Long before transistors and other electronics came along, calculators were large mechanical machines that performed mathematics through a series of gears and cylinders turning inside their boxy exteriors. The YouTube channel called the Numberphile got its hands on one such device called the “Millionaire,” and released a video Tuesday showing how it works. Related stories …

Sure Batman might have some really cool toys, but it’s kind of hard to beat the simple elegance of the batarang. Part boomerang, part ninja throwing star, the whizzing weapon has delivered plenty of “kablooeys” to the noggins of evildoers over the years. Now, bad guys in Germany had better watch out. YouTube inventor Patrick Priebe, who lives in Germany, …

Most of the things inventor and YouTube host Colin Furze has created are more for entertainment and shock value than actual usefulness. Case in point: his real-life Wolverine claws. Or his magnetic boots that let him hang upside down from anything metal. Or his high-voltage ejector bed. Or…well, you get the idea. But now Furze has created something truly useful. …

Americans aren’t known for their turnout at elections, but that’s not to say they’re averse to voting. Millions of them vote every single day in a sense — by clicking the “like” button on Facebook posts, profiles and pages. Now, the folks at FiveThirtyEight, an ESPN-owned site that focuses on polling, politics and more, have created a national map and …

I’ve always been impressed by guitar players who look like they were born with a six-string in their hands. Whenever I go to a show and see a guitarist killing it onstage, I always think, “I want to learn how to do that!” However, the few guitar lessons I’ve taken were pretty uninspiring, and practice between lessons was downright boring. …

If you told me a video of someone slicing into a clementine with a scalpel would hold my attention for a full 3 minutes and 16 seconds, I would have scoffed. Then I watched just that on a new YouTube channel launched by an anonymous user who goes by the name The Food Surgeon, and I was hooked. While watching …

As a regular swimmer, I can attest to the fact that doing laps in a pool can get boring pretty quickly. So when I got the chance to try the Beker waterproof bone conduction music player to add some beats to my routine, I lapped it up. If you’re not familiar with bone conduction technology, it basically funnels music to …

Bad drones look out: a new flying robot could be coming to capture you. For all the fun and utility they can provide, pesky drones in 2015 did things like crash into the White House lawn, deliver drugs to a prison in Ohio and distract firefighters from doing their work in upstate New York. The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) …

This time of year, it seems the Internet is equally full of articles telling you how to succeed on your new diet and those telling you why your resolution to slim down in the new year will never work. In short, there’s just way too much mention of the word “diet” on the Net. Strangely enough, Lean Cuisine, a company …

There’s an inherent contradiction in drinking. Do it with a group of friends and it’s called partying. Do it by yourself and, well, there are a lot of names for that. Because South Korean inventor Eunchan Park couldn’t bear to drink alone, he came up with a novel solution. He built a robot that can hoist a shot glass to …