Gizmodo: incandescent

Bulb 2.0: Homage to a (Once) Timeless Design

Mark Wilson — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 13:16:00 EDT

Not that there's anything particularly wrong with the soft serve style of traditional CFLs, but we sort of love the overly cutesy nature of the Bulb 2.0, a compact fluorescent shaped lamp with the faux filament of a traditional incandescent lightbulb. It's both a nod to Edison in an era when his most famous invention is (thankfully) going obsolete, and, maybe more importantly, a way to finally stop our painful, compulsive CFL licking. [Formstark via Notcot]

Purdue University Breakthrough Could Lead to Low-Cost, Mass-Produced LEDs

Jack Loftus — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 16:00:00 EDT

The researchers at Purdue University are just full of bright ideas these days, and this weekend was no exception. Thanks to a major breakthrough, they may have overcome a major obstacle for "solid state lighting," which laymen like to call LED (light emitting diode). That obstacle? Cost. LEDs are expensive, mostly because their innards are created on a substrate of sapphire. That means only a few gadgets and luxury cars headlights have benefited from the tech so far. Purdue researchers solved the conundrum with a technique that creates the LEDs on low-cost, metal-coated silicon wafers. This is great news for energy conservation, because while LEDs are much more efficient than their incandescent brethren, they are also 20 times more expensive to produce. [Purdue University]

'CFL FTW' Illuminates the Tragedy Behind Lightbulb Progress

Mark Wilson — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:00:00 EDT

Poor incandescent bulbs. They had about 100+ years of dominance, but now it's the era of energy-efficient compact fluorescent. And this triumph of the CFL has been archived for future historians in the most permanent record known to our culture: a T-shirt. If you'd like to see this clever garment actually be produced, make sure to vote over at Threadless. [Threadless via superpunch]