How the Venus Flytrap ‘Remembers’ When It Captures Prey
Scientists are continuing to tease out the mechanisms by which the Venus flytrap can tell when it has captured a tasty insect as prey as opposed to an inedible object…
Everybody Hates Chris(es)
The Monitor is a weekly column devoted to everything happening in the WIRED world of culture, from movies to memes, TV to Twitter. You know what? Fuck Chris. Screw him…
‘Amnesia: Rebirth’ Has Evolved Beyond Jump Scares
Amnesia: Rebirth is somewhere between the two. It’s got more story than The Dark Descent and asks big questions like SOMA. Unlike The Dark Descent, it focuses on the story…
The DOJ Is Fighting Google on a Shifting Battlefield
Marissa Mayer, Google’s 20th employee who later went on to lead Yahoo!, once told me that for many years, Google would do a test: It would show a certain percentage…
The Best iPhone 12 Deals (And Which Model to Pick)
Apple’s newest lineup of iPhones is here, and you have more choices than ever. More options bring more confusion. If you’re unsure which iPhone 12 to buy (or you’re just…
How the Google Antitrust Case Trickles Down Onto Your Phone
This week, the US Department of Justice filed an antitrust suit against Google. It accuses the company of stifling competition and operating a near-monopoly on the search advertising industry. Naturally,…
How 30 Lines of Code Blew Up a 27-Ton Generator
Earlier this week, the US Department of Justice unsealed an indictment against a group of hackers known as Sandworm. The document charged six hackers working for Russia’s GRU military intelligence…
Star Wars: Squadrons Is the Soaring Antidote to Force Fatigue
You may have seen this meme: Along with the quote “I grew up here,” people posting images of their cherished virtual spaces—some chose their favorite Halo map, others a scene…
The Case for Reviving the Civilian Conservation Corps
In 1933, with the country deep in the Great Depression, the United States government created the Civilian Conservation Corps, a work program that gave young men jobs transforming the American…
18,000 Years From Now, People Will Still Play Football
Professional sports are looking pretty bizarre right now. Baseball players perform before stadiums of unblinking cardboard cutouts; sound engineers manipulate fake crowd noise to make everything seem just a bit…