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Enlarge / A home in Prague, Oklahoma, after a magnitude 5.7 earthquake in 2011. (credit: Brian Sherrod, USGS)

The largest earthquakes in the recent spree caused by the injection of wastewater in deep disposal wells in Oklahoma have been far smaller than the disasters in, for example, Chile. But buildings have sustained damage nonetheless. That damage has to be repaired, and repairs cost money. Insurance companies have been tapped to pay out while state regulators have been pressured to prevent future earthquakes. A few residents have gone another route—suing the companies operating the injection wells.

On Friday, resident of Pawnee, Oklahoma, filed a class action lawsuit against 27 energy companies, the Associated Press reported. Pawnee experienced the largest Oklahoma earthquake so far—a magnitude 5.8 quake in September. The attorney filing the lawsuit claims that hundreds of homes suffered some degree of damage, and the properties have lost value as a result of all this seismic activity.

This is actually not the first lawsuit filed in Oklahoma. One suit filed by a resident of Prague, Oklahoma, was dismissed by a District Court before being restored by the Oklahoma Supreme Court. Another suit involving Prague residents is in process as well. And the Sierra Club has filed a federal lawsuit aiming to halt wastewater injection in the state.

Enlarge (credit: Sam Machkovech)

For three years, Google's Chromecast platform has stood out in the streaming-box category for one simple reason: your phone is your remote. Smartphones and tablets can do a lot of the heavy lifting in the TV-watching experience (browsing content, picking through apps, typing keywords). Chromecast takes advantage of that: no remote, no separate set-top box app ecosystem, lower cost.

Last year's second-gen Chromecast offered decent upgrades over the original, but not much else. The device changed designs, shrank in size, and drove 1080p video to your TV screen a little faster and more efficiently. That device still exists for the same low price of $35. Is there a reason we need a third-gen Chromecast?

On paper, there might be. Streaming boxes with support for the rising 4K and HDR standards are still few and far between, and this month's $69 Chromecast Ultra advertises support for both while still being $30 cheaper than the cheapest 4K HDR Roku box. The Ultra is also the first Chromecast model to support wired Ethernet.

Jonathan Gitlin

LOS ANGELES, Calif.—Unusually, Mazda and Porsche chose this year's LA Auto Show to reveal to the world their latest racing cars. In fact, a host of racing machinery was on display at the LA Convention Center, joining the regular mix of new production cars and cool concepts. Normally, race cars get unveiled at pre-season tests or at the beginning of the year, so for both companies to choose LA as their venue is a vote of confidence for the health—and importance—of their factory racing efforts.

Mazda RT24-P

Let's take a look at the Mazda RT24-P first. It's built to contest the IMSA's WeatherTech Sportscar Championship's Daytona Prototype International class, an offshoot of the LMP2 category that runs at Le Mans and in the World Endurance Championship. But LMP2 is a pro-am class. Although teams can choose a chassis from four different constructors, they all have to run the same kind of engine and electronics. IMSA's DPI category, on the other hand, is for OEM-supported teams, and it has given car companies like Mazda a little more freedom to use their own engines, ECUs, and body work.

Welcome to Ars Cardboard, our weekend look at tabletop games. Check out our complete board gaming coverage at cardboard.arstechnica.com.

You might have heard about SeaFall. It’s comfortably one of the most hyped board game releases of the past couple of years, the first so-called “legacy” game to be designed from the ground up as such, rather than one reconstituted on the bones of an older game.