This is incredibly technical, and I have to admit I don’t really understand how it all works, but it looks pretty sweet. The link is thanks to Ian A. Walker, who explains, “Apple puts a 3D motion sensor in its laptop hard drives, so it can lock them to protect from damage in falls, jerks, hits, and vibration. People have found all sorts of interesting “unofficial” uses for that sensor including…a seismograph, a light saber sound generator, and a Marble Madness game that you play with tilt control.”
Author Archives: Guest Contributor
piep, piep
This is what mice say according to about 74% of Swiss people who speak German. They make some cool ones. Mice. Swiss people make them…for computers. Ok! Bad pun ended!
Really, though, go check out Pat Says Now. They make some really funky mice, and if those aren’t good enough for you, they do customs as well. I particularly like the duck; it’s just a thing I have. I love seeing more companies who let your personality shine through your gear!
Thanks to 3Yen for pointing out the Koi mouse.
Who'da Thunk it? – 3
As you are all aware, today is a very special day as it is America’s birthday (or something like that). July 4th is one of those days that really epitomizes the summer season. When I think of July 4th, I think of many things; baseball, hotdogs, but one thing that really symbolizes this time of year is ice cream, more specifically ice cream cones. One problem I have alway had with ice cream cones is the fact that it takes way too much effort to eat an entire cone. Well…not anymore. Now,thanks to the motorized ice cream cone , now the only effort you have to make is scooping the ice cream in and sticking your toungue out (wow,that just doesn’t sound right).
Seriously, this invention has so many positive aspects, I don’t even know where to begin. First off, no one eats the cone anyways, I’ve scavanged through many a garbage cans and I can’t tell you how many half eaten cones I have come upon. Think of the fact that there will be considerably less garbage which will in turn help the environment. Plus, we can send all the cones to third world countries to help feed the needy. No one would eat a half eaten cone, but now with this clever invention, those less fortunate can dine on complete, uneaten cones. Secondly, the clever colours reminds all those using this ingenious product that they are indeed eating a product that originated from inside a cow. So in other words, this product, feed the needy, saves the environment, and teaches children about the nature of food. How many products can do that?I’ll save you the time to look it up…none.
Look at the complexity of this! It’s mind-boggling! In addition to the above helpful uses, by not having to actually turn the cone around to lick, the energy you save could perhaps be the difference between rescuing a cat from a tree or a baby from a burning building. Think about it, how tired do you usually get eating an entire ice cream cone? I know i’m both mentally and physically exhausted to the point where I can barely keep my eyes open. Not anymore…
Coming to you with another wacky and useless product, this is Merv.
Lifedriving
After a hideous amount of soul-searching, I buckled and got Palm’s Lifedrive. I needed a palmtop for when the laptop of doom couldn’t come, because my ability to keep written notes crumbles under my tremendously bad handwriting. After a few months of beating the tar out of it, I’m as pleased with it compared to a “standard” PDA as I am with my Mac laptop as opposed to a Windows laptop.
It’s stunning for work, in particular it’s voice recorder. The pic-up mic is clear and catches everything that gets dropped within a space up to a decent boardroom, and the storage capacity of the drive pays for itself in being able to keep just about every interview, voice memo, or bootleg I need both on my PC and on the Drive. Sometimes, I just have to remember what someone said when I’m on the bus — getting home is too late!
The video playback, predictably, isn’t worth a tick’s fart. It’s cute that I can move my Samurai Champloo grabs onto it, but there’s no real built-in tools to manage or view video the way I want to. Mp3 playback isn’t a problem, and playing the voice memo audio files in their native format is cake, but the machine puts them out as .wavs naturally — which means that if I take a voice mail from the palmtop to the desktop and back, I have to change it into an Mp3 midstep.
Media functions, so, blah. It’s nice there’s software built in to let me do something other than just put voice memos onto that 4 gig drive, but the media functions just aren’t up to snuff. Although ease of transfer is light-years ahead of the PSP, the PSP looks at least that much better.
But, for someone who needs all the basic Palm functions and would be carrying a voice recorder anyways, this is a fantastic machine. Essentially unlimited storage for voice, with plenty of space leftover to make it a decent back up disk for essential docs, and the default handiness of a Palm have come together better than I’d hoped for when I got it.
Other than my glee at a device not just being for fun, where I’m going is deliberate. The PSP and the Lifedrive are both hyper-designed; a ridiculous amount of money and research went into making each one a solid multi-media platform with a core functionality. PSP’s is games; Lifedrive’s is organization. But neither product actually benefits from the periphery abilities except for very specific users, such as myself. Isn’t the lesson here clear enough that Sony would realize that foisting blu-ray onto the console war is going to hurt them — that insuring a clean, core gameplay accesability is more important than what are essentially expensive widgets for everyone but a few teritiary market members?
On that note, I’m going to go borrow a DS for the trip into Berkeley. Sorry if the spellings off today; this was a quick one before ribs. And ribs, we can all agree, come before perfect spelling.
SeV Performance T-Shirt by Scottevest
About a week ago I received the newly designed SeV Performance T-Shirt by Scottevest Incorporated. The shirt is part of their “Technology Enabled Clothing (TEC)” line. This t-shirt is for the avid technologist who is constantly on the go.
Fitting into the shirt and installing your portable devices is a bit tricky. Once I put the shirt on, it did not make it clear where exactly the wires and devices fit. It took more than a few minutes to “figure out” how exactly the devices fit.
When I first tried out the shirt, I could tell that it was light weight, but with an iPod and digital camera it made the shirt feel incredibly off-centered. When using the shirt on a hot day, the fabric did not “soak up” the sun; the shirt did not get that hot. After the first use, this shirt is not designed for the average iPodder.
The shirt is designed out of 100% Polyester 3M Quick Dry fabric – the same materials that athletic clothing is made out of. This type of Polyester is designed to repel moisture from your body, which in turn means the shirt dries faster and the user is not left with a “soaked” shirt after a good workout.
The shirt comes equipped with a patented Weight Management System; in essence, the shirt has extra fabric in the shoulders in which it evenly distributes the weight.
The shirt comes equipped with the patented “Personal Area Network” in which wires are run in the lining of the jacket. All of the pockets have a little hole in the pocket, in which it allows you to connect all of your devices. For example, if you wanted to connect your phone to your Pocket PC you could do this without having any wires showing. The shirt also has a hidden compartment to store a pair of ipod sized earbuds.
After having used the shirt off and on for a little over a week, it has proven to be a great shirt for the outdoor businessman. Having tested the shirt with a Motorola RAZR, Video iPod, and Digital Camera, the shirt held up to all of its claims. The Personal Area Network was very difficult to set up, and was not that much of a help.
Pro’s
- Light weight
- Comfortable fit
- Cost efficient
- Attractive Design
Cons
- Difficult to install devices
- A bit heavy when installing more than an iPod and phone
- Lack of documentation or step by step set up guide.
I would recommend this product to those who are constantly on the go and care about having people see your “cords” or “earbuds.” For $34.99 (Plus Tax and S&H), it is a nice luxury, but certainly not a shirt you could wear everyday.
For more information and to purchase the product directly from the manufacturer, please visit Scottevest Online Store. The shirt comes in sizes Medium thru XX Large and is available in both short or long sleeve designs.
Courtesy // Scottevest
This is a diagram of the various components of the shirt.
Courtesy // Scottevest
This is an “inside out” view of the shirt.
Courtesy // Scottevest
This is the shirt as it will first appear once you open the packaging.
For a video demonstration of the Personal Area Network feature see Personal Area Network (PAN)*
… and for the Weight Management System feature see Weight Management System Demo*
* Windows Media Player Required
World of Warcraft update, because I'm the site's dork King.
World of Warcraft. Even if you’re not interested in gaming, consider that it’s roughly six million people, paying a minimum of 12 dollars a month to play the game, and climbing. There’s estimates that it’s fifty percent of the Massive market. Blizzard actually will give their players a free month if they get someone else to sign up.
But have they gone a step too far?
The game has had technical issues since launch, in part because they grossly underestimated how many players they’d get. Fair enough — everyone did. One of those issues has related to servers being under- or over-loaded, with extremely limited character transfer services. Now, players can pay to move their characters from one server to another. It’s a microtransaction model that Blizzard has been talking about for some time. But…
They haven’t really fixed the problems with their free, limited transfers. The list of servers you can go to is still very, very limited. And, the biggie issue, is that it’s a 25 dollar fee.
Forget about any other fears about microtransactions, or people paying ten bucks to get a cooler sword. 25 bucks — per character transfer, not for access to the ability to transfer — is the better part of a whole ‘nother video game, a DVD and some coffee, or a pretty decent lunch in downtown SF. With Blizzard putting forward this relationship between fee and service, they’re setting a standard — a gold standard — that will only accelerate the cost of games for a consumer base that’s already tired of coughing up blood trying to find the cash to upgrade their systems, pay for the games, and finding the time to play.
In other words, it’s a great time for one of the MMO second-stringers to step up and simply by offering their service at a nominally reasonable price, look better than WoW.
Gabbin'
Here is something interesting I discovered quite on accident this afternoon while browsing. It caught my attention because I have a friend who has been trying to come up with a way that people can chat together while surfing his web page. The service is Gabbly, and it’s amazingly simple. All one has to do is stick “gabbly.com/” before any URL (in a compatible browser) and it will open not only the URL you typed, but a window to chat in. I’ve tried several of my favorite places (including this blog right here) and, sadly, have been the only “Gabber” around.
One quite interesting detail is that when you leave a website, your conversation doesn’t; it stays for whoever shows up next. In fact, I have seen many previous conversations on exactly that topic, past gabbers chatting about past gabbers. There seems to be lots of potential here. You could leave notes to people about what content is good, or post links to relevant items. Of course, there are also those who just spam the heck out of any chat they can get their handle into.
Another chat I came across seemed to be one fellow initiating his friend into the Gabbly-ness. They started out at Kotaku and then, following the first’s suggestion (in the chat window,) headed over to Engadget. Friends can surf together! Of course, there is nothing preventing people from going to Engadget together in any instant messenger program they choose, but they aren’t going to meet up with anyone else when they get there. Is this just goofy, or will it really catch on? I have no idea, but it’s definitely worth taking for a spin.
Who'da Thunk it? – 2
Once again it is time to look at another pointless electronic product available to you, the technology junky. This particular product is geared more towards pet owners. More specifically, dog lovers. Even more specific, dog lovers with a dirty mouth and no limit of shame.
The product to be looked at today is the “X-rated Talking Dog Collar”
Now there is finally a way to make those big loud german sheppards or pitbulls even more aggressive and those Chihuahuas even more yappier – by mixing in rude and obnoxious phrases such as “Tricks! You wanna see tricks? Get yourself a hooker!”
Doesn’t the dog look more loyal and obedient with the talking collar? You would never have to worry about anyone kidnapping your beloved rex so long as it spews out such classic lines like “Hey, ever eat your own s**t? I have!”. If you ask this guy, there are absolute no drawbacks for putting this product on your dog.
If you want to purchase this product, please go here .
Coming to you with another wacky and useless product, this is Merv.
Why isn't my car on the Information Superhighway?
Yesterday after work I got out to my car and realized I was almost out of gas. Not usually a huge deal but I was on a tight schedule. I now had to take time out and drive, in the opposite direction of my destination, to get gas. This annoyed me.
So I was thinking to myself, “I wish I could have known earlier if I was going to need gas or not so I could have factored this in.” Then it hit me – I need my car to be a little more proactive when it needs something. Yes, I could have just looked at the gauge before I went in to work or better yet I could have just paid attention and gotten gas the day before or earlier. But with technology embedded almost everywhere, why is it that I don’t have the option of getting emails or text messages from my car when it needs things done?
A New Look for the Tube
Go to any big electronics store and check out all the humongous, flat screen, HD TVs with speakers that knock you down; they are at once terribly thrilling and immensely boring. There are black boxes and there are silver boxes. Boxes. The rationale certainly has something to do with decorating, matching anything, being inconspicuous. For anyone who thinks that is a little too drab, HANNspree provides an alternative.
Animal plushie? Smooth wood? Trucks and trains for your son? Fanciful crystals for your daughter? The sports fan can get a TV to match a favorite team, and kids of all ages can appreciate the Disney licensing. HANNspree is about expressing your personality not just through what you watch, but how you watch it. Their website proclaims, “Our televisions are meant to be bold declarations of individuality, pride, and personal style.”
However, it’s obvious looking at one of these perky sets in action that the screen quality isn’t quite up to what you’d expect from the mainstream brands. The staff at the Flagship Showcase in San Francisco weren’t hiding the fact that, “It’s definitely a trade-off,” between technology and personality, but they also were quick to note that the screens they do use are made by Hannstar, one of the top 10 LCD display manufacturers.
Another potential concern is the small size of the screens. To address this, the company will begin to release larger models. One example is seen here, and I was able to take a look at pictures of some others. It seems that with the screen enlargement, the televisions regress back into simple boxes. I, for one, would have no problem with a giant plushie giraffe. Hopefully in the future some of the whimsy of the smaller TVs will be injected into the big screens.
Prices are currently being tested in the range between $199 and $999, but look for them to settle somewhere between $249/99 and $999. The larger models will increase the range of prices, as well as products. Since many people are willing to pay thousands of dollars for a super hi-tech TV, it seems perfectly reasonable for others to pay hundreds for something that is so personal. At first, I was thinking kids would outgrow the more playful sets, but when I found myself picking out which one I would take home if I had a choice, I realized that’s probably not the case.
The Prey Demo isn't out!
Not for Xbox 360 owners, anyways. The promised demo for this still-hotly anticipated game (it’s been about ten years of dev time) released for PC owners flawlessly, but the Xbox Live Marketplace demo is still sitting somewhere not reachable by mere gamers. With the upcoming Live Anywhere feature, does Microsoft really think anyone buys into it anymore? Downloadable content is reaching a boiling point of costing too much and delivering too little, and Microsoft’s Xbox division has only been fronting it for six months. Add in some chronic lateness (Street Fighter II arcade? Anyone? Street Fighter II arcade?) and it’s a horrible fantasy land for MS to think that being able to access the marketplace anywhere is a perk.
The worst part is, they’re still likely to end this generation the solid market leader in console games.
Opera 9 is Out!
I’ve just downloaded the new version of Opera’s web browser, and my Official Stance is: Nifty.
It’s not so much that I’m a stickler for particular features; I just want a browser that’s fast and doesn’t crash. Is that too much to ask? Regardless, here’s the skinny on the latest features available in Opera 9.
- Tabs display a thumbnail of the webpage: How cool is this? If you’re looking at your tab and can’t figure out what it is just by the title alone, hovering over the tab will display a little thumbnail image of the page for you
- Built-in BitTorrent support: Now, when you click on the download link for a torrent file, Opera begins its download, without requiring you to save the file and opening your torrent client manually
- Widgets: Yep, just like Mac OS X, Widgets are little stand-alone apps that do just one thing, unconnected to the browser. There are a bunch of them, too, in categories ranging from games to graphics to weather to blogs, etc.
One thing that peeves me about Opera 9, however, is the way it organizes my imported bookmarks alphabetically. I’ve gotten quite used to my preferred organization, thank you… I don’t need them alphabetized! I will say this, though… this browser proved quite speedy in opening and displaying graphics for many of the sites I regularly browse. Having said all this, however, I’m sticking with Firefox. I’m just that way, I suppose. But the rest of you interested in an alternate browser, you can download Opera 9 here.