Gadgets & Tech – Spoken Edition

The Ayam Cemani, an all-black bird indigenous to Indonesia, is the most sought-after chicken on the market right now, but not for its taste. In fact, no one would dare eat these Sith Lord birds. According to Greenfire Farms owner Paul Bradshaw, who breeds Ayam Cemani in Florida, Ayam Cemani is “the ‘it’ chicken right now,” due to its inky aesthetic: its internal organs and muscles are entirely black—which means its heart is, by extension, black.

Reddit can feel like a cesspool of hate most days, but occasionally, it turns up some internet gems. Today, for example, a userposted a bonkers photo of a posse of large, intimidating-looking birds chilling on an airplane. “My captain friend sent me this photo,” user lensoo wrote in the post. “Saudi prince bought ticket [sic] for his 80 hawks.” The photo appears to be unedited, but it left us asking a bunch of questions.

As more and more things become connected to the internet, they all become more susceptible to hackers. So it should come as no surprise that even state-of-the-art hotel lock systems are now getting ransomed. Hackers recently penetrated the security system of a 4-star hotel in Austria, locking every room’s door from the outside. The doors were only unlocked after the hotel agreed to pay a ransom in Bitcoin.

Someone at Boeing has been on a serious Kubrick kick, as evidenced by the new spacesuits it made for Boeing Starliner astronauts. The blue suits, which were revealed today, combine a retro flare with a modern feel. In fact, the suits look just like a smoothed out version of the blue spacesuit in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

If society collapses at some point in the next four years—or even if you’re planning a low-budget road trip—this nifty Car Hammock turns your ride into a comfy place to sleep so you don’t have to resort to a night spent in an uninsulated tent, or apocalyptic abandoned factory.

In the Southern United States, the weather can be deadly, but it can also be surprisingly courteous, as an elderly Texas woman learned this weekend when a tornado picked up the bathtub she was hiding in, spun it in the air, and put her back down in the woods without injury. According to KSLA, 75-year-old Charlesetta Williams was watching television with her son on Saturday when the twister approached her home.

Gwyneth Paltrow—purveyor of $15,000 gold dildos and sex-dust smoothies—is back at it again with another oozing spoonful of Goop for your sex life. Ladies, it turns out that the key to life is sticking a jade egg up your “Yoni.” In the latest Goop newsletter, Paltrow turns to jade egg-veteran Shiva Rose for the 411 on all of the amazing things that putting a $66 piece of jade up your hoo-ha can do for you.

If you’re someone who occasionally puffs on electronic cigarettes, you should stop right now. Because when shit goes awry, it turns into a disgusting scene of blood, charred skin, and broken bones. An Idaho man claims he lost seven teeth and suffered second-degree burns to his cheek after his vaporizer pen exploded in his face. Andrew Hall, of Pocatello, says he was getting ready for work on the morning of January 14 when his vaporizer pen unexpectedly exploded.

South Korea is in political chaos after the recent impeachment of its President, Park Geun-hye, and now, the charges of corruption are spreading to the highest levels of Samsung. A prosecutor is seeking the arrest of the company’s vice chairman and de facto leader, Jay Y. Lee. Samsung’s official chairman, Lee Kun-hee, has been out of the public eye since he suffered a heart attack in 2014.

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Galileo satellites have been having a bad time for the past 17 years. Now, the 10 billion euro project has suffered what might be its strangest setback yet: Nine clocks across the 18 Galileo satellites in orbit have suddenly stopped working. For a fleet that was supposed to create an independent European GPS system, the satellites really can’t seem to get their shit together.