eBay is giving Australians another high-tech way to spend their money. The e-commerce company has teamed up with Myers, a department store in the country, to launch a virtual reality shop. It can be accessed through existing headsets like Samsung Gea…
Technical
Some ‘Warcraft’ movie tickets include free ‘World of Warcraft’
Following a similar business tactic that drug dealers have employed for ages, developer Blizzard is giving folks who check out the upcoming Warcraft movie a free, full, copy of World of Warcraft. That's assuming you see the movie at certain Regal Cin…
Bezos confirms more brick-and-mortar Amazon stores
Amazon is building more brick-and-mortar stores and beefing up Prime membership perks, company CEO Jeff Bezos has confirmed at the company's annual meeting for shareholders. At the moment, the mostly online-based retailer has a single bookstore in Se…
NASA shows a typical day on the ISS via Snapchat
NASA hasn't exactly been secretive when it comes to activities aboard the space station, but seeing astronauts living the dream is something else. To celebrate the ISS' 100,000th orbit around our planet since it launched in 1998, the agency has teame…
GarageBand goes to China with new instruments and Live Loops
If you're looking to bring some new voices to the music you make in GarageBand, Apple's got you covered. The company has recently added a slew of Chinese instruments including the pipa and erhu to the app. That's in addition to some 300 loops of musi…
Linksys will let you use open router code under new FCC rules
While the FCC's imminent rules for wireless device interference are supposed to allow hackable WiFi routers, not every router maker sees it that way. TP-Link, for instance, is blocking open source firmware out of fear that you'll run afoul of the re…
ESL gives eSports an official oversight body
While eSports is now a big money-maker, it's still wildly inconsistent at times: rules, prizes and schedules can vary from league to league. The Electronic Sports League thinks the industry can do better, though. It's forming the World Esports Asso…
Software predicts the lifespans of machines by ‘cloning’ them
In some cases, machine breakdowns are more than just inconveniences — in the military, they can spell disaster on the battlefield. Software is quickly eliminating those rude surprises, however. NASA spinoff Sentient Science has been offering Digit…
‘Battlefield 1’ breakdown reveals a close attention to history
Video games play fast and loose with realism by definition, but authenticity still matters to some degree After all, it's hard to enjoy a history-focused game if there are obvious factual errors. So how does Battlefield 1 stack up, then? So far so…
Scientists release personal data for 70,000 OkCupid profiles
A group of Danish researchers scraped data from 70,000 OkCupid profiles, packaged it in a data set, and released it on the internet. While the profiles are technically public, collecting personal information on such a massive scale without getting co…
The Weather Channel’s odd local news service is coming to iOS and Android
The Weather Channel is a shining example of cable TV's heyday — but it's become increasingly irrelevant with the rise of the internet and smartphones. The company started working to get more into localized news and weather with Local Now, a channel…
Disney Research uses RFID tags for low-cost interactive games
Disney Research and Carnegie Mellon University have developed a way to use RFID tags to make interactive games and controllers so cheap, they're "essentially disposable." Their system called "RapID" can sense if you're moving or touching objects atta…
Billboard for fake funeral home urges drivers to text
A billboard with the unusual message of encouraging texting while driving was showcased this week along the the Gardiner Expressway in Toronto, Ontario. The ad, which says it's for the Wathan Funeral Home, isn't a way to drum up business for a mortua…
Windows 10 won’t let you share WiFi passwords any more
Remember Microsoft's WiFi Sense? One of its cornerstones is the ability to share password-protected WiFi networks with contacts, saving them the hassle of logging in when they visit. Unfortunately, though, there weren't many people enamored with th…
One of Apple’s earliest Siri engineers reportedly leaves for GE
Apple hasn't had a great time holding on to the original Siri team, and we don't just mean the founders — there are precious few of those core members left. And today, we're learning that one of those last remaining pioneers may have walked out the…