Technology news

After coming off Q1 2018 touting the iPhone X as its top selling smartphone, Apple today announced that in fiscal Q2, the company brought in $61.1 billion in revenue, meeting its own projections. International sales accounted for 65 percent of the quarter’s revenue, with 20 percent of growth coming from Greater China and Japan. Apple’s fiscal quarter ended on March 31st, meaning this did not account for the new red iPhone 8 and 8 Plus that were added to the company’s Product (

Leonardo DiCaprio is an Academy Award winning actor, environmental activist, and most recently, a beetle namesake. 
A water beetle species discovered in Malaysia was named Grouvellinus leonardodicaprioi in honor of DiCaprio's environmental work. The tiny black beetle — Leotle, if you will — was  found on the side of a waterfall in Malaysian Borneo. The 3mm Leotle found by scientists was in rough shape — it was missing an antennae and front leg. 
SEE ALSO: Crowdfu

MarkDude. You're a great Bruce Banner, but you're terrible at this whole keeping secrets thing.
When Avengers: Infinity War stars Mark Ruffalo and Don Cheadle sat down for a chat with Good Morning America in July 2017, Ruffalo did a dumb thing. He spoiled the end of Infinity War.
SEE ALSO: Who's who in 'Avengers: Infinity War'
What? I'm not going to do the thing and tell you what he said. You'll have to watch the video to hear the spoilers for yourself. (Honestly, it's also just funnier that way

Snap’s stock price plummeted during after hours trading today following its first quarter earnings report. The stock dropped by more than 15 percent, or roughly a sixth of its worth. Although the app grew its global users by four million or so since the last quarter, it made less money per user.During the prior quarter, the company made $1.53 per user globally, or $286 million in total revenue. This quarter, that dropped to $1.21 per user and $231 million in revenue. Still, that’s a

Few subjects give parents pause like talking about racism. 
For black families, the topic can be painful and often involves the upsetting task of explaining to children how they may be viewed differently by just about anyone — but specifically law enforcement. 
SEE ALSO: The skills that every teen should learn before they ever get a cellphone
White parents, on the other hand, may avoid the subject altogether, fearful that they'll say the wrong thing or worried that acknowledging

It might be a beautiful day in Venice, CA, but things at the beach-headquartered Snap are not so sunny at the moment.
Snap reported disappointing revenue in its Q1 earnings report on Tuesday — and the market reacted like the volatile, fickle beast that it is. 
SEE ALSO: Snapchat blew its first-ever earnings
Snap missed investor expectations big time, reporting a quarterly revenue of $231 million. The expectation was $244.5 million, according to a Thomson Reuters consensus estimate.
An

This week, the South China Morning Post reported that Chinese companies are “mining data directly from workers’ brains” using wireless sensors in hats. The article is full of exciting quotes about employers using technology to monitor their workers’ emotions, but the reality is that these hats probably don’t work very well.
The report is low on details, so the claims should be taken with a grain of salt. Allegedly, workers wear safety hats or uniform hats that have

Why break into a Taco Bell to eat Doritos taco shells when you can buy a bag of them literally anywhere else?
That's a question for Jose Cruz who, per the Pasadena Star-News, broke into a local Taco Bell on Saturday, and ate a bunch of cheese dust-coated taco shells. Then he turned himself in to the local authorities. 
SEE ALSO: Chief Taco Officer could be your next career move
His defense?
"He said he was drunk and hungry and broke into the business to eat taco shells," Lieutenant Pete Het

The iPhone X wasn't a magic elixir to reinvigorate Apple's iPhone sales, but it wasn't the flop some people were saying it would be.
In Apple's second quarter earnings report, the tech giant saw revenue continue to grow, but its key product, the iPhone, fell just short of sales expectations. 
SEE ALSO: The iPhone X's camera may get a third lens in 2019
Analysts were predicting 53 million in sales, but this quarter it was a meager 52.2 million. That's a 32 percent drop from the previous quar

If you haven’t heard, Facebook is getting into the dating app scene. It will soon let users opt into an experience resembling Tinder that lets them browse other profiles with photos and first names. Dating app executives took the opportunity to chide Facebook for its tattered history of data privacy practices and for allowing Russia to meddle in US elections.
Joey Levin is the CEO of IAC, the company that owns a majority stake in Match Group (which in turn owns Tinder, OkCupid, Match, and

Facebook announced its idea for a dating app today. There’s still a ton we don’t know about how it’ll work, though we know that the platform will live inside its official app and that users will be able to “unlock” individual events or groups that they’re members of to see potential matches. The company says in promotional material: “Just like in real life, the more active you are in the communities around you, the more opportunities you’ll have t

Kanye West is back in the public eye, and he doesn't seem eager to leave any time soon.
Over the past few weeks, the rapper has created some serious buzz by returning to Twitter to reveal his extreme thoughts on life and politics, interact with Donald Trump, share some private text messages, and drop a bunch of album release dates, including his own. Today he implied slavery was a choice. Seriously.
Last weekend he released a song about poop and another about politics, and on Tuesday he decided

All that we are, or hope to be, we owe to our parents — both real and fictional.
While biological moms deserve major props for seeing us through our formative years, serving as role models, and literally giving us life, we must never forget all the comfort and wisdom that TV moms bestowed upon us over the years.
SEE ALSO: Best Mother's Day gifts for every kind of mom
Through our television, laptop, and phone screens, we've watched as mothers on our favorite television shows shared relation

Warning! Spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War below. Do not read unless you've seen the movie, or if you're like me and enjoy spoilers without abandon. 
Avengers: Infinity War, the most ambitious crossover in cinematic history, left a lot of people in tears due to its catastrophic ending. Ya know, where Thanos decides to wipe out half the world's population — including some of our superhero friends. They start disintegrating into dust and then, most notably and most tragically, young S

Appleended up with a pretty decent report for its second quarter, beating analyst expectations on most of its metrics — but it is making a huge move in terms of returning capital to investors.
The company said it is announcing a new $100 billion buyback program and increasing its dividend by 16%. That means that Apple investors are going to get more of an opportunity to snap up the value the company has created over time as it’s continued to grow significantly. While Apple in the pas

Millions of beauty enthusiasts have learned how to copy the makeup of their favorite stars, give themselves complex nail art, and yes, master the elusive and sultry smoky eye look through the vanguard of YouTube: makeup tutorials. Yet, a quick glance at social media over the past few days would suggest that political commentators have watched few, if any, of them.
Over the weekend, comedian Michelle Wolf hosted the White House Correspondents’ Dinner with a scathing routine that targeted T

Westworld’s second season only kicked off two weeks ago, but HBO appears to be happy with what it’s seen from the show so far. The network has just announced it’s picked up the series for a third season.
Created by showrunners Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy — and inspired by the 1973 Michael Crichton film of the same name — Westworld tells the story of a futuristic theme park populated by intelligent robots called “hosts.” The park allows visiting guests t

This dude is hanging way more than 10. 
Brazilian surfer Rodrigo Koxa was awarded the Guinness World Record for "Largest wave surfed" on Saturday for tackling an 80-foot wave off the coast of Praia do Norte in Nazaré, Portugal. He rode the wave in November of last year, but the 38 year old was officially given the honor at an event in California held by the World Surf League.
Koxa took the Guinness World Record from American Garrett McNamara, who surfed a 78-foot wave back in 2011.&n

The team behind secure messaging app Signal says Amazon has threatened to kick the app off its CloudFront web service unless Signal drops the anti-censorship practice known as domain-fronting. Google recently banned the practice, which lets developers disguise web traffic to look like it’s coming from a different source, allowing apps like Signal to evade country-level bans. As a result, Signal moved from Google to the Amazon-owned Souq content delivery network. But Amazon implemented its

Facebook may be planning to launch its rumored smart speakers internationally before bringing them to the US due to the increased concerns over user privacy following the Cambridge Analytica scandal, according to a report from CNBC.Facebook has been rumored to be working on a smart speaker since last August, when Bloomberg first reported on the project. The company is said to have two smart devices planned — a larger, $499 Echo Show-esque device called “Portal” with a laptop-s

WhatsApp is getting several new changes including stickers and business-focused app features, its parent company Facebook announced today during the annual F8 developer conference. The messaging platform will also be adding group video calls in the coming months, WhatsApp director Mubarik Imam announced.Imam didn’t have many details to give about how group video calls will work just yet, but from the example video, we can see that calls will allow four people to simultaneously participate

Six major companies including Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony have received letters from the US Federal Trade Commission warning that some of their product warranties may be in violation of federal law. HTC, Asus, and Hyundai also received warnings. You can read all six over at Motherboard.
The FTC said that it sent warnings to six “major companies” last month, but it didn’t disclose which ones. Now, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Motherboard, we know wh

Facebook just wrapped day one of its F8 developer conference keynote, which comes at an unfortunate time this year after the Cambridge Analytica data scandal seems to have put Facebook at odds with how it is handling user data within its developer community. Nevertheless, the show had to go on, and Mark Zuckerberg tried his best to keep developers excited about continuing to build on his platform.
The CEO spent a brief moment of the keynote rallying developers to keep building and using their s

Republican FCC commissioner Michael O’Rielly broke a federal law preventing officials from advocating for political candidates when he told a crowd that one way to avoid policy changes was to “make sure that President Trump gets reelected,” according to a newly released letter from government officials. O’Rielly was warned by the officials about making similar comments in the future.
O’Rielly received a warning letter
The Hatch Act bars many federal employees from

Have you ever wondered just how hot it has to be outside for someone to say it's "hot as balls?"
One very curious man did.
Over the past year Jim Webb, a web developer in Washington D.C., developed a project to analyze tweets that correlated language and temperatures. Every time someone used a temperature phrase in a tweet, like "cold as fuck," Webb geo-located the tweet and nabbed the real-time temperature.
He collected about 5,400 of these tweets from August 2017 to January 2018, cataloging of

Warning: Major spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War below.
When Avengers: Infinity War opened on April 27th, it exceeded even Disney’s own lofty expectations, besting Star Wars: The Force Awakens for the biggest box office opening in history. Given that it’s the film meant to bring together all previous 18 movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Infinity War certainly had plenty of audience hype working in its favor. But it also had a secret weapon to help inspire interest: death.
F

Eighteen states, led by California, announced a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency today over its recent rollback of Obama-era vehicle emissions and fuel economy standards. The EPA decided at the beginning of April that the standards, which were set by the previous administration, were “not appropriate and should be revised.”The lawsuit was filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. With it, the states — along with the California go

Aspiring comedian Logan Paul says he's "learned" and "grown" since he filmed the body of an apparent suicide victim for his vlog. Oh, and he's in a Twitter feud with Chris D'Elia.
Buckle up for this one, folks. 
SEE ALSO: Logan Paul exploits car crash for vlog views, proves he's learned nothing
It started on Sunday, when Paul, the king of clickbait, announced that his daily vlogs were ending, emphasis on daily. In the announcement video, he says he wants to get back into comedy, and then sp

If you're anything like me, you buy a whole lot of things from one place: Amazon. 
Out of toilet tissue? Amazon Fresh has it. Need a refill of basically anything? Prime Delivery can get it to you in as little as two hours. Want to update your home décor? You can order tons of stuff for that, too. The online retailer has just about everything, from your favorite snacks and gadgets and clothes to everything in between. 
SEE ALSO: Learn how to start your own clothing brand with the

A new God of War game has arrived. It's a signpost of maturity for the video game industry, but it's also a symbol of problems that still persist.
For seven games, an ash-covered man with chains fused to his forearms battled his way through the Olympian pantheon in a gleeful parade of blood, sex, and weapon upgrades. Ultra-gory deaths, orgy mini games, and the character walking away from it all like nothing mattered, were all staples of the franchise. 
SEE ALSO: 'God of War' depicts the dis

Gig economy workers, including drivers for popular ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft, could find their employment status shift under a major new decision from the top court in California. The ruling will make it more difficult for companies to classify their drivers as independent contractors and avoid paying them wages and benefits as required by state law — a potentially huge setback for Uber and Lyft, which have built their multibillion-dollar businesses on the backs of a flexib

A doctor in Denver, Colorado recently called tick biologist Nathan Nieto to say that he found a lone star tick feeding on a patient. 
The problem is, lone star ticks aren't supposed to be found anywhere near Denver. These ticks are supposed to live in the eastern United States, said Nieto, a biologist at Northern Arizona University, in an interview. 
But ticks, along with mosquitos and other biting insects, are now spreading disease throughout the United States. The Centers for Disease

Oculus wants people to watch TV in their VR headsets, and later this month, it’s launching a dedicated “Oculus TV” app with partners like Showtime, Netflix, and ESPN. The app is a virtual home theater and a hub for non-VR video apps. That includes existing services like Netflix and Hulu, which have been on the Gear VR since 2016, but also services we haven’t seen on a headset before. The new ESPN+ subscription service, which launched in April, will be launching through O

10-year-old drag superstar 'Desmond Is Amazing' is in fact, amazing. The New York City drag kid is inspiring others left and right with his positive attitude to 'be yourself always no matter what anyone says'. At only 10 years old, Desmond has immersed himself with a handful of LGBTQ youth advocacy projects and is making one thing clear:  Desmond Is Amazing is the future and we're here for it. Read more...More about Mashable Video, Lgbt, Lgbtq, New York City, and Lgbt Rights

Back in 2014, Arrested Development creator Mitch Hurwitz announced that he had decided to recut the show’s fourth season Netflix revival, abandoning its original structure — with each episode focused on a single character — and replacing it with a version that intercuts all the characters’ stories chronologically. It wasn’t clear at the time whether that edit would ever be made available to the public, but today, Hurwitz finally announced the new version’s Ne

AR camera effects are coming to Instagram in a closed beta, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced at Facebook’s F8 conference today. Instagram will debut new filters through partnerships with Kylie Jenner, BuzzFeed, Ariana Grande, the NBA, Vogue, and others so you can try on Kylie Cosmetics lipsticks through a face filter or add floating effects to your background through a world lens.
Instagram has had Snapchat-like AR filters since last year, but it’s the first time partners are teaming u

Warning: This post contains spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.Hello, I am a lifelong Harry Potter fan who saw Avengers: Infinity War on opening night, and I had me some serious fandom déjà vu.
Here was a powerful evil being, hell-bent on absolute power, searching far and wide for objects to make him stronger and ultimately defeat his foes. It's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
Also, Thanos' children look like Voldemort. Don't @ me!
SEE ALSO: Who's who in 'Avengers: Infinity

The weather in the Plains states has been anything but normal lately. Oklahoma — a state synonymous with tornadoes — didn't have a single twisters through April 30, a new record. Instead, states from Texas north to Nebraska have been dealing with dust storms and sprawling, fast-moving grass fires as unusually dry weather has taken its toll on the region. 
That tornado and precipitation drought changes on Tuesday, as a complex series of storm systems unleashes several rounds of s

Como Audio appeared two years ago and immediately began building out a line of retro-looking speakers with modern tech inside them. They included screens, Bluetooth, and even streaming services like Spotify. But they haven’t included any smart assistants — at least until now.
On Kickstarter, Como is starting a campaign for a speaker called the SpeakEasy, which retains the company’s old-fashioned designs but adds in the Google Assistant. Like other Como speakers, it’s cov

Mark Zuckerberg is not well known for his speaking skills.
Last month, when the Facebook CEO spoke in front of Congress, he was viciously meme'd for his robotic demeanor, something he's always gotten a lot flack for. But during his keynote at F8 on Tuesday, Facebook's annual developer conference, Zuckerberg didn't sound like himself. But he did sound familiar.
SEE ALSO: Whoops! F8 website crashes as Facebook’s biggest event of the year starts
Fresh off the tails of the Cambridge Analytica

One is the loneliest number, which is probably why Facebook is taking steps to connect the people on its network who aren't in a relationship.
At it's annual F8 developer conference Tuesday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that his company will soon add a dating service to the main app.
"This is going to be for building real long-term relationships, not hookups," Zuckerberg said during the announcement.
Zuckerberg did not elaborate much on what the feature will look like or how it will wo

If you've been feeling stressed lately, you've got plenty of company. A study by the American Psychological Association found that about 63 percent of U.S. adults reported experiencing stress, thanks to anything from the state of the nation's economy and healthcare system to national violence and crime rates ... among other things. 
Of course, some stress is absolutely normal, perhaps even vital. But living with prolonged stress can be psychologically and mentally debilitating. Now, we aren

Instagram is upgrading its offensive comment filter today, expanding it to automatically filter out bullying comments “containing attacks on a person’s appearance or character, as well as threats to a person’s well-being or health.”
The comment filter was originally introduced last year, with a focus on toxic and divisive comments, but the update today broadens what gets hidden to include the aforementioned types of comments. Users will also be able to disable the filter

Facebook's annual developer conference, F8, is underway, and it's all eyes on Zuck.
The Facebook CEO opened the conference with a keynote address on Tuesday. He squared off with the elephant in the room right away: what Facebook plans to do to rebuild the user trust that was destroyed by the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
That's why Zuckerberg spent the first several minutes of his keynote detailing changes Facebook is implementing — some old and some new in the wake of the controversy. Nota

Facebook is giving Messenger a major design overhaul, promising a much simpler and cleaner user experience after years of jamming the chat app full of superfluous features like games.“When you’re messaging, you really want a simple and fast experience,” Mark Zuckerberg said during the company’s F8 keynote. “We’re taking this moment to completely redesign Messenger to focus on these ideas.” Zuckerberg again reiterated the “clean” and “f

Ashley Judd is taking Harvey Weinstein to court, and she intends for any judgments in her favor to benefit the Time's Up movement.
Judd filed her suit in the Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday, as she confirmed on Twitter. She's seeking damages for defamation, sexual harassment, and violations of California business laws governing unfair competition and intentionally interfering with a person's livelihood.
SEE ALSO: Here are all the women who have accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual abuse so fa