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You might think of drones as friendly things, like the DJI Phantom you fly yourself or those Amazon drones that could soon be delivering your groceries.Think again when it comes to military drones. An MQ-9 Reaper unmaed aerial vehicle with a 66-foot wingspan can loiter 50,000 feet above the Earth for a day at a time, poised to hit a target with a devastating 3,800 pounds of Hellfire missile payload. But as with all weapons, the awesome firepower of a drone needs to be aimed accurately. "It's less about technology than about strategy, about the way it's deployed," said Gavin Hood, director of drone drama "Eye in the Sky," out now on DVD and Blu-ray. "Drones are new but still a weapon of warfa...

Seven words was all it took. Kevin Bacon responded to a fan's suggestion that he play movie maniac Freddy Krueger onscreen with seven positive words, and fans went as crazy as the Elm Street maniac himself.On Friday, a fan tweeted that Bacon should take on the iconic horror role, and he surprisingly responded. Bacon's got a horror-movie pedigree. He was famously filleted in bed in the original "Friday the 13th" movie in 1980, and he's also starred in "Flatliners," the chilling "Stir of Echoes" and the original "Tremors" film, among others.Fans loved the casting suggestion, and let the world know it. ...

[embedded content] It's monsoon season in the US state of Arizona and that brings some gorgeous storms along with it. Hallie Larsen, a park ranger at the Petrified Forest National Park, captured an unusual burst of lightning in a photo. The bolt arcs across the landscape and forms into what looks like a Tyraosaurus rex head, mouth agape, ready to take a bite out of a mesa.The US Department of the Interior posted the image to its Facebook page on Wednesday, gaering thousands of reactions. "Have you ever seen lightning make such crazy shapes?" the department asked. Facebook fans saw lots of things besides a dinosaur. Here's a brief list of other responses: the front hal...

More than 6,000 people fled war and slogged across a continent to get to a refugee camp in northe France. Now they endure political hostility in a place they don't want to be. Sudanese, Afghans, Chadians, Syrians, Iraqis, Iranians and others live in a Calais camp known as the Jungle, and another in Grande-Synthe about 25 miles east, because the camps are the closest jumping-off points to the UK, the country they want to be in. That's where many refugees, who often speak English, have family and friends. My colleague Rich Trenholm and I visited the camps in June to get a feel for how technology is -- or isn't -- helping refugees. Mobile phones provide a psychologically important link, bu...

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Mixing and matching. Deciding which combination of components sounds best to you. Buying new pieces of gear to fit into a system is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the AV hobby. Yet until now, no one has really thought to take this concept to tabletop speakers. But Sonic Blocks is looking to change that.The Sonic Blocks ecosystem is a unique entry in the wireless speaker sector, offering users the ability to customize almost every segment of the product -- from the sound, to the number of chaels, to the appearance, and finally to the role it will perform in your home.The kits start as a $399 cube, which comprises a "bass" driver, a flat-panel midrange and a soft-dome tweeter. Each panel...

[embedded content] Pro golfer Bubba Watson has a thing for outrageous golf carts. Watson and his sunglasses-making sponsor Oakley had a tall order to top 2013's thoroughly nutty hovercraft golf cart. They delivered with the debut of the BW-Air, an unholy combination of a jetpack and a golf cart that thumbs its nose at pesky little things like designated paths, water hazards and sand traps.The BW-Air is both an advertising stunt and a way to celebrate golf's retu to the Olympics. The sport is on the menu for the 2016 summer games in Brazil in August. The Olympics last hosted golf way back in 1904, long before jetpacks were a thing. Watson's ride c...

In a butt-puckering video, three Russian men climb Paris' Eiffel Tower and record it using POV and drone footage....

Image by Deis Skley, CC BY-ND 2.0 The US Senate on Wednesday narrowly rejected a proposal that would have expanded the FBI's surveillance powers, including allowing searches of inteet browsing histories without a court order.The legislation, included as an amendment to a criminal justice funding bill, would have expanded the types of communications records the FBI could have demanded by submitting national security letters, which don't require court approval. The proposal would have granted the FBI expanded access to telephone and inteet records, including browser histories and email metadata.The amendment, ...

Oscar Gutiérrez/CNET It might make you feel like vomiting (a rainbow), but seeing more advertisements in between your snaps on the immensely popular messaging app Snapchat was basically an inevitability. Now, Snapchat's making it official with "Snapchat Partners," a venture aimed at expanding advertising opportunities in the app.The focus for now are Snapchat's auto-advance stories, which let you quickly cycle through the snaps your friends have posted as part of their stories. In the coming weeks, you can expect to start seeing "Snap Ads Between Stories," which are precisely what they sound like. Snapchat s...

The Motorola Moto Z. Lenovo Dressing up your phone with bolt-on accessories may be the new black. Lenovo on Thursday unveiled its Moto Z and Moto Z Force phones, which both boast the ability to accept modular add-ons, letting you magnetically attach things like a souped-up speaker from JBL or a miniature projector. Lenovo is just the latest company to offer modular attachments, underscoring a push by the phone makers to stand out beyond a simple rectangular slab. LG already offers this capability on its G5 and Google's Project Ara promises even more customizable options. Will you want to customize your Moto Z...