context is certainly important. Bloomberg notes that the majority of Uber’s losses stem from the massive a

It’s early days for bots, but based on what is being made, VB Insights believes the bot landscape is made up of more than 170 companies who have received more than $4 billion in funding.
On Wednesday the influential Botness group released a survey to get a better feel for the bot community.
“The aim is to give everyone who is investing in messaging and bots access to the same information. Once published, we will extract the list of pressing problems and issues to be discuss

Within the first few minutes of the mesmerizing home-invasion thriller Don’t Breathe, writer-director Fede Alvarez and co-writer Rodo Sayagues pull something clever enough to impress jaded psychological-horror fans, without boring the adrenaline junkies sitting next to them in the theater. After one gruesome opening shot that teases where the film is eventually going, Alvarez and Sayagues introduce their protagonists in the middle of robbing a well-appointed house. With minimal dialogue an

Wargaming has shut its WG Cells mobile gaming studio in Bellevue, Washington, cutting about 64 jobs, according to a report in Geekwire.
Cyprus-based Wargaming told Geekwire that it was shutting the WG Cells studio, formerly called DropForge Games, just a year after getting it started. It’s a sign of how hard it is to survive in the $36 billion mobile game market, where there’s a ton of competition and acquiring users has become very expensive.
David Bluhm, CEO of WG Cells and cofound

Twitter is developing a dedicated page on its service where you’ll be able to catch streamed coverage of live events. With its expected launch, it’ll be easier to watch videos from the NFL, PGA, NHL, NBA, MLS, and other content providers without needing to search endlessly for a link.
There’s no public timing for when this page will be rolled out, but one could hazard a guess that it might be right when the NFL’s regular season kicks off this year.
Stay tuned. S

A person with plenty of experience in a very different kind of competition is getting into the world of esports.
Ken Hershman, formerly the president at HBO Sports, is now the executive chairman and commissioner of the World Esports Association, according to ESPN. The WESA is a product of competitive gaming teams and the ESL, one of the most prominent esports organizations. This is another example of people and groups that previously worked in traditional sports getting behind the grow

Prince’s legendary home and recording studio complex in Chanhassen, Minnesota, will likely open to public tours beginning in October, according to a report from Minnesota TV station KARE 11. In a statement released yesterday, the late musician’s siblings announced that the complex, called Paisley Park, will be transformed into a museum.
"Opening Paisley Park is something that Prince always wanted to do and was actively working on," Prince’s sister Tyka Nelson said. Only a few h

GUEST: Convenience is a cornerstone of any effective commerce strategy. How quickly and seamlessly we can satisfy the end consumer’s needs through digital commerce is critical to overall success. If we can do it better, with a more genuine and easy-to-understand experience than the other guys, then we win. If not, then we leave ourselves vulnerable in the hyper-competitive digital marketplace. If you need an example, just look to the meteoric rise of services like Uber and Lyft and the imp

Pop quiz: how many elaborately detailed, scientifically generated topographical maps have you created in the last day or so? Chances are the answer is "none," unless you're writing or publishing a series of old-school fantasy novels. Those kinds of novels were the inspiration for glaciologist Martin O'Leary, who created a Twitter bot named @UnchartedAtlas that generates a new map every hour, complete with cities, mountains, rivers, valleys, country borders, and other features. As O'Leary says in

Have you ever dreamed of being a journalist? Maybe just of being on TV? Maybe just of 10 minutes of internet fame? Or maybe just relative internet obscurity that brings approximately 120 strangers in contact with your face for all of 52 seconds?
Then head on down to Washington, DC’s Newseum where you can "Be a Reporter!" Thejournalism-centric museum on the Washington Mall lets anyone stand in front of a green screen and deliver a news segment. A teleprompter is provided, but use of it is n

Apple is looking to challenge two of its most successful App Store developers with a homegrown video editing application for iOS, according to a Bloomberg report. Both Facebook, with its Instagram property, and Snapchat are being targeted by the alleged program, which is said to be aiming for a 2017 release.
The goal of the app — which reportedly might still be rolled into the existing camera app as a new feature instead — is said to enable users to capture footag

The esports counter-terrorists are heading back to TBS.
Valve’s Counter-Strike: Global Offensive military shooter is getting a second season as part of Eleague’s televised competitions, and it kicks off with preliminaries September 7. Turner and esports talent-agency WME-IMG plan to feature the top Counter-Strike teams in a broadcast on the TBS cable channel at 10 p.m. on Friday nights. But fans can also catch the action on livestreaming video site Twitch. Esports is a growing market

Earlier this month, an Emirati human rights activist named Ahmed Mansoor got a suspicious text. It promised new details of torture in the country’s state prisons, along with a link to follow if he was interested. If Mansoor had followed the link, it would have jailbroken his phone on the spot and implanted it with malware, capable of logging encrypted messages, activating the microphone and secretly tracking its movements. Continue reading…

20th Century Fox’s two upcoming series set in the X-Men universe are starting to look a little more ambitious. The Hollywood Reports writes that director Bryan Singer, speaking at the Edinburgh Television Festival in Scotland, plans on linking the series to the larger X-Men franchise, saying the shows "will relate to future X-Men movies."
Singer was referring to Legion, which follows the life of a young man who finds that his mental illness is actually a manifestation of his incredible pow

EXCLUSIVE: Enterprise software company SAP is acquiring Altiscale, a startup that offers a cloud-based version of the Hadoop open source software for storing, processing, and analyzing lots of different kinds of data, VentureBeat has learned. News of the deal should be announced in the next few weeks.
The deal could be valued above $125 million. The investors are slated to receive three to four times as much money as they have put in, a source familiar with the matter told VentureBeat. The start

Yesterday, the European Southern Observatory dropped a bombshell announcement: an Earth-sized planet orbits around Proxima Centauri, the closest star to our Solar System. And as an added bonus, it sits in the habitable zone of its star — the place where temperatures are just right for liquid water to exist. That means the planet, called Proxima b, is potentially habitable and may support life. Continue reading…

Apple today released iOS version 9.3.5, which contains patches for security vulnerabilities that exist in earlier versions of Apple’s mobile operating system. Today’s update follow the release of iOS 9.3.4 earlier this month.
Mobile security startup Lookout says it discovered the vulnerabilities in association with the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab and have collaborated with Apple to fix them. Lookout encourages people to install today’s update to prevent attacks fr

Grabr, a startup that allows users to request travelers to bring them rare finds from all over the world, announced today that it scored a $3.5 million seed investment.
The startup’s marketplace allows shoppers and travelers who have extra space in their luggage to negotiate rates to pick up and deliver goods. The traveler will purchase the assigned merchandise and get paid once the delivery is completed, either in person or by mail.
“We are inspired by peer-to-peer an

A weasel using a woodpecker as its own private convertible; a wolf stuffing its snout in another wolf’s mouth; a reindeer comically failing to camouflage itself with some leaves. The internet has an insatiable appetite for bizarre wildlife pictures. But, like anything that brings us joy on the internet, these photos always came with the condition that they might not be entirely real. Truths Behind Fake Nature Photography, a Facebook page created by concerned nature enth

We’re going to a section of a magical tower that holds a bunch of animals, dragons, and other strange creatures. What could go wrong?
The Menagerie wing is now open in One Night in Karazhan, the latest adventure for Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft. It includes more bosses to kill, which earn you more new cards. Cards are good. We want the cards. That’s why we created this guide — to help you get those cards.
Note that these strategies only cover the normal versions of each figh

Garmin has a robust wearable lineup that includes activity trackers, smartwatches, and even an analog watch with activity features. Now it's attempting to make a luxury smartwatch, and it's not exactly cheap. The Garmin Fenix Chronos is a watch designed for people who don't like to sit in front of computers all day that will start at $899.The Fenix Chronos comes with standard activity features like step, calorie, and sleep trackers, as well as more advanced tracking for physical a

The party continues.
Hearthstone’s latest adventure continues today as the third episode of One Night in Karazhan is now live. You can purchase the wing on its own for $7 or you can purchase the whole season for $20, which will get you access to the remaining wings as they roll out over the next couple of weeks. As with previous adventures, Karazhan is introducing new cards and mechanics, and these capabilities will likely have a large impact on competitive play. Through add-ons like this,

In 2002 a little-known developer called Retro Studios from Austin released Metroid Prime on the Nintendo Gamecube. Built in collaboration with Nintendo, the game transformed the seminal sci-fi series from a 2D side-scrolling experience into a vast, three-dimensional world. Before it launched many fans were skeptical of the idea, worrying that the beloved series would be turned into just another first-person shooter. Yet despite the drastic shift in perspective, Prime retained virtually all of th

Volkswagen has reached an agreement to resolve litigation with its US dealers related to Dieselgate, including both the TDI vehicles and the value of Volkswagen franchises. The settlement includes cash payments and "additional benefits" to dealers, though final details of the settlement — including the total amount of compensation — have yet to be worked out. The final agreement is expected by the end of September and will need to be approved by a judge overseeing the proceedings.
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