Hands-on with Vivaldi, the new Web browser for power users It's been a long time since a brand new desktop browser landed on the Web. Web newcomers might even be forgiven for thinking that there have always been just four such browsers: Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. After the vicious early days when the world of Web browsers closely resembled the ruthless world of the railroad barons a century earlier, the browser market settled down to something pretty boring. Ars Technica
Why companies have little incentive to invest in cybersecurity Another month, another data breach, and another set of proposals for what is seemingly an intensifying cyberattack problem. When we examine the evidence, though, the actual expenses from the recent and high-profile breaches at Sony, Target and Home Depot amount to less than 1% of each company's annual revenues. After reimbursement from insurance and minus tax deductions, the losses are even less. The Conversation
It's time to make daylight saving time year-round Daylight Saving Time officially starts this year on Sunday, March 8, at 2 am in the morning. Everyone will need to remember to set their clocks forward one hour. Unfortunately, doing so will create all sorts of problems. In the days following the change, researchers have found, rates of heart attacks, traffic accidents, and workplace injuries tend to increase slightly -- likely the effect of millions of people's bodies being forced to adjust to the missing hour of sleep. Vox
Hacking your brain "It's like coffee times ten," raves one enthusiast. "I use it a couple of times a week and problems solve themselves. At the end of the day, I haven't wasted hours on frivolous websites. At the end of the week, my apartment is clean." This marvel of productivity is not a new energy drink or an experimental wonder drug but a simple electrical device that he built at home for less than $10. Whenever this physicist feels like an extra burst of motivation, he places electrodes on his skull and sends a jolt of electricity into his brain. The Economist
Lockheed Martin laser stops truck in its tracks Don't piss off Lockheed Martin: The aerospace company this week used a laser to obliterate the engine of a small truck from more than a mile away. The company used its 30-kilowatt fiber weapon system known as ATHENA (Advanced Test High Energy Asset). The ground-based laser prototype burned through the engine manifold of a mounted truck in mere seconds. The vehicle, hoisted onto a test platform, was running its engine and drive train, simulating a real-life military scenario. PCMag
CIA plans major reorganization and a focus on digital espionage The CIA embarked on a sweeping restructuring Friday that will bring an end to divisions that have been in place for decades, create 10 new centers that team analysts with operators, and significantly expand the agency's focus on digital espionage. The plans were unveiled by CIA Director John Brennan to a workforce in which thousands of employees are likely to see changes in which departments they work for... The Washington Post
Inside the post-Minecraft life of billionaire Gamer God Markus Persson It's 7 p.m. on a Monday in Stockholm, and Markus Persson sits on the terrace of his ninth-story office, sipping the speedball of alcoholic beverages, a vodka Red Bull. Three hours ago he committed to not drinking today, still in recovery from a 12-drink Thursday bender while nursing an ear infection. Yet here we are, embracing heavy-handed pours of Belvedere while surveying the workers in adjacent high-rises hacking away at their keyboards. Forbes
Why it's almost impossible to teach a robot to do your laundry I've been doing laundry every week for almost a decade, and by now the process is so familiar that I can practically do it in my sleep: Bring the hamper to the laundry room, separate the whites and colors, load the washing machines with clothes and detergent, transfer the washed clothes to the dryer, take them out of the dryer and put them into the basket, fold the clean clothes, and file them into the appropriate drawer. Medium
The drug cartels' IT guy It could have been any other morning. Felipe del Jesús Peréz García got dressed, said goodbye to his wife and kids, and drove off to work. It would be a two hour commute from their home in Monterrey, in Northeastern Mexico's Nuevo León state, to Reynosa, in neighboring Tamaulipas state, where Felipe, an architect, would scout possible installation sites for cell phone towers for a telecommunications company before returning that evening. Vice
How to hack flashlight batteries and a fire brick, into a desktop arc reaction chamber This project was originally inspired by Theo Grey and his book, "Mad Science". After seeing the concept, I couldn't find any information anywhere on the internet or in libraries about arc furnace experiments, so I set out on my own to achieve these results. Grant Thompson
A history of Maxis: Thanks for SimCity The Maxis that you knew, the studio that released SimCity and invented The Sims, is no more. The SimCity brand might live on, and the Maxis brand might live on elsewhere, but they will survive only as brands, things EA will invoke to sell things. This is a very sad thing, but let's try and remember the good times. Maxis was founded all the way back in 1987 – by Jeff Braun and Will Wright -- as a means of publishing SimCity... Kotaku
Online community and culture wars: What do we know? What's been going on with the gaming community? Raph Koster, Gordon Walton and Rich Vogel are veterans of the online gaming space, and know a thing or two about how groups form and behave on the internet. At GDC, the three presented important findings for community managers about how to gain control over an increasingly depressing work environment. Gamasutra
I tried VR porn, and it was weird "Have you ever tried VR porn?" Vander Caballero asked me. The video game developer was trying to convince me of VR's potential to revolutionise intimacy. "Do you want to try it right now?" Of course I said yes. Of course I did. It's hardly what I expected from my demo session of his new game, but you don't say "no" when a game developer offers you the opportunity to try VR porn. Kotaku