Future Stories

The coronavirus is currently changing slowly. There are only about two dozen mutations. There have been many reports of multiple strains of SARS-CoV-2. Virologists use the world strain as a label to the same group of samples. This does not mean they are functionally different. Strain can also refer to viral genotypes that are functionally distinct. Functional distinctness of strains requires more experimental, clinical and epidemiological data than is currently available. There is a hypothesis that there are two SARS-Cov-2 strains. These would be “D614” vs “G614”. This has not been proven. A study from China claims that people who

Michael Shellenberger of the Breakthrough Institute has written Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All.” An article covering his book was published and then censored at Forbes. The Breakthrough Institute has scientists on the staff. Zeke Hausfather, Director of Climate and Energy, is a climate scientist and energy systems analyst whose research focuses on observational temperature records, climate models, and mitigation technologies. He spent 10 years working as a data scientist and entrepreneur in the cleantech sector. He has master’s degrees in environmental science from Yale University and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and a PhD in climate science from the

I’m sorry, but if I see Patrick Troughton’s face ever again, it will be too soon. Read more...

Rumors are circulating that Apple won’t be including a charger or earbuds in this year’s iPhones . As annoying as this is—since I doubt Apple will be dropping the price of the phone to match—the fact of the matter is that the bundled chargers weren’t that great anyway. If you have to buy another charger, skip Apple’s… Read more...

A big part of the charm of Toei’s original Digimon Adventure anime was that you could rely on each episode to feature at least one of its signature transformation sequences, in which a Digimon taps into its hidden power to evolve into a larger, stronger, more formidable form. The newly rebooted Digimon Adventure series Read more...

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Marine biologists from Japan say whale sharks have eyeballs coated in tiny teeth, in a discovery unique to this hulking but gentle aquatic species. Read more...

Despite governmental beliefs trending otherwise , it turns out we are still indeed in the middle of a global pandemic that is keeping a lot of people indoors. We’ve spent months setting up virtual tabletop RPG sessions , getting distressingly into yeast , and yes, catching up on shows and movies. But in our streaming,… Read more...

U.S. researchers have designed a new robotic system that kills most microorganisms in its proximity using UV light.

This is it! The final installment of io9's special presentation of Molly Tanzer’s new novel, Creatures of Charm and Hunger . You’ll now be able to read it in full until July 7, so don’t miss out! Read more...

Although plants make up over 80% of the biomass on Earth, for centuries they have been thought of as inanimate and passive things . Researchers even coined the term “ plant blindness ” to refer to a cognitive bias that literally makes our brains zone out plants in our view and underestimate their importance. Read more...

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As long as fans have breath in their lungs, they’ll be arguing about the ending of Lost . Did it satisfy? Did it not? Last month marked 10 years since the series finale, and bringing it up at a party (remember those?) is still sure to spark debate. In a new interview,  Lost co-creator and executive producer Damon… Read more...

It worked for Spider-Man , and now maybe it’ll work for the heroes in a half-shell . Paramount and Nickelodeon are teaming up for yet another reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Read more...

The excellent 1999 racing game Star Wars Episode I: Racer received an HD re-release for Switch and PlayStation 4 last week. It’s hideous in the unique way that only sharpened-up ‘90s-era 3D games can be, and I adore it. Read more...

Streaming is more important than ever. As huge numbers of people stay home during the global pandemic, many have turned to the plethora of services for a much-needed escape. At the start of each month , most streaming services do a little shuffle, adding new movies and taking some off, and we’re here to help with your… Read more...

In Netflix’s upcoming adaptation of Frank Miller and Tom Wheeler’s Cursed , the legendary sword Excalibur is a burden to be bared by Nimue , one of the last remaining magical beings fighting to survive her kind’s ongoing extermination at the hands of religious zealots. Though Nimue’s the hero of this particular tale, a… Read more...

In an era of the climate crisis, it’s easy to imagine things getting worse because that’s all we know. Read more...

The Tosche station deleted scene from Star Wars: A New Hope paints a fascinating picture of early plans to flesh out the galaxy far, far away , even if, in hindsight, it was probably for the best that it remained on the cutting room floor. But as Mark Hamill recently reflected, one sad reason it remains mostly hidden… Read more...

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Sharks have been terrorizing big screen beaches for decades—way more than they do in real life , actually. But in Hollywood, you have to be more than just a regular old shark to get a fin up on the humans. Sometimes, being a movie shark means you’re a smarter predator. Other times, it leads you to make very bad shark … Read more...

Discord is based around digital chat in all its various forms, and while it’s maybe best known among gamers, it can power group chats for a whole host of purposes—like a cooler, less formal Slack. Whether you’ve been on Discord for years or only just opened up the app for the first time, these tips can help you get… Read more...

Zach Galligan has high hopes for the future of Gremlins . Bill and Ted are facing both the music and another delay. Get a brief glimpse at the nightmares to come in Candyman . Plus, what to expect when Fort Salem returns (someday), and NBC sets its sights on new X-Files ian drama Debris . To me, my spoilers! Read more...

If we send telescopes out to 4 light days we can use the gravity of the sun to amplify the power of telescopes by 100 billion times. Although we can build larger telescopes with higher resolution than exists today near to Earth, the telescopes that are sent out to gravitational lensing regions would resolve much faster. In some cases, it would take millions of years or more to resolve an image while the gravitational lens telescope could resolve in weeks. The resolution amplification out at the gravitational lens would be mammoth compared to large telescopes near to Earth. There is

Buying a TV can feel overwhelming, with dozens of models to choose from and a bunch of confusing specs rattling around your head. Couple that with a global pandemic ensuring you can’t even see these TVs in person before you buy, and you’ve got a tough call to make. If you’re on a strict budget, we’ll save you the… Read more...

Remember that time on Doom Patrol   when Flex Mentallo, the Hero of the Beach, ended up accidentally giving the entire Doom Patrol , a roving band of cabaret performers, and a sentient street spontaneous orgasms by flexing his muscles? Of course you do, because who forgets something wild like that? Read more...

Road crews in Poland stumbled upon a lost 16th-century cemetery, in which the vast majority of graves belong to children. Incredibly, some of the skeletons still have coins in their mouths, a tradition that dates back to ancient times. Read more...

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With a resumé that reads like a best-of list for soapy TV shows of the past decade, it’s easy to get excited for a new show by writer-producer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa. Which is exactly what happened when he announced a new show called The Brides , starring Gina Torres. The show flipped the Dracula myth by turning it… Read more...

Kamen Rider might be one of the biggest tokusatsu shows around in Japan, but it’s taken a very long time for the series to get any traction in the U.S. Not that there weren’t attempts (we see you, very loveably bad Masked Rider ), but it’s only been recently that classic Kamen Rider has been officially available… Read more...

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It was a gift of a revelation wrapped in a delivery as mundane as parcel paper. Once Kipo And The Age Of Wonderbeast ’s plucky titular heroine confessed her burgeoning romantic feelings for fellow wasteland survivor Benson, the teenage boy wasted no time letting his friend down gently. “You’re all kinds of awesome,”… Read more...

For the first time in most of our lifetimes, your local movie theater won’t have a summer blockbuster season. The covid-19 pandemic took care of that , pushing most of the big-budget popcorn films scheduled for this year’s summer months into fall, spring, or even next summer . Since we can’t enjoy summer blockbusters in… Read more...

The US has runway repair teams that can repair holes in two hours or less. They use truckloads of dirt and rocks and then cover with a 45 by 60-foot fiberglass mat. Chinese suppliers sell fiberglass paving mats for 55 cents per square meter in lots of 10000 square meters. T17 fast setting cement can set in 45 minutes and be ready for landings in about one hour. Runway bombs have been standard for many decades. Each one has smaller bombs to make about 20 big holes. Not a Maginot Line The WW2 Maginot line had artillery with a few

We’ve seen Back to the Future . We’ve seen Ghostbusters . We’ve seen Lord of the Rings . And now, it’s time for the X-Men. Well, kind of. Read more...

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Way back in 1994, Revolution Software released Beneath a Steel Sky , a cyberpunk point-and-click adventure game collaboration between Broken Sword creator Charles Cecil and comic artist and Watchmen co-creator Dave Gibbons. I spent the weekend with Beyond a Steel Sky , a sequel I’ve been waiting over two and a half… Read more...

“It’s time for magic.” With that phrase, Disney revealed on June 10 that Disneyland and Disney’s California Adventure would reopen on July 17, the 65th anniversary of opening day in 1955. That date’s been pushed back because of the novel coronavirus pandemic, but Disney is determined to open its doors soon. Guests are … Read more...

Last week, CBS All Access’ Twilight Zone revival dropped its second season all at once, enabling a binge-view that made it easy to note parallels between episodes. Amid the aliens, creatures, magical objects, and alt-reality scenarios , a big theme emerged: there’s no scarier monster than a frustrated man. Read more...

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Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson is set to become one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s key power players in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier , Disney+’s upcoming series that follows its titular Avengers as they keep fighting the good superhero fight. Sam’s newfound prominence tracks closely with the character’s path to … Read more...

Two years ago, io9 shared author Molly Tanzer’s Victorian fantasy novel Creatures of Will & Temper   in serialized   excerpts . And now we’ve got good news for fans of the author, not to mention fans of free books: We’re doing it again, with her newest title! Check out chapter twenty-eight today. Read more...

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Have the major airlines spent decades suppressing teleportation research? Have a number of renowned scientists in the field of teleportation studies disappeared under mysterious circumstances? Is there a cork board at the FBI linking Delta Airlines, shady foreign security firms, and dozens of murdered research… Read more...

Jai Courtney teases some tonal changes between the original Suicide Squad and its sequel. Lucifer ’s next season is getting a little help from Supernatural ’s god. Souza’s in trouble in new Agents of SHIELD pictures. Plus, Nic Cage’s killer theme park movie gets a teeny name tweak, and what’s to come in Snowpiercer ’s … Read more...

A large reservoir of freshwater was discovered beneath Fiery Cross Reef, one of the artificial islands China made in the South China Sea. The reservoir is growing at a rate of about 1 meter (3.3 feet) per year. This is twice as fast as reservoir water level growth in naturally formed islands. Freshwater can support agriculture. Agriculture can be exported. Islands that are habitable and have commerce can qualify for UN exclusion zones. Fiery Cross Reef is 2 square kilometers (0.77 sq miles or about 470 acres). Annual rainfall was nearly 3.0 meters (118 inches) at the reef. This is

There is a company called Nikola which claims they will sell semi-trucks using hydrogen. Amazingly, with virtually no revenue and no vehicles made, Nikola is worth over $22 billion. They say they will lease the vehicles and get hydrogen for $2 per kilogram. Most have the lowest cost of hydrogen at about $2.5-4.5 per kilogram. Bloomberg NEF forecasts that $2 per kilogram hydrogen is possible in 2030. Even if they hit all of their goals, they will still be more expensive to drive and own than a diesel truck and will be more expensive than a Tesla Semi. 75-85% of

People know that computers became a multi-trillion dollar industry because it rode the exponential growth in power of Moore’s Law. Aviation also experienced decades of exponential growth and Space has had ten years of exponential growth and is looking at 40 years of exponential growth. Air passenger travel had decades of exponential growth in passengers. There were 6,000 airline passengers in the United States recorded in 1926. This grew to approximately 173,000 in 1929 about one million in 1936. Air passenger traffic grew faster in the United States than anywhere else in the world, largely due to superior aircraft and

A rare and prized commodity, tanzanite became the fifth leading gemstone by sales value – ranking behind only diamond, emerald, ruby, and sapphire. By the early 2040s, mining reserves are depleted.

In 1985, Paramount Pictures released a film called D.A.R.Y.L. About a computerized superintelligence in the form of a ten-year-old boy, it starred the child actor Barret Oliver alongside Mary Beth Hurt and Michael McKean. It did not sell particularly well, nor did it review particularly well. Regardless, TNT and TBS … Read more...

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Generally, when famous people start working with Disney a lot, it feels like they’re being absorbed into the Disney Content Machine so they can make things specifically for Disney and not necessarily for themselves (which is probably why a lot of big-name filmmakers have bounced off of Marvel and Star Wars movies).… Read more...

Harley Quinn , the devious animated series starring the DC anti-villainess, seems like it will be headed to HBO Max sometime in the near future. Which might mean some consolidation for the Warner Bros. streaming slate. Read more...

Art, music, the joys of sound and expression . These things are a meaningful part of what makes being human wonderful. That joy seems to be key to what makes Soul , Pixar’s latest, tick. Read more...

Although the U.S. is still in the middle of a raging coronavirus pandemic that is breaking records in states like Texas and Florida and getting us banned from visiting Europe , American Airlines has decided to throw out social distancing measures on its planes. The airline quietly announced on Friday that it will start … Read more...

Two years ago, io9 shared author Molly Tanzer’s Victorian fantasy novel Creatures of Will & Temper   in serialized   excerpts . And now we’ve got good news for fans of the author, not to mention fans of free books: We’re doing it again, with her newest title! Check out chapter 27 today. Read more...

At least, that seems to be the case? It’s all a little unclear. But it does look real nice. Read more...

Earlier this week, Microsoft abruptly announced that its game-centric livestreaming platform, Mixer, is not long for this world. After paying top dollar to scoop up household names like Tyler “Ninja” Blevins and Michael “Shroud” Grzesiek last year, Mixer will be no more as of next month. Suddenly, streamers who’ve… Read more...

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