Human Civilization And The Black Plastic Kitchen Utensils Panic

Recently there was a bit of a panic in the media regarding a very common item in kitchens all around the world: black plastic utensils used for flipping, scooping and otherwise handling our food wh…

br00t4c (@br00t4c@mastodon.social)

543K Posts, 3.19K Following, 3.06K Followers · More machine than man at this point. 24/7/365 stream of news and vitriol from a mostly leftist/progressive perspective. News feed is algorithmic. Commentary is me. I *try* to answer in a timely manner...

The London Underground Is Too Hot, But It’s Not An Easy Fix

The London Underground is an iconic piece of Victorian era engineering. What started in 1863 quickly became a core piece of infrastructure that would define the modern character of the British capi…

There’s Now A Wiki For Hacking Redbox Machines

With the rapidly evolving situation surrounding the Redbox vending machines still out in the wild, it’s about time somebody put together a Wiki to keep it all straight. The unredbox wiki has …

With Core ONE, Prusa’s Open Source Hardware Dream Quietly Dies

Yesterday, Prusa Research officially unveiled their next printer, the Core ONE. Going over the features and capabilities of this new machine, it’s clear that Prusa has kept a close eye on the…

The Great Redbox Cleanup: One Company Is Hauling Away America’s Last DVD Kiosks

Remember Redbox? Those bright red DVD vending machines that dotted every strip mall and supermarket in America, offering cheap rentals when Netflix was still stuffing discs into paper envelopes? Af…

Smart Thermostats Pitched For Texas Homes To Relieve Stressed Grid

It’s not much of a secret that Texas’ nearly completely isolated grid is in a bit of a pickle, with generating capacity often being handily outstripped during periods of extreme demand.…

Will .IO Domain Names Survive A Geopolitical Rearrangement?

The Domain Name System (DNS) is a major functional component of the modern Internet. We rely on it for just about everything! It’s responsible for translating human-friendly domain names into…

Recycling Tough Plastics Into Precursors With Some Smart Catalyst Chemistry

Plastics are unfortunately so cheap useful that they’ve ended up everywhere. They’re filling our landfills, polluting our rivers, and even infiltrating our food chain as microplastics. …

Vehicle-To-Everything: The Looming Smart Traffic Experience

Much of a car’s interaction with the world around it is still a very stand-alone, analog experience, regardless of whether said car has a human driver or a self-driving computer system. Mark …

Fukushima Daiichi: Cleaning Up After A Nuclear Accident

On 11 March, 2011, a massive magnitude 9.1 earthquake shook the west coast of Japan, with the epicenter located at a shallow depth of 32 km,  a mere 72 km off the coast of Oshika Peninsula, of the …

Elon Musk Owes You $100 • Cards Against Humanity Saves America Day 7

Elon Musk stole your land, and now he owes you $100.

Catching The BOAT: Gamma-Ray Bursts And The Brightest Of All Time

Down here at the bottom of our ocean of air, it’s easy to get complacent about the hazards our universe presents. We feel safe from the dangers of the vacuum of space, where radiation sizzles…

A Look At The Small Web, Part 1

In the early 1990s I was privileged enough to be immersed in the world of technology during the exciting period that gave birth to the World Wide Web, and I can honestly say I managed to completely…