Probe of the Kobe Bryant Crash Will Examine If Fog Played a Role

While the investigation into the helicopter crash that killed basketball star Kobe Bryant and eight other people Sunday morning is just beginning, a likely focus of attention will be the fog that limited visibility in the Los Angeles area. En route from Orange County to Bryant’s youth basketball academy in Thousand Oaks, pilot Ara Zobayan… Continue reading Probe of the Kobe Bryant Crash Will Examine If Fog Played a Role

An Origin Story, Smart Headlights, and Other Car News

The future comes in fits and starts, and we buckled up and went through a few this week. Cruise, General Motors’ self-driving unit, hosted a big party in San Francisco to launch Origin, an electric six-seat, steering wheel-free vehicle that it says is the future of shared autonomy. The vehicle will go into production…sometime, and… Continue reading An Origin Story, Smart Headlights, and Other Car News

Scientists Predict Wuhan’s Virus Outbreak Will Get Much Worse

As more data on the new coronavirus circulating in China emerges, it’s becoming clear that whatever the country is experiencing now—dozens of deaths, hundreds of people hospitalized, cities of millions quarantined—is just the tip of the outbreak. On Friday, a team of researchers based in the UK and US reported in a preliminary paper that… Continue reading Scientists Predict Wuhan’s Virus Outbreak Will Get Much Worse

No, the Wuhan Virus Is Not a ‘Snake Flu’

Sharing data during an outbreak is vital for public health. But it can also lead to sensational, and even spurious, research, like a controversial new paper claiming that people probably picked up a novel coronavirus from snakes. One of the many mysteries behind the outbreak of a new respiratory-tract-attacking virus that’s now infected nearly 650… Continue reading No, the Wuhan Virus Is Not a ‘Snake Flu’

Germany Rejected Nuclear Power—and Deadly Emissions Spiked

On New Year’s Eve, while the rest of the world was preparing to ring in a new decade, employees of the German energy company EnBW were getting ready to pull the plug on one of the country’s few remaining nuclear power plants. The license to operate the two reactors at the Philippsburg nuclear facility expired… Continue reading Germany Rejected Nuclear Power—and Deadly Emissions Spiked

A ‘Captain Marvel’ Sequel Is in the Works

Good day! Welcome to The Monitor, WIRED’s roundup of all the biggest pop culture news around. This week’s biggest news so far has been a bit of a grab-bag, spanning everything from Studio Ghibli to Radiohead and of course, streaming services, because in 2020, there’s always something happening with streaming services. Here we go. Marvel… Continue reading A ‘Captain Marvel’ Sequel Is in the Works

Spot the Robot Dog Trots Into the Big, Bad World

This autumn, after years of dropping view-amassing videos of Spot the robot dog fending off stick-wielding humans and opening doors for its pals, Boston Dynamics finally announced that the machine was hitting the market—for a select few early adopters, at least. BD’s people would be the first to tell you that they don’t fully know… Continue reading Spot the Robot Dog Trots Into the Big, Bad World

Free Press Advocates Decry Cybercrime Charges Against Glenn Greenwald

The Brazilian government is charging journalist Glenn Greenwald with committing cybercrimes, according to a criminal complaint released Monday. The accusations are connected to leaked text messages that Greenwald reported on last year for The Intercept Brasil, which the outspoken journalist launched in 2016 as a spinoff of the US-based news site he founded two years… Continue reading Free Press Advocates Decry Cybercrime Charges Against Glenn Greenwald

A Handy Chrome Feature, a Sonos Update Warning, and More News

Chrome is protecting and Sonos is disconnecting, but first: a cartoon about the new big screen. Here’s the news you need to know, in two minutes or less. Want to receive this two-minute roundup as an email every weekday? Sign up here! Today’s News Don’t ignore Chrome’s new password checkup feature If you’ve logged in… Continue reading A Handy Chrome Feature, a Sonos Update Warning, and More News