Living

Aug 8, 2012 6:40 PM   Sharing your pictures with friends on Facebook is convenient! It's also really convenient for creepers you hardly know to peer at your body and digitally stalk you too. And with Facebook's privacy settings so confusing, you need something better. You need McAfee's Social Protection app. It's potentially a very useful tool for people who are slightly paranoid and/or just don't want their mug all over the Internet. The way McAfee Social Protection works is that it allows you to pick and choose which specific Facebook friends can see your photo. Drunk, naked and sprawled across the street? Let's only show that to your two best friends. Working hard on vacation? Let's give your boss access. For the people you don't allow to see pictures, it shows a blurry thumbnail instead—they have no way to access the photo unless allowed. Even more, McAfee protects you on a whole 'nother level too—your friends who have access to view the pictur...

Jul 26, 2012 6:05 PM   One thing that stood out in Facebook's relatively by-the-books earnings call is how few ideas Facebook seems to have outside of "make it like mobile." That's probably not the best news for you. Facebook's primary focus today was its effort to convince advertisers that Facebook ads aren't a waste of money. That's been a big problem for the company (naturally, given that 90% of its revenue comes from advertising), and mobile has been a particularly sticky wicket. Its main source of revenue came from ads—poorly performing ads, but ads—that were on the right hand side of the page. But you can't do that on a 4-inch screen. The saving grace is Sponsored Stories. People click them, because they're in the news feed, and they look like something one of their friends might have posted. And on a mobile screen, they're basically a full-page ad. They're by far the most successful type of ad that Facebook has. Thankfully, Faceboo...

You crack that frosty brew. It's a hot day. You're salivating. You take a deep swig and... what the hell is that? Pepé Le Pew? A flatulent egg farmer? No. It's your precious beer, and it's gone bad—skunked beyond recognition. How could this happen? More importantly, how could you have prevented it? It's Friday afternoon, you've made it through the long week, and it's time for Happy Hour, Gizmodo's weekly booze column. A cocktail shaker full of innovation, science, and alcohol. If it stinks, don't drink. You may hear friends use the word skunky to describe several nuances that can ail a lager. Wrong. Skunky is specific. It does not mean flat. It does not mean it tastes stale, sour, bitter, or metallic. Skunky means skunky, as in it literally smells and tastes like a skunk. (Don't pretend you've never tasted skunk, you dirty liar.) That is caused by a very specific chemical compound: 3-methyl-2-butene-1-thiol, or what Dr. Malcolm D. Forbes, p...

Jul 26, 2012 6:05 PM   One thing that stood out in Facebook's relatively by-the-books earnings call is how few ideas Facebook seems to have outside of "make it like mobile." That's probably not the best news for you. Facebook's primary focus today was its effort to convince advertisers that Facebook ads aren't a waste of money. That's been a big problem for the company (naturally, given that 90% of its revenue comes from advertising), and mobile has been a particularly sticky wicket. Its main source of revenue came from ads—poorly performing ads, but ads—that were on the right hand side of the page. But you can't do that on a 4-inch screen. The saving grace is Sponsored Stories. People click them, because they're in the news feed, and they look like something one of their friends might have posted. And on a mobile screen, they're basically a full-page ad. They're by far the most successful type of ad that Facebook has. Thankfully, Faceboo...