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New name, new logo, same Jaguar shell...

Regular readers may remember an odd little story we ran back in May about the Retro VGS game console project. Sporting a plastic shell made from the actual original Atari Jaguar molds, the new system was being designed to support new games made with an old-school, 16-bit aesthetic. Oddest of all, those games would be distributed on old-fashioned, solid-state cartridges made to last for decades.

Just over half a year later, the Retro VGS console is no more (though the company behind it still bears the same name). It's been replaced with the Coleco Chameleon, a rebranded version of the same idea that dredges up a well-known name from gaming's "ancient" past.

That rebranding is somewhat necessary, given the poor reputation the Retro VGS had garnered in the classic gaming community during its short pre-life. The system failed to get much buy-in during an aborted Indiegogo crowdfunding effort in September, raising just $80,000 of a hefty $1.95 million funding goal. For context, the Ouya only asked for a minimum of $900,000 in its initial Kickstarter (though Ouya shot past that number to receive $8.6 million in crowdfunding)

(credit: Pete/Flickr)

As a child develops, a tug of war between genes and environment settles the issue of the child's intelligence. One theory on how that struggle plays out proposes that among advantaged kids—with the pull of educational resources—DNA largely wins, allowing genetic variation to settle smarts. At the other end of the economic spectrum, the strong arm of poverty drags down genetic potential in the disadvantaged.

But over the years, researchers have gone back and forth on this theory, called the Scarr-Rowe hypothesis. It has held up in some studies, but inexplicably slipped away in others, leaving researchers puzzled over the deciding factors in the nature-vs-nurture battle. Now, researchers think they know why.

In a new meta-analysis of 14 psychology studies from the past few decades, researchers found that the strength of poverty’s pull differed by country, with US poverty providing the only forceful yank among developed nations. The authors, who published the results in Psychological Science, speculate that the wider inequalities in education and medical access in the US may explain poverty’s extra power. The finding could not only resolve the data discrepancies of the past, but it may also lead researchers to a more nuanced understanding of poverty’s effects on IQ and how to thwart them.

Nissan

With the driver over the rear wheels and the engine up front, the Nissan GT-R LM was unlike anything else on track at Le Mans.

6 more images in gallery

One of the most interesting—and certainly one of the most hyped—stories in motorsport this year has been Nissan's GT-R LM. And now that story has come to a close, following an announcement earlier today that the Japanese automaker is pulling the plug on the racer. The GT-R LM was designed to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans (and the other races in the World Endurance Championship), but Nissan will not contest the 2016 season of the WEC. Godzilla has been slain.

The GT-R LM was a brave idea. The car was the brainchild of Bon Bowlby, and it turned its back on everything we've learned about racing cars in the years since John Cooper first moved the engine behind the driver in the 1950s. Bowlby figured that the benefits of a mid-engine car were offset by the large rear wing it needs (necessary since the car's weight is biased toward the rear). Convinced that there was another way, for the GT-R LM he moved the cockpit right to the back of the car, with the engine and hybrid system just behind the front axle.

But the GT-R LM went further. Under the current rules, Le Mans Prototypes have to be hybrids; they can drive one pair of wheels with power from an internal combustion engine and are then allowed two other hybrid systems (motor-generator units on each axle, for example, or on one axle and a turbocharger). The GT-R's turbocharged V6 engine would power the front wheels and recover kinetic energy under braking from all four, storing that energy in a flywheel. But instead of using well-proven electric motor-generators and an electrically driven flywheel—a race-winning combination for Audi—the hybrid system was going to be entirely mechanical, with cogs and gears and driveshafts connecting each corner of the car with the flywheel.

One way or another, Microsoft has been promising Windows 10 Mobile for years.

References to "Windows Everywhere," the notion that some version of Windows could run on everything from PCs to servers to cars, can be found as far back as 1998, when Redmond was hawking Windows 98, Windows NT 4, and Windows CE. Per Paul Thurrott, the plan was conceived as "NT Everywhere"; the broader ambition of "Windows Everywhere" soon made space for the Windows 9x and Windows CE variants.

How the idea was expressed varied—in 2009, for example, Microsoft called it "Three Screens and a Cloud"—but the notion of having a Windows platform for any device has endured.

(credit: Valentina Palladino)

When Motorola launched new Moto 360 models earlier this year, it also announced the Moto 360 Sport as an Android Wear watch for the more active among us. The Sport will be available for purchase on January 7 (it's already on sale in the UK and France). With a built-in GPS and heart rate monitor, the watch has the hardware chops to compete with dedicated workout devices, and it works with the Moto Body fitness app to track just as much information as the hardcore Fitbits and Garmins of the world.

The $299 Moto 360 Sport is the only Android Wear watch to really sell itself as an advanced activity tracking device in addition to a Google-powered smartwatch, and in many ways it combines the best of both. But it's not as much a general sport watch as it is a dedicated running watch, and since it is powered by Android Wear, you'll have to deal with those limitations as well.

Design: toy-like, but not necessarily immature

The Moto 360 Sport was designed to be the more durable version of the new Moto 360, resulting in a watch you'd see drawn on the wrist of Charlie Brown. It's round, friendly, and simple, with a silver bezel surrounding the 1.37-inch, 360×325-pixel display and a strong silicone band. The display is always on, like most other Android Wear watches, and it has "any light" technology that uses sunlight instead of the watch's backlight to illuminate the display. This makes it easier to read in direct sunlight for those who often jog outside.

If you like Ars' coverage of science, you've undoubtedly been thrilled by having Eric Berger and Beth Mole join the staff here. If you had a hard time imagining that things could get better, then prepare to expand your imagination: as of this week, we're happy to welcome Annalee Newitz to the Ars staff!

Annalee's official title will be Tech Culture Editor, giving her a broad remit when it comes to what she writes about. Technology, culture, and science have an intricate relationship, each having a profound influence on the others. Understanding how that influence flows and how we can study and possibly shape it is a significant challenge.

Fortunately, it's a challenge that Annalee is phenomenally well-equipped to handle. After getting a PhD in English and American Studies (from the finest graduate institution in the world, I might add), she received a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship that allowed her to study at MIT. She's been an analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and has published in places ranging from The Smithsonian Magazine to Popular Science.