Technology news

A whole soccer match came to a halt when a cat decided to go for a run across the field. 
During a Premier League game between Everton and Wolves on Saturday, a feline player wandered onto the pitch and started sprinting. 
SEE ALSO: The only inspiration you need for 2019 is this video of a cat and dog hugging
"A black cat is on the field!" the announcer said, convinced that someone had smuggled "kittles" into the stadium. The two teams watched the cat run back and forth across the

Elliot Tebele, founder of marketing firm Jerry Media and creator of the popular Fuckjerry Instagram account, said today that his company will no longer post content without being able to identify its creator and without that creator’s express and advance consent. The change comes in response to backlash from the comedy world, which has long despised accounts like Fuckjerry’s for profiting off jokes, memes, and other creative works on the internet without approval and, in earlier yea

If you want to understand the zeitgeist of the last decade, just scroll through FuckJerry's Instagram account — it's a growing archive of viral jokes and videos sourced from every corner of the internet. But social media users are over FuckJerry's unfair content stealing, and #FuckFuckJerry is working. 
Comedians are leading the campaign to unfollow FuckJerry, a massive meme account and media giant that "curates" and reposts content from other creators. The account is run by Elliot Te

It hasn't been a good Saturday for Virginia Governor Ralph Northam.
Northam made headlines on Friday after his personal page from a 1984 yearbook surfaced featuring a photo of two men: one wearing Ku Klux Klan robes and a hood, and the other in blackface. Hours after the offensive image surfaced, the Virginia governor released a statement.NEW: Governor Northam Statement on Offensive Photo. “I am deeply sorry for the decision I made to appear as I did in this photo and for the hurt that dec

In a move that may seem obvious in retrospect, Lowe’s has decided that its Iris smart home platform is not in fact going to take off. Instead, the home improvement-focused retail chain is shutting the service down on March 31st, 2019 and advising all Iris users to kindly avoid taking their no-longer-functioning products back to a Lowe’s store. The company says it will however give you some money back in the form of a prepaid Visa card that will help you “migrate to another sma

Fortnite is a video game, a meme machine, an occasional subject of controversy, and now... a concert venue.
Marshmello set up shop on a virtual stage set up inside the game on Saturday. He was there to perform, and that's exactly what he did. The proof is all over social media.
Fortnite maker Epic Games treated the whole thing like an actual, real world event. Construction work on the stage began earlier in the week, as players discovered when they ventured into the Pleasant Park section of the

When it comes to making decisions, most of us are influenced to some degree by other people, whether that’s choosing a restaurant or a political candidate. We want to know what others think before we make that choice. Humans are social animals. So social that we can rarely be independent of others because of our propensity for copying behavior and communication – also known as social learning. Humans copy each other every day. You might buy the latest trainers because they’re

Even if you’re not a huge fan of electronic music or have never heard of the EDM producer Marshmello, Fortnite’s live in-game concert was still a shockingly stunning sight to behold — it was also an unprecedented moment in gaming. It truly felt like a glimpse into the future of interactive entertainment, where the worlds of gaming, music, and celebrity combined to create a virtual experience we’ve never quite seen before.At 2PM ET today, every one of the likely tens of m

Well, there’s a headline I never saw myself writing. Hulu seems to be planning a major advertising blitz with the word_record_egg Instagram account, which shattered the record for most likes on a single picture with its first upload earlier this month. But as we all know, the brands can’t resist an absurd, silly stunt.
Yesterday the account teased an announcement planned for immediately after Super Bowl, promising that “all will be revealed” during the spot. Hulu itself

Well, there’s a headline I never saw myself writing. Hulu seems to be planning a major advertising blitz with the word_record_egg Instagram account, which shattered the record for most likes on a single picture with its first upload earlier this month. But as we all know, the brands can’t resist an absurd, silly stunt.
Yesterday the account teased an announcement planned for immediately after Super Bowl, promising that “all will be revealed” during the spot. Hulu itself

Will Smith is a cool dad, but he's not above trolling his own celebrity children on social media.
The 50-year-old actor has quite the hilarious Instagram presence, and he gave his 27.5 million followers a real treat on Friday when he uploaded some archival footage of his son Jaden.
You see, back in 2005 when Jaden was six years old, he did what so many kids before and after him have done: He cut his own hair. View this post on InstagramI think Jaden’s Reverse Fade might catch on. 📹

Denis Villeneuve’s upcoming, two-part adaptation of Dune kicked into gear in the last couple of months. In that time, we’ve been flooded with a number of casting stories, showing off a film that’s shaping up to have a really impressive group of actors. That’s excellent news, given that the film will depend on them to convey its famously complicated story of a feudal struggle in the distant future.The cast that we could get for this film is really something. Oscar Isaac i

I heard so many people raving about The Good Place last year that I assumed it was some sort of trick and the show was actually terrible. But then a friend described it to me as “not exactly surreal but kind of like that show you like” (she meant Pushing Daisies), and suddenly I had to find out what everyone was talking about.
So yeah, consider this my three-year-late acknowledgement that The Good Place is super good, super smart, and super worth watching.
One thing I’m partic

Sign languages aren’t easy to learn and are even harder to teach. They use not just hand gestures but also mouthings, facial expressions and body posture to communicate meaning. This complexity means professional teaching programs are still rare and often expensive. But this could all change soon, with a little help from artificial intelligence (AI). My colleagues and I are working on software for teaching yourself sign languages in an automated, intuitive way. Currently, this tool can an

Sony Pictures is taking audiences back to Punxsutawney… this time in virtual reality.
Whether it’s an abomination and a perversion of one of the best movies in the Bill Murray oeuvre or a great way to immerse a viewer in one of the most perfectly realized worlds brought to the silver screen (I unrepentantly love Groundhog Day) is TBD. That’s for players to decide.
In Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Son players embody Phil Connors Jr., the son of Groundhog Day’s central

Groundhog Day has been a movie and a musical, so why not make it a virtual reality game next?
Sony Pictures has teamed up with Tequila Works — the studio behind 2017's wonderful indie efforts Rime and The Sexy Brutale — for Groundhog Day: Like Father Like Son. It's a......... sequel? To Groundhog Day? Set 26 years later, where you're playing as Phil Connors' son as he's caught in the same kind of time loop as his dad?
Sure, why not?
This game looks completely cuckoo bananas, though i

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, is giving back to the community and adding her own personal touch along the way.
On Friday, she and Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, visited the One25 organization in Bristol, which works to "reach out to women trapped in or vulnerable to street sex-work, supporting them to break free and build new lives away from violence, poverty and addiction."
During the unplanned visit, the Duchess helped volunteers pack bags of food for women in need. As they went about the wor

Mary Ann Azevedo ContributorShare on Twitter Mary Ann Azevedo covers startups and tech at Crunchbase News.
2019 has been good to the Austin startup scene so far.
Combined, Austin startups have raised $240.3 million in January. That’s not much less than the nearly $300 million raised in all of Q4 2018. And since the beginning of the year, the Texas capital has seen a number of double-digit funding rounds and a nearly quarter of a billion dollar acquisition.
Out of 10 known r

Facebook’s lead data protection regulator in Europe has asked the company for an “urgent briefing” regarding plans to integrate the underlying infrastructure of its three social messaging platforms.
In a statement posted to its website late last week the Irish Data Protection Commission writes: “Previous proposals to share data between Facebook companies have given rise to significant data protection concerns and the Irish DPC will be seeking early assurances that all suc

Super Bowl 2019 is tomorrow, so you still have time to get a sweet deal on a home theater upgrade if you’re able to pick up locally at Best Buy, Walmart, or Target.
If you’re already set for the Super Bowl proceedings, Valentine’s Day is coming up in just a few weeks, too. This weekend is the best time to buy gifts, especially if you think they’ll take several days to arrive. We’ve compiled this week’s best deals, along with a few exclusive offers that we thi

Punxsutawney Phil, the Pennsylvania groundhog we let decide our seasons for us, is officially predicting an early spring.
On Saturday morning, the famous groundhog awoke at sunrise to celebrate Groundhog Day and did not see his shadow. This, his male handlers in top hats dramatically said, signals an early start to spring and an end to winter. But don't get too excited.JUST IN: Punxsutawney Phil sees no shadow, predicts early springpic.twitter.com/BsMser58Rt
— NBC News (@NBCNews) February

Digital publisher Serial Box will release a new science fiction series in March called The Vela. It follows a mercenary tasked with locating a missing refugee ship in a dying star system, only to discover that there’s a deeper plot that could threaten the entire universe.Serial Box isn’t your typical publisher. It produces long-form, serialized fiction that plays out more like a television show than a novel. Each “Serial” is broken into installments, each of which is a s

FamilyTreeDNA, a popular at-home DNA test, is working with the FBI to help the agency solve violent crimes, the company acknowledged in a statement released this week. The policy appears to go beyond the privacy rules generally laid out by other major DNA testing companies.
BuzzFeed News first reported on the FamilyTreeDNA policy. The company told the outlet it had cooperated with the agency in less than 10 cases.
In its statement, the company said the laboratory that performs DNA tests for Fam

This is One Good Thing, a weekly column where we tell you about one of the few nice things that happened this week.While there are plenty of differences between Millennials and Gen Z, as digital natives we can all relate to one thing — being the in-house IT department for our parents. 
We've all been there: When your mom wants to change her Facebook profile pic, you're the expert. But one wrong click and suddenly — you've broken her entire phone, all her photos are gone, and it'

I spent the week in Malibu attending Upfront Ventures’annual Upfront Summit, which brings together the likes of Hollywood, Silicon Valley and Washington, DC’s elite for a two-day networking session of sorts. Cameron Diaz was there for some reason, and Natalie Portman made an appearance. Stacey Abrams had a powerful Q&A session with Lisa Borders, the president and CEO of Time’s Up. Of course, Gwyneth Paltrowwas there to talk up Goop, her venture-funded commerce and content e

Mark Minevich ContributorShare on Twitter Mark Minevich is a digital fellow at IPSoft.Japan, still suffering the consequences of its ‘Lost Decade’ of economic stagnation, is eyeing a transformation more radical than any the industrialized world has ever seen.
Boldly identified as “Society 5.0” Japan describes its initiative as a purposeful effort to create a new social contract and economic model by fully incorporating the technological innovations of the fourth industri

If you want to attend Marshmello’s next concert, you don’t need to go any further than your game console. The electronic DJ will be performing a set inside of Fortnite this weekend, in what is the latest in an ever-growing list of unexpected in-game events. It’ll be the first concert in the battle royale game, and over the past few days posters have been spotted across the island while the virtual stage has been assembled. Even the weather is looking nice; after a major snowst

It is both the best thing and the worst thing about Sundance that it's hard to know, in any given year, exactly what to expect. Big-name stars show off unexpected depths; unknown talents get big seemingly overnight; oddball trends start to take shape.
SEE ALSO: 10 movies we can't wait for in 2019
It's only when you look back that the patterns and lessons emerge. And while it's worth acknowledging that Sundance is so big, no two attendees will have exactly the same experience, there were a few th

Ask Alyssa Milano what's next for the #MeToo movement, and she'll say it's the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, a Constitutional amendment that would grant women legal equality.
The United States almost ratified the proposed amendment in 1982, but three more states needed to approve it. (Before an amendment becomes part of the Constitution, three-fourths of states must adopt it.) Now the ERA is back in the news — and so is Milano along with it.
The amendment is now one state away fro

They say the best way to learn is by doing.
You can't learn how to drive if you don't hop inside a car and step on the gas (and maybe hit a few curbs). You can't play the guitar like Jimi Hendrix by simply binging on YouTube tutorials. And you can't really perform CPR just by watching that one episode of The Office (although one person actually managed to do it).
SEE ALSO: Reminder: Smart toys are cute, cuddly, and full of security risks
The same principle applies to programming, and that's why

Roses are red, violets are blue, and we've got some great deals on flowers for you.
Whether you want to send a bouquet to your crush, your BFF, or your mom (aww!), you can save an additional 15% on these already-discounted Valentine's Day flower services by entering our coupon code LOVE15 at checkout. That way, you'll still have some money left over for a candlelit dinner with your significant other... or a fancy bottle of wine you'll wind up finishing alone in front of The Bachelor. Either

Who decided to make ice baths everyone's go-to muscle recovery method? Christian Grey, perhaps? 
Cold water immersions definitely do the trick when you need fast relief for sore muscles, but man, are they ever miserable. Besides, it's hardly convenient to set up a vat of icy water every time you feel a little achy. And sure, you could just take your mom's advice and get checked out by a doctor or chiropractor, but you know they'll just tell you to pop an Advil and wait it out. 
SEE ALS

Valentine's Day pretty much goes one of two ways:
You're in a relationship and about to wined, dined, and....you know — or you're single and wish you were getting that treatment.But one thing everyone has in common? There's no way your night couldn't benefit from a little spicing up. 
Lovehoney (better known as an online wonderland of sex toys) wants to ensure that you feel damn good regardless of your relationship status this year — so they're offering 30% off of customer

It’s not that there’s anything wrong with a box of chocolates or flowers on Valentine’s Day: Some things are clichés for a reason, and who doesn’t love being the envy of the office when a surprise bouquet of flowers is delivered to your cubicle, or getting to binge-eat a massive heart-shaped box of sweets? 
But flowers die, and chocolates get eaten. (Probably pretty quickly, if we’re being honest.) Even a gourmet meal, one of the cornerstones of the holi

Accounts by mariners of freak or rogue waves out in the ocean have long been a common occurrence but until relatively recently remained anecdotal. That is, until January 1 1995, when a huge wave was observed – and recorded – at the Draupner Oil platform in the North Sea. It was one of the first reliable measurements of a freak wave in the ocean and at a height of 25.6 meters, it was over two times the height of the waves that surrounded it. Appearing seemingly from nowhere, this sem