Category Archives: Blog

The Internet of Things continues to amaze, but unfortunately for all the techno-utopians of the world, it’s for exactly the wrong reasons. 

The latest case study in why connecting every little thing to the internet might not be such a good idea is brought to us by Lockstate — a company that manufactures, among other things, a Wi-Fi enabled smart lock marketed to Airbnb hosts around the world. The device allows for keyless entry and remote monitoring, along with the charming ability to be remotely bricked.

And, surprise, that’s exactly what happened on Aug. 7 when Lockstate pushed an errant firmware update that left a number of its locks permanently busted. Whoops. Read more…

More about Technology, Internet, Internet Of Things, Iot, and Tech

The American public is still trying to process Donald Trump’s disastrous press conference on Tuesday, in which he defended those who marched in a white supremacist rally.

Later that day, Anderson Cooper broke down exactly what was so disturbing about the president’s comments in a segment that lasted more than 11 minutes.

“In the remarks he made today, the president revealed what he truly thinks about race in America,” Cooper said, before showing clips of Trump trying to downplay a gathering of neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and alt-right members that resulted in a protester getting killed by a car.  Read more…

More about Cnn, Donald Trump, Anderson Cooper, Charlottesville, and Charlottesville Protests

Barack Obama may not be the president anymore but that’s not stopping him from making history.

In the wake of the deadly clash between neo-Nazi hate groups and protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia over the weekend, President Donald Trump’s usually eager Twitter fingers remained inactive for hours  while Obama rose to the challenge of addressing the nation.

Now, just days after the former president responded to the tragic violence with a powerful Nelson Mandela quote, his tweet has become the most-liked in history.

More about Twitter, Conversations, Politics, History, and Protests

If MoviePass sounded too good to be true when it offered unlimited movie tickets for $50 per month back in 2011, it really sounded dodgy when the service announced on Tuesday that it had lowered its price to $9.99.

Ten bucks! For unlimited movies?

Now the largest movie theater chain in the U.S. is getting cranky — and calling bullshit.

AMC Theatres issued a strongly worded statement Tuesday afternoon, saying that MoviePass is “not welcome here” and that they were exploring ways to opt out. Which is going to be a challenge, because the way MoviePass works, it technically still is welcome at AMC theaters — and just about any chain that does online ticketing. Read more…

More about Movies, Amc, Movie Theaters, Moviepass, and Entertainment

A mama black bear was caught on camera charging a Siberian husky at a campground in Alaska. 

The recently released clip, from a campground in Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, shows a bear and her three cubs approaching a trailer from the woods on July 5. When the bear spots the dog it delivers a bluff charge, and the bear and husky get into a brief fight off camera.

A woman can then be heard yelling at the bear, which returns to its cubs and runs away. 

Tom Henderson, who uploaded the video earlier this month, said in an email that his wife is the person heard yelling in the clip. Fortunately, the dog was unharmed in the scuffle, despite its screams. Read more…

More about Animals, Dog, Bear, Culture, and Animals

More about Hulu, Feminism, Activism, Change.Org, and Margaret Atwood

President Donald Trump may not know whether or not he considers what happened to Heather Heyer in Charlottesville an act of terrorism. But he does know one thing: “A lot about Charlottesville.” 

Why’s that? He’s got a winery there!

The topic came up at the close of Tuesday’s unhinged presser, in which the president discussed infrastructure, defended white supremacists and then, naturally, brought up Trump Winery.

More about Watercooler, Culture, Wine, Trump, and Press Conference

On Friday, some of America’s most racist trolls hatched from their egg avatars to wave Home Depot tiki torches and chant their fave Nazi, KKK, and white supremacist slogans in Charlottesville.  

Yet some were nonetheless caught off guard when their very public displays of hate were made, well, public. 

Twitter account @YesYoureRacist enjoined users to circulate photos of the Charlottesville marchers in hopes of identifying them over the weekend. It didn’t take long for the account’s popularity to surge and for the messages to flood in.

On Saturday morning, the account had close to 60,000 followers. By Tuesday afternoon, that had soared to 372,000. Read more…

More about Twitter, White Nationalists, Charlottesville, White Supremacists, and Charlottesville Protests

One of the best movies of 2017 and an all-time classic run from Mark Millar, Logan and Old Man Logan actually share very little. But of all the differences, which one actually matters most?

Visit CineFix on YouTube for more episodes and movie-related content. Read more…

More about Hugh Jackman, Comic Books, Graphic Novels, Patrick Stewart, and Cinefix

Los Angeles wants to join forces with businesses to fight cyber crime.

It announced the first collective regional cybersecurity defense effort in the United States on Tuesday, called the Los Angeles Cyber Lab. 

The goal is to disseminate knowledge gained from analyzing “one billion security-related events and over four million attempted intrusions into city networks per day” to businesses across the city, according to a press release put out by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti. 

“The lab will alert small and medium-sized business partners to attacks as they occur, and larger businesses can receive automated updates to their own cyber defense systems,” wrote the authors of the press release. “Over time, the platform will evolve into a mutual exchange of threat information with private sector partners, further fortifying L.A.’s capacity to thwart cyber criminals.” Read more…

More about Business, Business, and Cybersecurity