The Pokemon Plot: How One Cartoon Inspired the Army to Dream Up a Seizure Gun

In 1998, a secret Army intelligence analysis suggested a new way to take out enemies: blast them with electromagnetic energy until their brains overload and they start to convulse. Amazingly, it was an idea inspired by a Pokemon episode.

Application of “electromagnetic pulses” could force neurons to all fire at once, causing a “disruption of voluntary muscle control,” reads a description of a proposed seizure weapon, contained in a declassified document from the Army’s National Ground Intelligence Center. “It is thought by using a method that would actually trigger nerve synapses directly with an electrical field, essentially 100% of individuals would be susceptible to seizure induction.”

Particle accelerators could make spent nuclear fuel 200x safer

Until we can manage to make renewable energy sources pay off, nuclear power is arguably (and feel free to argue this) one of the cleanest and safest methods of energy generation there is. One of the biggest problems is the dangerous spent fuel, but there may be a solution to that: particle accelerators.

AMC quietly confirms there's gonna be a 4th season of Walking Dead

There's a long road ahead for AMC's The Walking Dead. Next month, the zombie hit returns for its third season, and the network currently has its eyes on a fourth. But they've indirectly confirmed what most us all already suspected. 

The Walking Dead is working with the American Red Cross for an upcoming blood drive. The network announced the partnership (on TWD official blog), while inadvertently breaking some major news. The Walking Dead has been renewed for a fourth season.

11 reasons we still love The Princess Bride 25 years later

It's got everything the perfect love story needs: a beautiful princess, a handsome adventurer, scheming villains, magic, pageantry and, of course, really big rodents. Today The Princess Bride turns 25, and it's still one of our favorite movies.

From the laughs to the love, here are 11 big reasons why. PHOTOS

Cabin in the Woods director reveals we nearly had an EPIC videogame

Frequent Joss Whedon collaborator and Cabin in the Woods writer Drew Goddard recently did a Q&A with fans, and we learned some pretty cool stuff about the quirky horror film that (finally) could. The coolest? They were planning a videogame that sounds pretty freaking mind-blowing.

The dock is dead: Best wireless speakers for the iPhone

Since Apple's iPhone 5 became official on September 12, it's been an emotional rollercoaster for tech enthusiasts. There have been plenty of highs -- It's so light! It's got 4G! Beautiful screen! -- but they've been tempered with some disappointing lows, too. On the software side, Apple's decision to move to a Google-free maps app has been the biggest sticking point. On the hardware front, there's still grumbling about the death of the venerable 30-pin dock port, which has been a mainstay of iPhone (and iPod) design since the early days.

Sharp reveals see-through solar panel

A see-through solar energy panel announced today by Sharp -- primarily designed for balcony railings and skyscraper windows -- offers an uncommon alternative energy solution and sense of privacy in a single package.

Google's Sergey Brin: You'll ride in robot cars within 5 years

If you're excited about the day when your car drives itself, you may not have too wait long.

Google cofounder Sergey Brin said Google will have autonomous cars available for the general public within five years.

"You can count on one hand the number of years it will take before ordinary people can experience this," he said at the signing of SB 1298, which establishes safety and performance standards for cars operated by computers on California roads and highways.

"Aporkalypse" Bacon Shortage Sends Twitter Into A Panic

Does that headline say "bacon shortage?" Why didn't anyone tell us?!?! Everyone PANIC!!!!

The Twitterverse quickly caught wind of the news, expressing their own brand of sarcastic shock and horror. Some clever Twitter users call it the "aporkalypse," while others blame the shortage on the internet's ironic love of everything bacon.

Another Critical Java Flaw Puts 1B Users At Risk

Another one? Seriously? Holy cow, it's only been a month since that last gigantic Java vulnerability. 

If you disabled Java when the last zero-day exploit was spotted in the wild, then you might consider doing so again . . . or dumping Java altogether? According to Security Explorations researcher Adam Gowdiak, who sent the email to the Full Disclosure Seclist, this Java exploit affects "one billion users of Oracle Java SE software."

The Worst BlackBerry Ad..Ever!

*WARNING* Do not watch this video if you just ate or have a weak stomach. Somebody needs their ass kicked for this one.  LINK

Party seems over for Somali pirates

HOBYO, Somalia (AP) — The empty whiskey bottles and overturned, sand-filled skiffs littering this once-bustling shoreline are signs the heyday of Somali piracy may be over. Most of the prostitutes are gone and the luxury cars repossessed. Pirates while away their hours playing cards or catching lobsters.

"There's nothing to do here these days," said Hassan Abdi, a high school graduate who taught English in a private school before turning to piracy in 2009. "The hopes for a revitalized market are not high."

Time travel through the Wachowskis' Cloud Atlas in 7 epic posters

Seven new posters have been released from the Wachowskis' epic new flick Cloud Atlas, showing off some wild scenes from the future, past and present. Want to see?

The film, based on David Mitchell's 2004 novel of the same name, weaves together several story lines through a massive span of time, dropping in on characters in various eras.

Retired Generals Fear That Kids Are Too Fat For War

At the intersection of fat-shaming and war-mongering comes a bizarre public health campaign: an effort by retired generals and admirals to ban sugary sodas and snacks from public schools. The kids today, say the former brass, are too fat to fight for their country. Welcome to the sum of all libertarian fears: a Nanny State that packs an M4 rifle.

Those officers, part of a group called “Mission: Readiness,” argue in a new report called “Still Too Fat to Fight” that unhealthy snacks, particularly in schools, endanger national security. “No other major country’s military forces face the challenges of weight gain confronting America’s armed forces,” they fret. (Well, except for the Chinese, but whatever.)

“It’s clear to us that our military readiness could be put in jeopardy given the fact that nearly 75 percent of young Americans are unable to serve in uniform,” write two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff involved with Mission: Readiness, retired Army Gens. Hugh Shelton and John Shalikashvili.

Skydiver aims to go supersonic October 8, finally

If you're going to try to zip through the air faster than the speed of sound -- without an airplane, and straight down to boot -- well, that's not something you rush into.

And it's been a long haul indeed for Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner, who for years now has been planning to make a historic skydive from higher than anyone's ever jumped, and faster too. As in supersonic fast.

Apple's Lightning Connector Uses Adaptive Technology to Dynamically Assign Pin Functions

With Apple's new Lightning connector on the iPhone 5 dropping to just eight contact pins from the 30 pins seen in the original dock connector and gaining the ability to be inserted in either orientation, many have wondered just how Apple has been able to maintain most of the functions of the original dock connector. Others have wondered why Apple simply didn't shift to micro-USB, an existing standard in a comparable form factor. 

Developer Rainer Brockerhoff has been examining Lightning's technical features and over the weekend outlined his thinking on how the "adaptive" nature of the Lightning connector highlighted by Apple during the technology's introduction at the iPhone 5 media event has enabled flexible functionality with a minimum of pins. Brockerhoff notes that the Lightning connector appears able to sense what kinds of devices are being connected and to use chips embedded in the cable to assign pin functionalities appropriate for each situation.

24-karat iPhone 5: Bite the golden Apple

Sometimes an iPhone isn't enough on its own. You need it to stand out. You need for everyone around you to know you have more money than sense. That's when you buy a gold-platediPhone 5.

Gold & Co. of London is here for you. You'll have to travel to the Collector's Palace at the Dubai Mall, but that shouldn't be a problem since you have a private jet. Your new iPhone 5 will be available gaudily covered in your choice of 24-karat gold or rose gold. LINK

Tesla Supercharger network fills EVs with sun juice in 30 mins

Why aren't you driving an electric car right now? Let's just ignore the fact that they're expensive, temperamental, and often inconvenient, and focus on the impossibility of long-distance travel, because that's a problem that Tesla Motors has just solved with the unveiling of a network of solar-powered battery "Superchargers" in California.

Best smartphones for $100 (roundup)

A hundred greenbacks is a respectable chunk of change, but when it comes to personal electronics like the ultra-personal smartphone, $100 (before taxes and fees) is a darn good deal. Since the smartphone operating system remains the same across handsets from the most entry-level to the most premium, what a price hike usually gives you is a step up in features -- like LTE or HSPA+ 42 support, a faster processor, and more premium camera components, for example.

Here are some of today's top picks.

Read more: http://www.cnet.com/8301-17918_1-57465142-85/best-smartphones-for-$100-roundup/#ixzz27W9rT8Mz

Hugh Jackman is shredded in 1st official pic from The Wolverine

After countless paparazzi photos, we finally have something official from The Wolverine, 'cause Marvel has released the first still from the movie featuring Hugh Jackman as the title character. Jackman has no problem showing a little skin for his fans. Here he is as Logan/Wolverine striking a pose and flexing some serious muscle. The claws are out and he's ready to fight. The Wolverine will center on the hero's journey through Japan, where he'll encounter the villainous Silver Samurai (Will Yun Lee).

Father sends son's toy on an epic journey to the edge of space

It almost goes without saying that the greatest gift you can give a kid is the gift of learning through adventure. One father recently decided to give his four-year-old son such a treat by sending his favorite toy train to the very edge of space and back again.

Video: finally a view inside a rocket doing its thing

In possibly his most glorious bit of "here's how you do it" video to date, serial DIY'er Ben Krasnow takes us through what it looks like inside a rocket during its burn. The hybrid rocket engine is built with acrylic to give us a view of the gaseous oxygen letting it rip.

Borderlands 2 Reset Bug Kills Your Badass Rank (XBOX360)

Anyone else run into this bug?

Air Force’s Secret Space Plane Prepped for New Launch

The Air Force’s mysterious X-37B space plane is now readying for its third space mission, slated to begin in October. And perhaps not surprising for the hush-hush orbital drone, the third time into space remains as secretive as the first two.

Next month, the X-37B will blast off again aboard an Atlas 5 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The exact timing of the October launch is unknown and subject to change due to weather conditions, and there’s no telling how long the drone will stay in orbit. ”Preparations for launch at Cape Canaveral have begun,” Major Tracy Bunko, an Air Force spokesperson, told Space.com.

Wearable camera takes shots for you, creates record of your day

The wearable camera "Autographer" provides a new twist on photography by taking the camera out of your hands and intelligently taking the snaps for you. It can capture up to 2,000 high-res pictures per day using its array of tools and then surprises you with a chronicle of your day.

Apple's new Lightning sync cable has chip to stop knockoffs

A couple of weeks ago we reported on how the iPhone 5's new Lightning connector was going to be a pain for people with older docking systems. Now it looks like it's not just the dock, but even the regular sync cable has been designed to make life difficult for aftermarket suppliers.

Anti-Japan tensions spread across China

Taiwanese Coast Guard ship (L) and Japanese Coast Guard ship fire water cannons at each other near the disputed East China Sea islets called Senkaku in Japan, Diaoyutai in China and Tiaoyutai in Taiwan in this handout photo from Central News Agency September 25, 2012. Several dozen of fishing boats from Taiwan sail near the Tiaoyutai Islands to assert local fishermen's rights to operate in what they described as their traditional fishing grounds. PHOTOS

Ultimate DIY: Man builds a cozy corner office from an old bus

There's nothing like a passion project, right? Well, it doesn't get much bigger than turning a rusting hulk of a bus into a shiny new office space.

Printrbot: The cheap and simple 3D printer for the rest of us

Although 3D printing efforts from the likes of MakerBot are making headway, such machines are still far from mainstream. Hoping spur more adoption of 3D printing, one inventor came up with a quick and cheap solution anyone can put together in just a couple of hours.

MakerBot shows off next-gen Replicator 2 'desktop' 3D printer

The new Replicator 2 looks good on a shelf, but also boasts two notable upgrades: it's insanely accurate with a 100-micron resolution, and can build objects 37 percent larger than its predecessor without adding roughly any bulk to its size.

In a small eatery in Brooklyn, New York, MakerBot CEO Bre Pettis unveiled the next generation Replicator 2, which he presented in terms of Apple-like evolution in design. From the memory of its own Apple IIe in much smaller DIY 3D printing kits comes the all-steel Replicator 2. The fourth generation MakerBot printer ditches the wood for a sleek hard-body chassis, and is "designed for the desktop of an engineer, researcher, creative professional, or anyone who loves to make things," according to the company.

Karl Urban explains his 'darker, grittier, more realistic' Dredd

Seventeen years since his disastrous big screen appearance, the iconic Judge Dredd returns in Dredd. This time the movie features a modest budget and focuses on the characters rather than a big name superstar.

Karl Urban, who portrays the titular character and first began reading the comic as a teenager in his native New Zealand, compared the two. "This was the Dredd I read as teenager. Tonally this a darker, grittier, more realistic with the right dry sense of humor. It was a very simple character driven story about survival, empowerment, and discovering your capabilities."

Air Force Video Compares Facebook, iPhone to Atom Bombs

The world of tomorrow is going to be a dark and sinister place, according to a group of Air Force futurists. One reason why it’ll be so scary: Facebook.

In an foreboding web video entitled “Welcome to 2035…the Age of Surprise,” produced by the U.S. Air Force’s Center for Strategy and Technology, the pace of human advancement races forward ever faster until the distinction between man and machine all but disappears and the dangers to those cyborgs are omnipresent. Social media, apparently, is a major step on the road to this dystopia.

The video is part of a USAF-led effort called “Blue Horizons,” which is tasked with producing a series of annual reports to attempt to predict the future’s technology. Blue Horizons tries to determine what air, space and cyberspace will look like in the next 20 years or so. It seeks to anticipate how the technology will change and who will have access to emerging technologies. But given their predictions, you’d be forgiven if you came away from the video with an impulsive need to burn your iPhone, deactivate your Facebook account and soberly promise never to go on YouTube again — wait, can I fit all that in a tweet?

10 nearly impossible concepts from Electrolux Design Competition

We love how these design competitions that Electrolux puts on have absolutely no basis in reality. Levitating washing machines? Sure, why not! Smoothie blender kinetic harvesting bouncy toys? Bring it on! This year's top 10 competition finalists don't disappoint, and we'll show you all of them in a nice big gallery of impossibility.

These 10 finalists come from an original field of 30 semi-finalists. Concepts like an armadillo-shaped ironing system and clothes washer in the form of a hula-hoop somehow didn't manage to make the cut, but we think you'll be suitably impressed with the bizarritude of the Electrolux Design Competition top 10. Check them all out below, along with captions from the concept designers themselves. PHOTOS

Electrolux, via Yanko

Nikita is back in 1st ass-kicking, game-changing S3 footage

Some major changes are coming in the third season of The CW's Nikita, and the first trailer shows off a whole new world at Division. NIkita (Maggie Q) is back, and kicking more ass than ever.

[Spoilers ahead!]

Watch 14 minutes of revealing Prometheus deleted scenes

Hungry for next month's Prometheus Blu-ray ? Why wait, when you can chomp down on four deleted scenes featuring some slimy alien skin, a chatty pissed off Engineer and Shaw goin' all Lizzie Borden?

Mystery Behind Deep-Sea Crop Circles off the Coast of Japan Solved - Puffer Fish

More than 70 percent of Earth is covered in water, and the oceans remain some of the most mysterious parts of our world. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, 95 percent of what lies underwater has not ever been seen by humans. NASA confirms that humans have better maps of the surface of Mars than of the bottom of the sea.

Earlier this year, off the southern coast of Japan, Yoji Ookata, a deep-sea photographer and diver who has been documenting the deep sea for more than 50 years, saw something he had never observed before. A circular pattern of rippling sand about 80 feet below sea level and 6 feet in diameter was on the ocean floor. Ookata returned to the same spot with a TV camera crew in tow to capture the discovery and figure out who or what had created its intricate design.

To See in the Arctic, Darpa Might Stick Sensors on Icebergs

 
Hyped-up fears of a coming Arctic war have, appropriately, cooled down recently. But Arctic ice is melting faster than ever, which could mean more activity — military and commercial — in an environment notoriously unforgiving to sensors and other location tools. Leave it to the Pentagon’s far-out researchers at Darpa to work on a solution: an all-seeing network of sensors to track what’s going on in the Arctic all year round — including, it seems, sensors placed on icebergs.
According to a Darpa briefing, the agency wants to leverage “mobile floating-ice” for electromagnetic and acoustic sensors, and to help track ships and submarines. In the briefing, floating icebergs are illustrated with networked sensors stuck on them (.pdf). The electromagnetic sensors are seen stuck on top, with acoustic sensors attached to the icebergs’ undersides, which could help with mapping the Arctic seafloor. The reason why is the icebergs drift up to six kilometers per day — which has been speeding up with global warming — which can allow the military to “leverage ice movement.”

Teens who sext more likely to be sexually active

A study of 1,800 high-school students in Los Angeles suggests that 1 in 6 teens have sexted, and that those teens are seven times more likely to be having actual sex.

After reviewing data from 1,839 14- to 17-year-old high-school students in Los Angeles, researchers are confirming what may otherwise seem obvious: sexting and sex go hand in hand.

But which of these activities comes first -- sex or sexting -- remains unclear.
"What we really wanted to know is, is there a link between sexting and taking risks with your body? And the answer is a pretty resounding 'yes,'" lead author Eric Rice, an assistant professor of social work at the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles, told Reuters Health.

Russian impact crater contains 'trillions' of carats of diamonds

Russia announced Monday that it's been sitting on a huge deposit of diamonds buried under an impact crater in Siberia. And these aren't just any diamonds: they're twice as hard as normal, thanks to their instantaneously violent extraterrestrial origins.
The trillions of carats of diamonds (that's hundreds of thousands of tons) that are located underneath the Popigai crater in Siberia represent 10 times as much raw diamond as the entire world's supply of the diamond reserves all put together. Apparently, the Russians have known about the diamonds for about 40 years, but they've been happy to just keep it a secret and go on selling us all diamonds from other places in Russia instead.

Intel: 5nm processors means Moore's Law good for the next decade

In 1965, Intel co-founder Gordon Moore predicted that the number of transistors on a given area of chip would double every two years. For like ten years or something. So far, Moore's Law (as it's now known) has been true for close to fifty years, and Intel has its sights set on keeping it rolling for another decade.

Borderlands 2 review: Hyperion strikes back

Like the first before it, Borderlands 2 is a game mostly about really big, really effective sci-fi weaponry. As a sequel, the second game offers up a clearly improved yet faithful experience for the familiar. For the first time player, here's a good a place as any to get into Borderlands.

The Story So Far

Borderlands 2 finds a group of heavily armed "Vault hunters" once again pitted against a corporate agressor on a backwater planet. This time it's the Hyperion Corporation led by the verifiably evil Handsome Jack, who has mounted a massive mining operation to uncover a powerful tool for destruction. The bounty seekers have formed a rebel alliance with their foes from the first game, the Crimson Lance, and the fate of the very universe could be in their hands. You know, or something — Borderlands 2 doesn't take itself very seriously.

12 big, bold concepts for homesteading on Earth's final frontier

Back in 2000, then-President Clinton convened a panel of leading oceanographers and explorers. That panel ultimately produced a report entitled "Discovering Earth's Final Frontier". What they actually developed, outlined in that document, was the world's first and only national strategy for the exploration of the world's oceans.

NASA: Warp drive is 'plausible and worth further investigation'

Warp Drive, a staple of science-fiction, has just been deemed "plausible and worth further investigation" by the smart and apparently not crazy people over at NASA. And by way of further investigation, they've gone and started trying to create warp bubbles in the lab.

Japan invents armor for your teeth

For things in your head that are designed to eat stuff, eating stuff seems to be kind of a big deal for teeth. They're always demanding to be brushed and flossed and rinsed and taken to the dentist and whatnot. Japan is having none of this, and scientists there have created tooth armor that can keep you from getting any more cavities.

Hot Wheels world record corkscrew jump

Top Gear turns out some pretty great videos of drivers pushing their cars to the limit.

Is China’s New Stealth Fighter Headed to Sea?

The U.S. knows very little about China’s newest stealth fighter prototype, the Shenyang J-21. But the just-released photographs of the Chinese jet reveal it to have a barely noticeable but key detail — one that suggests the jet might be hauled by China’s future fleet of aircraft carriers.

The J-21, according to the three photos of it circulating on the Internet, has twin nose wheels. That’s the kind of tough landing gear usually associated with naval fighters optimized for launching and landing on the heaving decks of aircraft carriers at sea. Could the J-21 be a tool of Chinese naval power?

Just two days after the J-21 — or J-31, as some observers think it’s designated — made its blurry Internet debut at a factory airfield in northeastern China, there are far more questions than answers about the new airplane’s origins, characteristics and purpose.

Robot Made Out Of Paper Will Kill Us All

This guy has way more time and patience than any of us do. Hell, most of us can't make a paper airplane that can fly more than ten feet, let alone attempt something like this. 

Twitter Announces New Look for Profile Pages

Twitter has announced a new look for profile pages and announce a new iPad and Android apps.

What’s the biggest change? There’s now a huge header image that runs across the top, sort of like the banner image that Facebook users have on their timelines. The page itself has been reoriented to play up other visuals as well: Your avatar is no longer tucked in the corner, but will display front and center. The photo stream, too, has been moved up, and will now be accessible on the apps.

Twitter Announces New Look for Profile Pages

Twitter has announced a new look for profile pages and announce a new iPad and Android apps.

What’s the biggest change? There’s now a huge header image that runs across the top, sort of like the banner image that Facebook users have on their timelines. The page itself has been reoriented to play up other visuals as well: Your avatar is no longer tucked in the corner, but will display front and center. The photo stream, too, has been moved up, and will now be accessible on the apps.

Twitter Announces New Look for Profile Pages

Twitter has announced a new look for profile pages and announce a new iPad and Android apps.

What’s the biggest change? There’s now a huge header image that runs across the top, sort of like the banner image that Facebook users have on their timelines. The page itself has been reoriented to play up other visuals as well: Your avatar is no longer tucked in the corner, but will display front and center. The photo stream, too, has been moved up, and will now be accessible on the apps.

2013 Smart Forstars Concept

 

You can tell just by looking at the Smart Forstars Concept that Smart is diving out of the box with their recent concept offerings. Just like the For-Us Concept that we saw at Geneva, the Forstars Concept is a take on a future urban sports utility coupe that has a chance to appeal to a wide market.

Combining a new style that’s far removed from the conservative nature of Smart with cutting edge technology that we don’t normally see on a Smart, the Forstars Concept is the kind of concept that we’d love to see Smart build as a production model in the future.

New Entertainment and Game Studio Announced by Microsoft

Microsoft announced that the company will be starting a studio devoted to games development for the Windows 8 tablet. This will supplement the already announced 40 title library of Xbox games which launch in October.

A recruitment drive for the as yet unnamed new studio is currently underway. The new outfit will initially be based at Microsoft Studios' Great Pulteney Street premises in London and will commence operations in November.

Stealth Jet’s Oxygen Woes Still a Mystery, Air Force Admits

Mitt Romney says he wants to re-open production of America’s topline stealth fighter program. One problem: The Air Force still isn’t sure why the planes were intermittently choking their pilots for more than a decade.

Thanks to a big assist from teams of Navy divers and NASA scientists, the Air Force believes it has figured out how to keep the F-22 Raptor’s fighter jocks safe, after 12 years of disturbing incidents. That’s the good news from today’s Congressional hearing on the Raptor’s long history of causing mysterious, and potentially fatal, breathing difficulties.

This visual landmine detector is powered by smartphones : PETALS Live

The United Nations reports that since the 1960s as many as 110 million landmineshave been spread globally into some 70 countries. Metal detectors are currently used to try and locate the mines, but a new startup has come up with a prototype that could more quickly identify the mines by providing a visual confirmation via smartphones.

Skyrim Helm of Yngol Build ft. Malukah

I decided to record the entire process of one of my projects: the Helm of Yngol from Skyrim. A full write-up on the process of the helmet shown here will be posted to my webpage eventually: www.volpinprops.com

Half-Life: Black Mesa

It's nearly time to go back to where it all began, to once again board the underground tram and travel deep into the bowels of the Black Mesa research facility. The long-in-development Half-Life total conversion, Black Mesa, is set for launch on Steam in T-minus 24 hours. Are you ready to relive Gordon Freeman's iconic first crowbar-wielding adventure?

After eight years of development, presumed cancellation, and a surprise rebirth earlier this year, Black Mesa will finally be available for download tomorrow for free, and courtesy of Project Greenlight and Valve's thumbs up, it will be on Steam.

Official RoboCop synopsis shows OmniCorp will still be to blame

 

The folks behind RoboCop have gotten their act together. After casting shakeups and rumors of a hellish production, filming is finally underway. Not only that, but MGM and Columbia have released an official plot synopsis.

The NSA Wants Hackers

Attention hackers: The NSA wants you! We're not talking the "let's-go-for-a-ride-with-a-black-bag-over-your-head" kind of way either (well, maybe some of you), this is an employment opportunity.

Hey, hackers: The NSA is out to get you. If you're an American who can code malware to infiltrate a network, or snoop on SMS messages, or stop a distributed denial-of-service attack in your sleep, you're a person of interest. Age is of little consequence. Location likewise. The NSA's mission is simple: It's trying to identify formidable hackers. But not to arrest them. To recruit them.

From Brand New Laptop to Infected By Pressing 'On'

You know, it is a damn shame that you don't even get the pleasure of surfing the "risky" sites anymore before getting infected with a virus/malware.

A customer in Shenzhen, China, took a brand new laptop out of its box and booted it up for the first time. But as the screen lit up, the computer began taking on a life of its own. The machine, triggered by a virus hidden in its hard drive, began searching across the Internet for another computer.

Diplomat Killed in Libya Told Fellow Gamers: Hope I ‘Don’t Die Tonight’

On Tuesday, Sean Smith, a Foreign Service Information Management Officer assigned to the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, typed a message to the director of his online gaming guild: ”Assuming we don’t die tonight. We saw one of our ‘police’ that guard the compound taking pictures.” The consulate was under siege, and within hours, a mob would attack, killing Smith along with three others, including the U.S. ambassador.

Students use giant balls to build omnidirectional motorcycle

Riding this bike takes balls. Gigantic balls. Quite possibly the largest pair of balls you've ever seen in one place. Round wheels are out and spherical wheels are in with this project from students at San Jose State University, the end result of which will be a rideable electric motorcycle that uses balls instead of wheels.

Meet the most brilliantly shiny natural object on Earth

Isn't this pretty? It's a little fruity berry type thing called Pollia condensata, from Africa, and it's the shiniest thing on the planet. We're talking "shiny" like Firefly shiny: something brilliant and awesome and sparkly that lasts forever, because there's no actual pigment going on in there. The color is structural, like a butterfly wing, and will never ever fade.

Officially, the P. condensata fruit is the most intense natural color there is, reflecting a massive 30% of the light that falls on it. Researchers from Kew Gardens, the University of Cambridge and the Smithsonian Natural History Museum wanted a piece of the action, so they all tried to figure out what kind of pigment P. condensata was using, but after attempting to extract said pigment they realized that there wasn't any. At all.