On April 1st Mobile PC Magazine had me pretty good with an elaborate post about nuclear powered batteries. It was an April Fools joke. Picking up my ego from the ground when I realized I had been fooled, I got ta thinking “Man, a nuclear powered battery — that would be cool as long as it didn’t make me grow a third testical.”
Well here it is. A tritium based battery will last for 12-20 years. This means two things.
Mitsubishi Electric has given us the gift of green. A new fridge will actually enhance the nutrients in your vegetables the longer they stay in.
The box gives off orange light-emitting diodes (LEDs) that promote photosynthesis in the greens. Typically vegetables lose vitamins and other such goodies the longer they stay in the fridge, but now that process will actually be reversed. Truth be told, however, I tend to only eat vegetables when they come topped on pizza. So really this does me no good.
Also related is a refrigerator that actually keeps things cool by using sound. Researchers at Penn state actually designed a refrigerator which makes such loud sounds that the gases inside the box constrict and cool down. I hope they figure out a way to turn off the sound when you open the fridge, like that annoying light I always try to catch off.
Most techies are also sci-fi fans. At a young age I remember my dad trying to explain what it meant to “Grok” something. Ironically enough at my tender age, I couldn’t understand it.
Knowing what it means now, I think it’s a great name for a search engine. Unfortunately Grokker, the visual search engine, doesn’t really live up to its name.
First off, it’s powered by Yahoo. Maybe I’m a search engine snob, but I often find that Yahoo’s results just aren’t as good as Google’s. But more important than that, its innovative design, while fun to play with, doesn’t really help you get to where you want to go.
But like I said, it is a fun layout to click around with. Check out the results for “LiveDigitally,” and see the different relationships we have to other sites.
This small little ball plays 20 questions with you when you are trapped in the car with your grandmother and that strange grandmother smell.
Based on 20q.net, the ball will ask you questions that you can reply to with “yes,” “No,” “Sometimes” and “Rarely.” By the end of the 20 questions, the ball has to guess who you were thinking of. It’s a technological spin on one of the oldest games there is.
While 20q.net learns with every person it plays with, this ball’s artificial intelligence is static, but it’s still reported to be staggeringly sharp.
Tianyutek, a company whose name I do not dare try and pronounce, sent me a little message about a foldable piano.
From what… echem the company says, it sounds like this roll-up piano is similar to the Keytare from the 80’s. Yes the keyboard-guitar infusion that rocked ever so hard, until everyone realized they sucked. But now, you can rock on your keyboard and roll it up before anybody sees you pretending to be Amadeus. The material looks pretty light, so you could stuff your pants with it when you are done and act like David Bowie from Labyrinth.
Also, I will try extra hard to stop all references to the 80’s for, a good week.
From the maker of montage-a-google comes a new Google based game called Guess-the-Google.
I wouldn’t recommend any game that I haven’t tried out myself and after a few rounds I can safely say this is a fun little pick-me-up. It’s almost the exact reverse of Montage-a-Google. For Guess-the-Google, a group of pictures are provided and you have to guess the keyword that they are all related to. Some can be a bit of a challenge. I tried really hard to get in today’s top scores, so I could show off here, but alas, I am not a Google image expert.
Check out this virtual image of Berkeley (my old college stomping ground).
Avideh Zakhor and her research team made this virtual map of the city in 4.5 hours. That’s 30 minutes of driving time, with a high powered laser strapped to your car, and four hours of data processing.
If you ask me, it kicks the crap out of Google’s Satellite images, if only because its up to date. This New Scientists article, however, makes it sound like the application of this mapping won’t be to amuse yourself in the cubicle, but to help soldiers conduct urban warfare.
I love modern art which not only recognizes, but is inspired by, technology and how it has changed our lives. Another guilty pleasure of mine are emoticons. As dorky as I feel whenever I use them, I can’t help but place an animated smiley face to emphasize my point. It makes me wish I had emoticon stickers to use in real life.
Web Are You comes pretty close. Leave it with a friend and update them with your current state through the Internet. You can let them know when you are happy, sad, upset just like in real IM conversations!!!!
In the 80’s you needed a big boom box to carry on your shoulder, bumping your favorite tune as loud as you could. Soon, the new boom box might just be a patch on your shoulder. A Korean research firm has developed a technology to mass produce sound speakers that are as flexible as fabric.
Speakers will never look the same again. In fact, we may never see another speaker, in the traditional sense, if this takes off. Just weave your speaker into your sweater and have a blast.
Back in the day, before fax machines, you used to have to send a messenger boy out every time you wanted to get some paper from point A to point B. Today, fax machines aren’t even needed. Just send a gig of data over a broadband Internet connection and bamm. Job done.
The Associated Press wrote a great story today about what that spells out for bike messengers. In our own words here at LD, we would now call bike messengers Janky. They simply aren’t needed the way they used to be. Sure, I like Puck too, but I don’t trust him as much as WiFi.
If I were a bad blogger, I’d keep the Nanofactory Product Catalog a secret. I could probably milk another 5-10 posts from this baby. Although some of the “products” are speculative, like solar powered lawn grass, they are all the kinds of ideas that make you go hmmm.
Many of the product descriptions assume a post-nanofactory fictional history, but the site assures us that its technical consultant, Chris Phoenix of the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology, has put great effort into making all product descriptions fall within the plausible capabilities of theoretical molecular manufacturing. This includes a biomass food machine. Any kind of biomass goes in, and tasty food comes out.
Not all the ideas are pure speculation though. Some are labeled “in development” and make you smile about the bright future with bite sized gadgets that can do it all.
In the Stone Age grocery shopping was an analog task. You wrote down your shopping list, perhaps with something as quaint as a pencil. Traveled to the store, hopefully everything was refrigerated and after getting all your items you would call it a day.
Now there is a new way to shop. IBM and Springboard Retail Networks are each working on their own version of a computerized shopping cart. The cart can guide you through the aisles using a GPS like map. It won’t count your calories, but it can ring you up, making the grocery store a one-stop hassle free encounter. You’ll never get lost looking for pickles again, the cart will take you to them, just like you were on a treasure hunt.
But, seeing as how it will cost a store 160,000 to get fully equipped with the smart shopping carts, I have a feeling we won’t be seeing them at Costco anytime soon.
