First up, their rig used a Canon A470 camera with 8GB SD card that they bought used on Amazon. And instead of the expensive GPS radios commonly used by weather balloons, they used a prepaid Motorola i290 GPS cell phone to receive location text messages.

The Earth's stratosphere can get as cold as -67 degrees fahrenheit (-55 Celsius), but they couldn't afford expensive temperature-resistant housing. The solution: a styrofoam beer cooler, and an instant hand warmer. Awesome.

Their low-cost balloon-launch platform reached 17.5 miles high, into near-space. Using the GPS phone to track its location, they found the rig 20 miles away from the launch site about 5 hours later.

Total weight was 800g (about 28 ounces). Apparently FAA regulations only apply to balloons with payloads over four pounds. If you want all the details—including a full parts list—check our their site below.

While groups like EOSS (Edge of Space Sciences) have done things like this in the past, I've never seen it done so cheaply. High school science teachers, please take note! [L337arts via Slashdot]

As school goes back, it's a fun reminder that the laptop wasn't always the essential piece of tech gear that you need to survive college. And with e-book readers and tablet PCs taking on more and more text-book duties, maybe clam shells in classrooms will soon be old fashioned. Time will tell. [PC World]

Tisch School of the Arts student Kacie Kinzer created the tweenbot as a kind of art experiment. In her words:

I wondered: could a human-like object traverse sidewalks and streets along with us, and in so doing, create a narrative about our relationship to space and our willingness to interact with what we find in it? More importantly, how could our actions be seen within a larger context of human connection that emerges from the complexity of the city itself? To answer these questions, I built robots.

In New York City, we might expect the smiley-faced tweenbot to be stabbed, stomped, mugged, or covered in graffiti, but every single one of the journeys was completed without a hitch. Pedestrians would stop and help the little guy when he was trapped against a curb or headed into traffic, and point him in the right direction.

I don't know about you guys, but I like to think this project says more about the state of our nation than that stupid negative-nancy stock market. It's just about the warmest, fuzziest thing I've seen since the last Muppet movie. [Tweenbots]

The DIY project is powered by five microcontrollers and features 120 RGB LEDs, five per cup. The lights pulse and change color depending on the arrangement of (presumably) classic red plastic cups see-through plastic cups, and is equipped with a wireless module to let it communicate with a scoreboard to be constructed later. The LEDs are under a sheet of glass to protect them from the cheap beer of choice. [Thanks, Dan!]

[Geekologie]

The university will begin the program with 15 students, eventually bolstering it to 60, and currently have 30 faculty working in robotics. This announcement goes hand in hand with the launch of Georgia Tech's new center specifically designated for robotics. Maybe Carnegie Mellon should worry about their distinction as the robotics school. [Gizmag]

The Stingray, with its carbon-fiber hull, is the brainchild of the San Diego iBotics Student Society, a bunch of undergraduates from a variety of colleges and universities in the San Diego area. They and the Naval Academy will be battling it out against teams from Duke, Cornell, MIT and last year's winner, the University of Central Florida. There's a whole bunch of other pics at over at CNET if, like me, you're into hot pool action.

[CNET News]

Check out this years top entries after the jump, and feel free to dissect them and come up with your own, better ideas in comments.

Casablanca - New York University: A hybrid social networking and mobile/alternative reality game that pits teams of players against each other as members of either "the Occupation" or "the Resistance." The game plays out online and via text messages; is one part espionage, one part team-builder; and rewards players for building or infiltrating real-world and virtual communities.

Selectricity - M.I.T.: An online voting technology that focuses on preferential decision-making— shifting away from a winner-take-all paradigm to a more democratic standard. Using a drag-and-drop mechanism, voters rank "candidates" in order of preference and the Selectricity application generates a winner that is most acceptable to the group as a whole.

Osiris - Brown University: A first-of-its-kind iTunes visualizer that uses song lyrics to automatically generate music videos using images pulled from Flickr and pictures on the user's hard drive.

RapHappy - New York University: An online hip-hop destination where users can record, collaborate on, search and listen to freestyle or written raps. The site will encourage user interaction and collaboration, enabling users to form groups, start battles or rate/comment on the sites' submissions.

How Do I Say This? - UCLA: One of the greenlighted Digital Incubator programs from last year, the 2006 SXSW Web Award-winner will return bigger than ever in its second season. "How Do I Say This?" is an interactive, Web-based advice wiki, where users help script and create video messages for people with problems that have left them at a loss for words.

You scholars out there should love this Jellyfish inflatable beer bong. Never before has it been so easy to give yourself alcohol poisoning. Now, rather than needing to tote around a funnel and some tubing, you can crush the Jellyfish up and keep it in your pocket or bag. When the mood is right, pull it out, inflate the cup, and pour some frosted Natty Ice down your throat. Boy, that $40,000 a year sure is worth it! –Adam Frucci

Product Page [BeerSudz]

They didn't just measure download and upload speed, either. Sure, infrastructure had something to do with it, but the surveys and studies also considered whether professors posted course materials online, what kind of computer training was available, and what sorts of distance learning and high-tech courses were offered. Plus, they've figured in whether the school allows peer-to-peer (cough!bittorrent!cough) connections. How did the schools stack up? We'll go 10 better: jump for the top 20.

1 Villanova University
2 M.I.T.
3 Indiana University Bloomington
4 Swarthmore College
5 Creighton University
6 University of Illinois
7 Michigan Tech University
8 University of Southern California
9 Quinnipiac University
10 University of Oklahoma
11 United States Military Academy
12 University of Minnesota Twin Cities
13 St. John's University
14 Clarkson University
15 Temple University
16 Stevens Institute of Technology
17 Stanford University
18 Eckerd College
19 Pomona College
20 University of Virginia

Hey, where's my beloved alma mater, University of Miami? Oh well, perhaps hardy partying schoolboys are too hungover for online activities. Sigh. – Charlie White

Top 10 Wired Colleges [PC Magazine]

Authorities first assumed the fire may have had something to do with fireworks, but then sent the laptop found in the room to the ATF lab for analysis. It's probably too soon to blame Sony for their batteries on this one, even though fires caused by said batteries have injured a few. We're siding with the "stupid college kids" theory for now.

Full story after the jump.

Published November 21, 2006

Laptop eyed in fatal fire at college

BY MATTHEW HANSEN AND PAUL HAMMEL
WORLD-HERALD BUREAU

A faulty laptop computer is being investigated as the possible cause of a deadly fraternity fire that killed one Nebraska Wesleyan University student and injured three others, authorities said Monday.

Lancaster County Attorney Gary Lacey said a laptop computer found in the room of Ryan Stewart, 19, of Ord, Neb., has been sent to a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms laboratory for analysis.

Faulty batteries in laptop computers have been blamed for a string of recent fires, prompting a recall by several computer companies.

More than 6 million of the lithium-ion batteries made by Sony and sold worldwide have been recalled.

Lacey said it was too early to make a definitive judgment about the cause of the fatal fire.

"(Investigators) have got a long ways to go," he said. "They don't really know what happened, and I'm not sure they will."

Flames engulfed a room on the second story of the Phi Kappa Tau fraternity house about 4 a.m. Friday, killing Stewart, sending three other fraternity members to a hospital burn unit and prompting other fraternity members to jump from second-story windows to escape the blaze.

The tragedy prompted an outpouring of support from other students, professors, alumni and random Nebraskans.

It also sparked questions about the behavior of Phi Kappa Tau fraternity members in the hours before the fire, partly because fraternity leaders confirmed that the fire started not long after they concluded a night of "activation activities" in a weeklong initiation of new members.

Sarah Boatman, Wesleyan's vice president of student life, said she's heard rampant speculation about the fire's cause from students not affiliated with the fraternity.

"Clearly the first wave of energy must go to caring for all of our students," Boatman said. "As we're taking care of our community . . . the questions start to arise. How did it start?

"The community has a deep, deep desire to know."

Boatman, Lacey and a fraternity spokesman wouldn't respond to on-campus rumors that fraternity members shot off bottle rockets inside the fraternity house in the hours before the fire.

Tim Klipp, a junior and the fraternity's social chairman, said the fraternity's members have been instructed not to talk publicly about the hours before the fire, or any possible cause of the fire, until the investigation is complete.

"As of right now, we're wondering the same thing as the rest of the world, pretty much," he said about the fire's cause.

Maria Roy, who lives directly behind the fraternity house, said she didn't hear fireworks Thursday night. She did hear fraternity members partying late that night, she said.

The neighbor said she often sees young men drinking alcohol behind the fraternity house.

"They're college kids, and that's what they do," she said.

On Monday, members of Phi Kappa Tau donned brown fraternity T-shirts and affixed black ribbons to their chests as they attended some classes after a weekend spent talking to fire investigators and undergoing grief counseling.

Fraternity members were buoyed by the news that the three students injured in the fire had recovered enough to breathe without respirators, Klipp said.

Saint Elizabeth Regional Medical Center in Lincoln upgraded Travis Mann, 22, of Beatrice and Aaron McGuire, 20, of Sioux Falls, S.D., to fair condition Monday. David Spittler, 20, of Elkhorn, was upgraded to serious condition.

The fraternity's members, who haven't been back inside the house to retrieve their belongings, were also amazed by the outpouring of support from the university and city, Klipp said.

Students gave them old books and clothes. Wesleyan sororities cooked meals for them. Professors handed fraternity members money on campus Monday.

The biggest donation of all came from Alpha Gamma Delta sorority, which will allow the fraternity members to live on their vacant third floor until the fraternity can reopen its house, Klipp said.

"When you have people around here that love you this much, it's just nuts," Klipp said. "Honestly, we don't even know how to be thankful."

The grieving process will continue for those close to Stewart, said Pauletta Lehn, Wesleyan's campus minister.

The grief may be compounded because many of the students have never lost a close friend or family member, she said. It also may be worsened by lingering feelings of guilt.

"Guilt is certainly one (emotion)," Lehn said. "Why didn't I go back for Ryan? Why did I jump out of the window so soon?

"When you think life is going to go on forever, and then you have something like this happen, it strikes you right to the core."
Contact the Omaha World-Herald newsroomCopyright ©2006 Omaha World-Herald®. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, displayed or distributed for any purpose without permission from the Omaha World-Herald.

Copyright 2006 Omaha World-Herald. All rights reserved.

– Jason Chen

Laptop eyed in fatal fire at college [Omaha]

Laptop Investigated in Fraternity Fire [Omaha - Thanks Dave!]

It is a good thing that they installed this HDTV. People go to college to watch football, right? Education, schmeducation. – Travis Hudson

Texas Has Too Damn Much Money [Deadspin]

If you recall, yesterday we mentioned the program that Monclair State University has implemented. For a quick refresher, they gave all incoming freshman a cellphone that comes equipped with a GPS tracker. Sounds a little Big Brother-ish, right? Well not really. I had a chat with an MSU employee who gave me the full rundown of the program and how amazingly awesome it is. Hit the jump to get the full scoop.

The entire system is an opt-in system. So you have to opt-in for the GPS to be enabled, then the individual GPS features are also opt-in. So nobody has to be tracked, ever.

One of the safety features that was explained in a 15-minute Guardian. So for example if you are drunkenly stumbling back to your dorm room and concerned about getting mugged, simply enable the Guardian feature on your phone. A little blip of you will pop up at the police station and the Guardian will remain on for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes it will remind you to turn the Guardian off. If you don't because you were mugged, beaten, passed out, etc, the police will call the phone and also go to your location to find out what the problem was.

While the safety features are great. The social networking features of the GPS unit are what makes the program really shine my eyes and probably popular with the college kids. Using web-based software you can create special social groups and allow other people to see your location whenever you would like by enabling the GPS tracking. This could be especially convenient trying to meet up on campus for studying, or better yet, meeting up at the bars.

There are a wide variety of Nextel-based phones available and the basic plan costs are included in tuition and fees. So it may feel like it is a free phone, but you will be paying for it in the future. All-in-all this is an extremely handy system that can provide safety and fun for students. Good job, MSU. – Travis Hudson

Montclair State University

Montclair State University will soon be providing their students with more goodies than just textbooks and debt up to their eyeballs. Students enrolled at this New Jersey college will also receive a free cellphone. The premise behind this idea is to provide safety for students by allowing them to always have a way to call for help or even a DD. There is a bit of a catch, though. Each cellphone is equipped with a GPS tracking device so at any given time school administrators can pinpoint the exact location of a student.

Sure the GPS tracking is probably more for safety, but what happens when administrators see that you spent 20 of the past 24 hours at a strip club. What say ye' commenters? Good for safety, or crossing the line of privacy? – Travis Hudson

College giving out GPS cell phones to students [Sci-Fi]

While I have been a Mac fan for years, I have never felt strongly enough to make the Mac a default recommendation. But things have changed. Mac software, both the OS X operating system and the applications such as iPhoto and GarageBand bundled with it, have gotten steadily better, while Windows seems stuck in a rut.

Stuck in a rut, you say? Pshaw! How are the geekses out there ever going to meet girls by ridding their powder-pink stickered Windows laptops of spyware, viruses, and porn pop-ups? Plus, what if some clueless Prof fails them for not using the "right kind of computer?" – John Biggs

Advice to Students: Pack a Mac[Business Week ]via MacMinute]

As the resident Gizmodo intern and college student I will strongly disagree with this study. Sure, my iPod is great and it usually never leaves my pocket, but nothing—and I mean absolutely nothing—could be more "in" than drinking extremely cheap domestic beer in large quantities. – Travis Hudson

Survey: iPods more popular than beer [The Detroit News]