The island of California. A huge triangle of land called Florida. A great ocean that cut down from the Arctic into the Midwest. As the New World came into focus beginning in the 17th century, explorers and cartographers struggled to measure a massive expanse of land that would take centuries to accurately map.
We post tons of great images on Gizmodo, from space to science to art to design. Here's a treasure trove of our very favorites that proves that 2013 was, if nothing else, eye-catching.
Ever since the internet came along, our relationship to libraries has changed dramatically. But recent studies show that these institutions—pillars of the OG sharing economy—are still viewed as essential to American communities. So it's fascinating to take a look through the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's collection of posters and propaganda from the American Library Association, an organization founded in 1876 and still going strong in its quest to make libraries—both physical and digital—cultural hubs for learning and leisure.
One of the more interesting aspects of urban life during the bombing raids of World War II was the clever and strategic re-designing of the London streetscape so that residents could live in a state of blackout.
This week, temperatures in Chicago dipped to -16 degree Fahrenheit (-26.7 degree Celsius) on the heals of the frigid, dense air known as a polar vortex
A few weeks ago, we showed you a terrifying Alpine tourist attraction called "Step Into the Void
It's probably one of the most amazing wonders of mother nature. Because of the severe cold weather, huge ice formations are starting to take shape along Niagara Falls—the American side—and the result is an incredible landscape of bubbling, whirling ice.
Fifty years ago today, in 1964, the US Surgeon General released one of the most progressive documents on smoking of its time, stating definitively that, yes, smoking tobacco can indeed be fatal. And with it, the Untied States' cigarette culture began its (often frustratingly, grudgingly slow) overhaul from one of hipness and health to shame and decrepitude.
As an image-driven person, I often find myself deeply lost and buried in the vast online libraries of universities and research centers. Scientists just love to show off all the big and shiny machinery they work on.
Every year, the American Institute of Architects invites its members—some 83,000 licensed architects—to enter the buildings they've designed in the past five years for an award. It's about as solid an award as an architect can receive, and this year's winners were just made public.
When I put together this post
Launched 60 years ago today, the USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was the world's first nuclear-powered submarine. Its atomic fuel source gave for the U.S Navy a dramatic increase in both range and operational flexibility. A few years later, the USS Nautilus achieved another historical first: she was the first vessel to complete a submerged transit to the North Pole, on 3 August 1958.
These days, we tend to think of New York's bridges as traffic obstacles. But at the turn of the last century, the bridges that sprang up in thickets around Manhattan's shores were objects of wonder and civic pride—near magical pieces of infrastructure that took many years (and lives) to build.
Getty Images has published a fresh set of photos from the heavily polluted Guanabara Bay in Rio de Janeiro—which is the site chosen for water sports at the Rio 2016 Summer Olympics. The photos are frankly shocking, as the iconic bay will be the site of sailing events during the summer Olympic Games.
Machines: They make stuff. Lots of it. Hundreds of millions and billions and hundreds of billions of things over and over again forever. Watching them work is positively hypnotic. And we've got the GIFs to prove it.
We've all seen it: That colorful human body, staring blankly ahead in the doctor's office, its stomach skin missing and guts exposed. But have you ever really stepped back and wondered what it took to perfect that anatomical diagram?
One of the biggest criticisms Google Glass has incurred since day one is that it's, well, ugly and/or weird-looking. Believe it or not, Google may have actually just solved the problem.
The Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics will start on February 6th, 2014. The Russian Empire has built a bunch of brand new arenas for the upcoming winter sports fiesta. This is our collection of the artistic-futuristic architecture of the Sochi Games, built from scratch in the past few years.
Just in case Florida didn't have enough going against it already (looking at you Florida Man), the state that everybody loves to hate is currently being invaded. No, not by Cuba—by a variety of non-native plants and animals that are wreaking environmental havoc and causing billions of dollars in damage. These are six of the most destructive.
The fact that humans can build big, complicated machines is commonplace. But the fact that we can build these massive machines and then move them, sometimes across the planet? That's not so common.