Gizmodo
robots
Posts Tagged “
Cats
”
roomba
Top Tips on Socializing Pets and Bots, Courtesy of WSJ
The Wall Street Journal has a great feature this morning about pets and household robots, such as Roombas and Pleos. Writer Andrew Lavallee has compiled all sorts of anecdotes—including useful tips on how to bed your pet in with the 'bot in your life, including protecting your Sony Aibo from cat bites (cayenne pepper and Cholula hot sauce applied to the 'bot butt, apparently). One dog owner told off the Roomba in front of his mutt, and the dog never lunged at the robot vacuum again. [WSJ]
cia spytech
CIA Animal Tech: Bats, Cats and Rats As Covert Operatives
I was surprised to learn that the CIA has had a long though not always fruitful relationship with the animal kingdom. In Spycraft, the authors describe many clever animal-assisted devices, from the dead-rat dead-drop pouch to the "acoustic kitty," a cat with a remote listening system embedded in its body. And what's this about the 1 million bats the CIA's precursor, the OSS, were gonna use to firebomb Tokyo during WWII? More »
gadgets
Unless you want to spend money on replacing your AV gear or replacing your pet, you're going to have to protect one from the other. Sound & Vision Mag has seven suggestions on how to do just that. Among them are wrapping up your rat's nest of wires behind the TV, placing a ScatMat (not what it sounds like) to gently shock little animals that step near your goodies, shielding your screen and hiding your remotes. Sounds like a pretty good warmup for when you have to baby-proof your AV gear a few years down the line. Especially with that ScatMat thing. [Sound And Vision]
Pet-Proof Your AV Gear For Fun and Profit
Unless you want to spend money on replacing your AV gear or replacing your pet, you're going to have to protect one from the other. Sound & Vision Mag has seven suggestions on how to do just that. Among them are wrapping up your rat's nest of wires behind the TV, placing a ScatMat (not what it sounds like) to gently shock little animals that step near your goodies, shielding your screen and hiding your remotes. Sounds like a pretty good warmup for when you have to baby-proof your AV gear a few years down the line. Especially with that ScatMat thing. [Sound And Vision]
fuzzywuzzymodo
Gizmodo Animal Day (Just Because)
I asked Wilson why we had two animal posts on the page, back to back. Seems like overload on critters. But then I kind of remembered I really LIKE animal + gadget stories. I mean, FuzzyWuzzyModo was my idea, and all. So, I think we'll do a few more posts like this, for the hell of it, on this slow news day. Look, a polar bear pretending to be on the phone! Leave a caption! [Photo via Dark Roasted]
cats
Cat Desktop Bed Is a Good Idea, But Cats Will Never Go For It
Our resident cat expert, Mark Wilson, tells me that cats will never go for this desktop cat bed. It's not that it's a bad idea—a clamp-on bed so your cat can sit close to your hands, but not close enough to mash keys on your keyboard—but it's just impractical. Mark claims his cat loves jumping in his arm, his hands and his stomach whenever he's doing work. This bed would just give the cat a little perch to leap off. Just look at the cat's eye language. It's saying, "watch out bitch, here I come." [The Refined Feline via DVICE via Oh Gizmo via Geekologie via MAKE]
animal welfare
Hot Dog Temperature Alert System for Car Owners too Stupid to Have Pets
If ever I want to give my late, unlamented sister-in-law—she's not dead, she's just not my sister-in-law any more—a present (other than a punch in the chops) then I need look no further than the Hot Dog Temperature Alert system for cars. Install it, turn it on, and if the temperature rises above a preset one, then the windows roll down automatically, the horn sounds and a man in uniform appears as if by magic with a red hot poker that he rams up your ass. Okay, so I made that last bit up, but here's a story about my late (I wish) unlamented sister-in-law that you might enjoy. More »
lolchute
Cat Jumps Off a Plane, Lands on Its Legs
We gonna die. We gonna die. We gonna die. We gonna die. DIE. I can has wings? Moar vodka? I hates Crazy Russians and crazy parachutes! (Editor's note: really, what's the deal with this? No kitty cam? The cat should have a cam to see his point of view, especially for when he rips his owner's face to pieces after touching down.) [English Russia]
Backyard Cat: A Haiku
Stay in the yard, Cat.
But stay away from the pool.
My kids would be sad.
[Product Page via Geekologie]
Stay in the yard, Cat.But stay away from the pool.
My kids would be sad.
[Product Page via Geekologie]
brush aside
Pull Your Dog's Hair Out with the Pet Furminator
Dog or cat hair problems? The Pet Furminator somehow gets to the undercoat where hair is matted, leaving the shiny topcoat untouched. Looks like a great way to solve that problem of furballs and hairs sticking to everything in your abode, including you. Or, you could solve the problem by just not living with a bunch of animals. Heck, you could just take a cue from the cuisine of some foreign countries, where uttering the sentence "I had a dog" isn't a wistful reminiscence, but refers to last night's dinner. After all, it's all protein. [Hardware Aisle]
guns
Kitty Corner Shot Rifle: If You See Toonces With an Unusual Glint In His Eye, Run
Weapon tech fans or Ghost Recon fanatics will remember the the corner shot rifle. This mod has the same camera, LCD and hinge that lets a soldier shoot around building edges without getting in the line of fire. But this one is wrapped up in a cat suit, just like the one that used to drive the car in Saturday Night Live. It makes a somewhat cowardly weapon even more pussy. So if you see an unusually tall cat peeking around corners in your local war zone with what looks like a muzzle coming out of his mouth, I'd say catnip is not going to get you very far. [Geekologie]
6:00 AM on Tue Dec 25 2007
By Brian Lam
10,886 views,
22 comments
Latest by Bokusatsu_Tenshi: Cat, I'm a kitty cat And I bang bang bang And I bang bang bang more »
awkward animals
Elvis the cat had a run-in with a truck that resulted in him losing the use of his back legs. Naturally, the only solution that owner and Battlebots (remember Battlebots?) engineer Carlo Bertocchini could come up with was a crazy robotic box for Elvis to be placed in to return his mobility. More »
Elvis the RoboCat Still Figuring Out This 'Moving Around' Thing
Elvis the cat had a run-in with a truck that resulted in him losing the use of his back legs. Naturally, the only solution that owner and Battlebots (remember Battlebots?) engineer Carlo Bertocchini could come up with was a crazy robotic box for Elvis to be placed in to return his mobility. More »
moggy mod
Cat Bed Made from Old Computer Monitor
Geek cats might appreciate this bed made from an old computer monitor and costing around $40. The modder made good use of the letters from an old keyboard, as well, as you can see from the gallery below.
More »
roundup
Afternoon News: XM-Sirius Merger Gets Serious, Gas Pumps Lie, and Mice Now Fearless
• XM and Sirius shareholders approve merger, next stop: the FCC. [AP]• Gas pumps that measure 1/1000th of a gallon really just trick you into thinking you're getting more gas. [Gadget Lab]
• Scientists genetically engineer mouse that isn't afraid of cats; rodent homicide rate expected to spike soon. [Pink Tentacle]
poll
Japanese Company Releases USB Pussy but Nobody Knows What It Is
All clues point to the fact that this USB cat from Japan is, in fact, a mouse. Or is it? What do you think this infernal contraption is most likely to be? Vote in the poll below.
animals
Untangle Your Headphone Cords Using Your Cat
This isn't the easiest or fastest way to get your headphone cord untangled, but it's probably the grossest. And yes, animal rights people who got all pissy about the squirrel catapult, this is fake. [Spulch]
4:30 PM on Thu Sep 6 2007
By Adam Frucci
53,220 views,
55 comments
Latest by Set to evil: I bet those headphones sound like shit now! more »
meeow-vision
Mr Lee Gives Cat's-Eye View of the World via NeckCam
Let's have a round of applaws (oh dear) and some stroky-stroky for Mr Lee, the world's foremost cat photographer. His owner, South Carolina resident Jurgen Perthold, was curious as to what Mr Lee got up to during the day. So he rigged up a shock-, scratch-, water- and theft-resistant camera, slung it round Mr Lee's neck and sent him off to hunt voles. Turns out he's pretty good at taking pics - as the gallery shows, after the jump. More »
animal abuse
Japan's Hello Kitty Cat Humiliation System
Oh… oh my. Japan, a country that never fails to blow my mind, has just seen the release of, according to Google's hilariously inept machine translation, the "Hello Kitty transformation set." It's basically a hat, bib, collar and carrying bag to turn your cat into the saddest, most ridiculous-looking cat on the block. Below, you'll find a gallery of cats with no dignity. After the jump, you'll find examples of perhaps the greatest machine translation I have ever seen, and I'm not exaggerating. You're gonna want to see this. Thanks again for the comedy gold, Japan!
More »
2:45 PM on Thu Jul 26 2007
By Adam Frucci
201,420 views,
32 comments
Latest by Dave D.: OMG, that is just wrong!!! But then, think about the people who dress up their cats and dogs in other types of ridiculous outfits...you know the kind I'm talking about! Which one is the greater atrocity? =) ________________________________________________________________ Get Guitar Hero more »
