[PlaySmart.jp via Trends in Japan]

It makes sense for the shift, what with Taser not exactly getting great press for its shocking weapons and IEDs being a pretty big problem for troops in Iraq. And by aiming at the base of the windshield of a car, it can short it out without frying it, stalling it but not rendering it undrivable, which would be a big plus for stopping vehicles at checkpoints without completely destroying them. And they should be ready in 5-6 years, which is a pretty quick turnaround for new weapons. Between these and lasers, we're going to be fighting comic book wars in no time flat. [Danger Room]

Q. What’s all this about driving them off cliffs and floating them in floods and tsunami’s? Are they really super cars?
A. The nature of the polymer construction, on those that use it, offers secondary advantages which are not part of the intended use but which could possibly provide additional safety in such circumstances.

It all sounds too good to be true until you realize that, best case scenario, you have to pick up your date in a freakin' balloon car. (Still, totally cool if you were one of those X-Games types and paint it Mt. Dew green, I bet.) [XP Vehicles via Ubergizmo]

The system takes feedstock (a combination of sugar and yeast) or discarded alcohol, and combines it with water to distill 100% pure ethanol. Turning sugar into gas may sound like the work of mad scientists, but according to CEO Tom Quinn, home ethanol production was advocated and used by Henry Ford when he created the Model T. I imagine that home-made ethanol wasn't as easy to make back then, because if it was, we probably wouldn't have switched to gasoline in the first place.

The MicroFueler produces ethanol using membrane distillation. Sugar, yeast and water are blended together to create the chemical reaction that produces ethanol. After two days, the fermented sugar water is turned into vapor, and the ethanol is separated from the water. By the end of the week, the MicroFueler reservoir will hold 35 gallons of pure ethanol, enough to fill at least two cars. This is a lot like Dean Kamen's water purifier, except in reverse. In fact, creator Floyd Butterfield says the water by-product is clean enough to drink.

The most astounding part is that a car doesn't require pure ethanol to run, due to its higher-than-gasoline octane content. E-Fuel says you can fill up your tank with 75% ethanol and 25% water and your car will run fine.

The price tag may seem steep, but federal, state and local tax credits can bring the price as low as $5000—average cost with credits is more like $7000. The creators say an average home will save around $4200 on gas each year, and the machine will pay for itself in about a year and a half.

That said, people have been doing this on their own for a while. Plans available online estimate a true DIY machine costs about $500 to build, but for those who don't want to run the risk of spontaneous combustion (like me), the MicroFueler seems like a wise alternative. [E-Fuel]

So how many trees would it take to match the oil output of, say, Saudi Arabia? Check our stats after the jump.

Saudi Arabia Oil Output Daily
11 Million Barrels

Output of One Acre of Copaifera langsdorfii Yearly
25 Barrels

Number of Acres Needed To Match Saudi Arabia Yearly Output
182,500,000 (Total Trees: 18,250,000,000)

Number of Acres in North America Alone
6,050,697,738

Number of Acres in North America Used For Corn (2007)
90.5 million

Amount of American Corn Spent on Ethanol
15% and growing

Frequency Corn Needs Replanting
Every Season

Frequency Copaifera langsdorfii Needs Replanting
Every 90 Seasons

UPDATE: Gallons of Oil In One Gallon of Diesel
7 (thanks lailoken!)

Some interesting metrics to think about. On a worldwide scale, it doesn't seem all that impossible to alleviate oil shortages with plants...and the natural carbon offsets seem worthwhile. It's just too bad these trees take 15-20 years to mature (by which time we plan on flying around in a hydrogen Jetsonmobile).

Is anyone out there a specialist on the topic who could enlighten us in the comments? [abc via treehugger]

Additional Sources: [world factbook] [nass] [yahoo] [popular mechanics]

Having the connectivity of both GPRS and Wi-Fi makes it instantly more useful than many products with static points-of-interest catalogs, no matter how many million are boasted. And the same networking that goes to the net to get data can be used in reverse: sending addresses and search criteria to the device from any computer takes a few seconds and no wires.

But it's not a clean victory for Dash—for all of the steps forward, the upstart misses some elements essential to any portable navigation device. Meanwhile, Garmin, Magellan and TomTom are racing with their own connected and crowd-sourced strategies. This is the opening salvo of what will eventually be a tough, possibly deadly battle. So far, however, Dash is in great shape.
What Dash Got
There are four compelling aspects to the Dash Express which are not found, as such, in other portable navigators on the market.

• Live real-time traffic - It's the biggest and most powerful of the four keys, mainly because of how badly GPS traffic reporting has sucked in the past. Dash builds a teamwork system not unlike the original Napster—you got data I want, I got data you want, and that central server will make sure the sharing happens in a fast and orderly manner. As you drive, you not only help others out, but you add useful data to the historical record, so that the plan for your own commute or Friday getaway could grow smarter. As we've said before, once each metro area is seeded with a few hundred Dash units, the traffic reporting becomes exponentially better. The funny thing is, what we've already seen, with just a handful of units on the road, was already better than anything to date thanks to the historical data which runs in 15 minute increments, and therefore knows the difference between weekends and rush hour. If you're wondering who is working on the traffic modeling, it's a couple of eggheaded PhDs in Traffic.

• Live search - Most navis have search features, but they only query a POI database of an average of 5 million or so. Dash only has 1 Million built-in points of interest, but its better 99% of the time. That's because it uses its GPRS cellular connection to ping Yahoo Local search for stuff, delivering better information in the exact same amount of time. You can save search terms you like as favorites, alongside addresses and, yes, standard POI categories. Oh, Yahoo local searches are returned by relevance, not sorted by proximity, but most things can be resorted and gas can even be resorted by price.

• MyDash web interface including Send2Car, GeoRSS and other features - With a quick browser plug-in, you can highlight any address and right-click, selecting the option "Send To Car." You can even highlight name and address, but for now you need to leave off the phone number. Within a second or two, the address pops up on the Dash, which could be at your side, or miles away. Blam found that entering addresses on the web interface was actually more effective than typing them on the Express, since the server can do a better job of fuzzy-matching the data you type. There are plug-ins to allow you to send any text to the Dash unit by right clicking text and selecting "Send to Car."

In MyDash, you can browse "saved searches" for dynamically updating data—a POI-like request ("CVS" or "Sushi") gives you a Yahoo Local search criteria that you can send to the Express. But you can also copy GeoRSS and KML feed URLs from around the net at sites like Yelp.com and Chowhound, containing more exotic and time-dependent stuff—"Nationwide Airport Delays" and "California Surf Report." For the most part, everything we tried worked, save a Craigslist RSS of Seattle real estate. (But GeoRSS feeds are kind of tricky to find in the wild.)

• Over-the-air updates - The Express uses any open Wi-Fi network it can to pull chunks of update down as you drive around. You can teach it your SSIDs and passwords for best Wi-Fi, but it's not necessary. Dash will deliver a few different kinds of update that we'll cover below; the important thing is to think about the last time you updated your Garmin or TomTom. Your answer is most likely "never." If you have, you probably paid a lot to do it. Dash of courses charges $10 to $13 per month subscription, but promises a constantly evolving platform in return.
-Traffic data will be updated monthly, using historical data from Dash drivers. That means that the first one will be a good 'un, as the first crop of users starts putting on the mileage.
-Big map updates will come every six months or so, about the same time Tele Atlas will release to other vendors.
-The first major software updates with bug fixes and new features (see below) will come this summer, and then every three months or so.
-MyDash servers can be updated on a weekly basis, so new web features could be appearing all the time—not that they will.

Here's a video that explains it all very well, even if it does paint it rosier than we found in real life. (That's the part we get into next.)

The Test
For our testing, Brian drove from SF to Tahoe and back with hours of city driving; I did a roundtrip from New York up to Boston. When you enter a destination, Dash looks at mileage, road speed and known traffic in planning the trip, devising up to three possible routes. In my case, it never did more than two suggested routes, and usually the first was obviously the best, but it was reassuring that it had backups in mind.

Traffic currently works with a combination of historic data and real-time data. A solid red, orange, yellow or green line means that either a Dash driver is currently on that road, or the historic data has proven so accurate it's as good as realtime fact. Broken lines, commonly seen in this pre-launch period, show shakier historic data, or data from supplier Inrix that Dash hasn't verified independently. Inrix doesn't provde data for local roads, though, only highways. Any data on local roads comes from Dash alone.

Blam says:

Getting across town during rush hour is challenging even for locals. Using Dash and trusting its copious historical information about what side streets would be empty and which would be crowded, I managed to get across town to pick up a friend and back to my place to meet another darting through side streets I'd never even known of despite living in SF almost eight years. I can't stress how useful it is to have all this data, typically the kind you see on Google Maps on highways only, in my car. Even though Dash didn't reroute me automatically (It only opts to reroute you on drastic changes in arrival time), it was easy enough to follow the green lines and avoid the reds. Over time, even more local roads will be filled in with colored squigglies.

Dash uses traffic data to calculate the original route, so it doesn't automatically re-route you just because you hit a patch of congestion. Instead, it waits until your trip has been slowed by unplanned traffic. Any trip that lasts one hour or less gets delayed five unexpected minutes, and the Express offers to re-check the routes to see if there's a better way.

At one point just outside of Boston, when I had to drive through the same congested intersection several times, it was fun to see how the intersection's condition changed from moment to moment. (Sadly, I think I was the source of the data, which meant that I was unable to benefit from it. A crowdsource of one ain't much of a crowd... or source.)

Again, what's cool is that traffic data in the boonies will soon be available as historical or live meshed data as people drive through it. The Dash servers are constantly recording (without identifying) patterns.

To get a better idea of what real-time traffic looks like, check out this video of changes to New York City's traffic yesterday from about 3pm to just after 6pm. Pick a road and note how things get stickier as rush hour approaches.
Blam and I both suffered some routing issues, however. Mine was a traditional problem—a bad bit of map data (Tele Atlas) telling me to turn left when I couldn't, and haven't been able to do for years.

This is an unexpected usage model of the Dash. Sitting with it indoors, on Wi-Fi, as it updates the traffic model. When the traffic dies down, you can road trip. But Blam's situation was a bit stickier...

I'd been eyeing my Dash GPS on my desk all day, using it to tell when the drive from SF to Tahoe to drop below the 3.5 hour mark. At 11pm, on a Thursday before Easter, it was time to go. I loaded up the car, drove 20 minutes to the Bay Bridge, and jammed into some 0 MPH road flow. The Dash had reported yellow and red, earlier, but I didn't believe it so late at night (my fault). Right then, the other GPS I was using for a benchmark, a Garmin Nuvi, suddenly lit up with traffic data that the bridge was closed and rerouted me. Dash, for all its IP connectivity, had no clue, and continued to have no clue as the police redirected me to an exit. I later found out that road closure data wouldn't be on Dash until a later software update. And without that data, the Dash merely assumed I was exiting the highway of my own accord. The rest of the Dash users behind me would have no idea of the closing, either.

Competing With Other PNDs
Overall, as a portable navigation device, it was fairly responsive. I'd put its user interface somewhere between a Garmin (on the high side) and a TomTom (slightly lower down)—not counting the extra dimension of a web interface, of course. But while driving around, the Dash would occasionally turn bush-league, pulling amateur mistakes like being slow to recalculate after a missed turn.

Some of our other troubles pointed out other standard PND features that the Express is still missing:
• Scheduled road closures generally make it into any device with some kind of connectivity, be it FM or MSN Direct.
• Other navigators can string together several destinations as waypoints, where the Express has only a one-track mind.
• When heading into a turn, other navigators tend to zoom in to show key details—some newer TomToms and Navigons even specifically point out the lane issues. The Express has none of that.
• When the GPRS connectivity dies, Dash says the Express has just 1 million catalogued points-of-interest (others have 4-12m, and man, did we feel the lack of POI when the connection went down). The rest, of course, come from connectivity. But if you're out in the middle of nowhere with no service, you get the most essential stuff (gas, hotel, hospital, airport) but you don't get as many listings for luxury or tourist spots (Blam's favorite ski resort) as other PNDs.
• When redrawing maps and calculating routes, all that traffic data causes big lagtimes in zooming and setting course. This also caused delays in rerouting after missing a turn.
• Many GPS devices like Garmin's Nuvi line have language and currency translators for travellers, MP3 playback (lame), Bluetooth dialing and speakerphone, FM transmitters.
• This thing is big. And the mount looks like a crane arm. It is giant.
• UI not as clear as a Garmin's.
• The volume goes to 11, and yes, it is as loud as 11/10 should be, although sometimes overdriven a bit (crackly).
• The voice sounds like speak and spell had a daughter with Borat. I mean, a GPS shouldn't pronounce avenue, "oovenue."

Promises and Teases
Dash may be taking our laundry list of basic stuff to heart, but it's also hinting at plenty more crazy, unheard-of features in the updates to come:

• Automated correction of maps based on car flow that either wasn't there before, or has suddenly stopped - "We don't do any of that now, but that's something we think about a lot."

• Learning routes from drivers - People who know great shortcuts can eventually be traced (anonymously), and their routes can be incorporated into the Dash's own routing algorithms. "That's super important for the future."

• Real-time traffic data appearing on MyDash website, and not just on the Dash Express screen - "We're big believers in that, not just on the device but when they're sitting at their desk."

• Third-party services - There's an API for outside developers, and there was talk of some of these hitting at launch, but soon users will be able to pick through new apps and send them to their Express. "We are working with companies. We can't tell you who but our goal in this area is to make this as easy as humanly possible." Zillow, that real estate program that can detail the price of almost any house, was demoed in the past, but will not ship on the device. Driving up to a house and pricing it is amazing:

The Dash isn't perfect today, but it is great, and will be incredibly powerful in the future. Even with fewer than 20 production units in the SF bay area during testing, the traffic's historical and even Dash user updates were extremely useful. Traffic performance today is potent thanks to the historical data and its 15 minute granularity, and will undoubtedly get better by the day as more users sign on (live data is actually minute to minute.) The connectivity with Yahoo! works to give you unlimited POIs as long as your GPRS connection is there. And although the community of shared custom searches will thicken out later, programming your own is not going to be easy for your mom, ever. Ultimately, there's a certain lack of polish compared to the big Garmin and TomTom devices, in terms of UI and odd features. But the new lower price helps take away some of the pain, even when considering the subscription price of $10-$13 a month.

After a combined 1000+ miles of driving with Dash in a week, Blam and I agree. Geek to geek, we'd say go ahead and buy with confidence based on the IP features and powerful traffic features alone. And know that this thing will only get better in the future.

(Congrats, Dash, on building a great first product. But don't forget to keep improving this thing for your early adopters.)

The jet exhaust is at wide angles for the helicopter application it was in. They wanted the exhaust to go away from the tail boom and have just enough velocity to keep the hot exhaust from being recirculated into the intake. The exhaust provides no thrust, it's all shaft driven but I do spray fuel into the exhaust to make some smoke and fire. It's funny how people think a jet engine isn't working properly if fire isn't spewing out the back, unless it's the engine on the passenger jet they're sitting in.

According to Chris, it can do the 1/4 mile in 11.17 seconds, and it topped at 113mph because he hasn't adjusted the rear axle ratio yet. "I have about $17,000 in the whole thing," Chris told us, "I got the turbine from a friend who deals in Government surplus. This all came about after being on the TV show 'Junkyard Wars' where i built a jet powered tricycle with a jet engine made from an old truck turbocharger." [RunRyder via Hacked Gadgets]

The car has 2,700 blue, black, and white diamonds covering its 18-karat white gold frame. The blue diamonds are used to mimic the Hot Wheels Spectraframe blue paint, while black and white diamonds cover the underbelly and for the engine. For the brake lights, they used rubies.

Hot Wheels® Kicks off 40th Anniversary with Unveil of Diamond-Encrusted Car at New York Toy Fair

Year-Long Celebration Activities Include Designer's Challenge™ Die-Cast Car Line, Cross Country Road Trip and Auction of One-of-a-Kind Jeweled Car

American International Toy Fair 2008
EL SEGUNDO, Calif.—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Hot Wheels® today announced its year-long plans to celebrate the brand's 40-year heritage at the 105th American International Toy Fair®. Anniversary activities were kicked off with the unveiling of a custom jeweled 1:64-scale Hot Wheels® car, designed by celebrity jeweler Jason of Beverly Hills. This one-of-a-kind car, the most expensive in Hot Wheels® history, was made to commemorate the production of the 4 billionth Hot Wheels® vehicle.

The diamonds on the custom-made jeweled car, valued at $140,000, total more than 2,700 and weigh nearly 23 carats in total weight. The car is cast in 18-karat white gold with the majority of the vehicle detailed with micro pave-set brilliant blue diamonds, mimicking the Hot Wheels® Spectraflame® blue paint. Under the functional hood, the engine showcases additional micro pave-set white and black diamonds. The Hot Wheels® flame logo found on the underbelly of the car is lined with white and black diamonds. Red rubies are set as the tail lights, while black diamonds and red enamel create the "red line" tires. The custom-made case that houses the jewel-encrusted vehicle also holds 40 individual white diamonds, signifying each year in the legacy of Hot Wheels®.

"Collaborating with Mattel on the jeweled Hot Wheels car was a dream project for me," said Jason Arasheben, president & CEO of Jason of Beverly Hills. "The car is truly spectacular and will be a brilliant addition to anyone's collection."

The vehicle was unveiled by multi-platinum recording artist and car enthusiast, Nick Lachey, who grew up playing with the die-cast car line. In late 2008, this unique Hot Wheels® vehicle will be auctioned off to benefit Lachey's charity of choice, Big Brothers Big Sisters.

"Since its introduction, Hot Wheels has revolutionized boys' toys and inspired automotive trends," said Tim Kilpin, general manager and senior vice president, Boys and Entertainment, Mattel Brands. "The historic activities we have planned are a fitting tribute to the brand's heritage and will allow us, and our fans, to celebrate this milestone year in true Hot Wheels style."

[Daily Stab]

SCARAB Aviation Lab spokesman Gregory Omelchenko told us that the Sirius and the Iris are "still in the design phase," but they are planes that "will be manufactured in the future." The company says they work with the Federal Space Agency, the Moscow Aviation Institute and Sukhoi, the third largest manufacturer of fighter airplanes in the world, including the mighty SU-3X series. Hopefully, that means that they will be able to make them into a commercial reality instead of just being some dream designs out of a Star Wars movie.

The two-seat Evolution DT model, however, is just "a few weeks from being completed and readied for commercial production," so if you are looking for a low-cost pod to fly with a co-pilot, get $11,500 ready. Like the one-seat Evolution ST, these are also hand-made with and get shipped "60 days after payment," according to Gregory. [Scarab via Sense4Fun]

[Reuters]

First off, the runners-up:

#1. 2007 International CXT, tricked out by Treo Engineering. This bad boy sports 11 LCDs (four 23-inchers), including two in the wheel wells. Nothing says class like an LCD in the wheel well of your pickup.

#2. Audi A4, pimping courtesy of Oxygen Audio. True, this car sports a lady on the side (a rarity here), but the popping screen/trunk combo's a bit too phallic for our tastes.

#3. Scion, modifications by Bear Mountain Audio. With 15 LCDs this car could win on sheer volume, but the it's the angles of the in-door screens that give this one the extra push.

#4. Mini Cooper, facelift from Quantum Audio and Hypnotic. Just when we thought you put an LCD screen in your car so you can watch it, it turns out you were doing the people driving next to you a favor.

And now, the finalists...

Chrysler 300, sexified by Exonic. Between the 10 LCDs, including one in the hood, something just caught our eye.

Honda Civic, alterations done by RCA Mobile. RCA, even I know your name. I can't believe you'd present yourself like this, in public no less. Two LCD screens in the dash, two more that hit each other when you close the door, and one on either bumper may make this ride the Abomination of the Ball.

So there you have it. Hey, meatheads: just because LCDs can fit in every inch of your ride doesn't mean you have to put them there. Leave them to geeks like us.

*Big shout out to Wilson Rothman for his awesome photography!*

In case you're wondering, this is a 2005 Infiniti Q35 G35 (happy now?) tricked out by Visonik and Clif Designs: [Clif Designs; Visonik]

Noticeable Differences Between Volt Hydrogen and Volt:

1. Volt Hydrogen features two hydrogen tanks near the rear of the vehicle.
2. Hydrogen still features a battery stack (we were told for electric-only option), but it's about 20% smaller than what you see in the Volt classic. (Specs say that it can go 40 miles on electric alone.)

Noticeable Similarities Between Volt Hydrogen and Volt:

1. That chassis looked identical—it's truly the Volt in hydrogen form.
2. It's called a Volt.

When can we expect to see it on the market? There's no official timeline out there, as GM is waiting for the hydrogen refueling infrastructure problems to be solved before launching a hydrogen car. In addition, GM isn't finalizing the design until they see how the Volt performs for the masses.

And as for that infrastructure problem, "we're working on a solution," a GM spokesperson said.

Although we still doubt such a crash would be survivable, this demo certainly changes our opinion of the safety of the diminutive Smartcar. We saw these cars all over the place on a recent trip to Montréal, and thought they looked way-cool, gadgety and almost toy-like. You might be seeing such cars around the United States sometime next year, and you can reserve a 2008 Smart fortwo now for $99. [SmartUSA, via New Launches]

• Autonomous battery charging - Honda developed a Borg-like charging bay for ASIMO. When the robot's battery level drops to a certain point, it seeks out the closest bay.
Future Shock: Seeking a power source is the first step towards domination, Coppertop.

• Avoiding oncoming people - ASIMO sees an oncoming person through its eye camera, judges its inertia, guesses its speed and path, then either changes course to steer clear, or simply takes a step back.
Future Shock: If they're taught subservience, they start questioning their predestined role. Also, doesn't this sound a lot like targeting?

• Working together - This involves constant sharing of relevant data between networked ASIMOs, and a survey of which robot is closest to the most pressing task, and what his battery life status is. Among them, they "decide" which one is best suited to go in and do the job.
Future Shock: If I have to explain to you why robots working together could be a bad thing, well, you're probably already dead. [Honda]

It's not actually a car. OK OK, we know, We're horrible. But it could be! Technically just a shell on casters, this strong composite body complete with laser-cut windows is ready to run after some fabrication onto a stretched Fiero chassis.

OK, another catch, only one proper running Fiero exists and it'll cost you $65,000, but we're pretty sure you could fit another car underneath if you put your mind to it. [ebay via autoblog]

The rear passenger seats both have access to N800 Internet browsers, which have been mounted into the back of each of the front seats and another N800 is added to the central console. All the N800s have the ability to stream audio to the car's stereo system, which could be cause for concern if you are traveling with your insane techno loving brethren (Mark). Of course, Internet connectivity is also provided via an on board N95, which gives access to the cloud for Gizmodo surfing happy times.

We said it before; Nokia are awesome, but they really should give someone else a go at design instead of that potato they pray to for styling cues—guys c'mon, potatoes may make an excellent source of carbohydrates, but that doesn't mean you should let them design your products. Jeez, who doesn't know that? Hit the link to see BGR's full gallery. [Boy Genius Report]

Forgive the lack of cheerleading, but we've witnessed similarly paradigm-breaking promises of so-good-it's-like-magic energy generation fall short literally moments before they were supposed to change the world. The situations aren't so dissimilar—small company claims to miraculously surpass all past and current efforts (by "400-fold," based on the numbers they're giving, according to one scientist) but offers no hard details to back it up. This is partially understandable—trade secrets and whatnot—but where's the beef?

True, EEStor has serious backing and asserts real results on the ground by year's end in the form of one of ZENN Motor's cars. But until we hop a ride and peek under the hood, we won't be letting going of our AAs or Li-ions just yet. Engineers in the audience, what's your take? Are we in for a ride or being taken for one? [AP, Ars]

Update: Apparently this is a Toyota UK thing. Sorry for the confusion!

This way, you can plan directions before you head out (instead of spending 10 minutes punching it in while your car's running in a garage like some kind of failed suicide attempt). Plus, once you do have directions programmed into Google and Yahoo maps, you can just press the "i" button and it'll auto-fetch them. The best feature is probably having other people send you maps and directions while driving.

These are available in the S-class and CL-class starting September 5, and in all 2008 C-class cars. [News.com]

This will probably be another exercise in incorporation, where iPod functionality is integrated into the car as it was on BMW 7 series. We're hoping it's considerably more substantial than the iPod integration into the Honda Civic Hybrid, which we've tested here and had a hard time getting enthusiastic about.

But if rumors from last month are true, we might see additional niceties on board, such as Wi-Fi and maybe even a Mac mini, totally driving drivers to distraction. Just don't check your email at 80mph, please. [Capital, via MacRumors]

Although Honda calls this version "all-new," he looks similar to the ASIMO we saw at CES last January. We saw that version running across the stage at what the host said was 4 kilometers per hour, but it wasn't doing a whole lot of interacting. If this ASIMO can actually run 4mph, that represents the next step in robot sprinting. If the little guy's capable of even more interaction, well, we want to talk with his agent—perhaps he would be interested in writing for Gizmodo. Wait, wait, just kidding. [Honda]

That's not all. To start up the bike, all you have to do is put your finger on the fingerprint reader, then punch the virtual ignition button. Oh, and there's an on-screen kickstand control too. If you thought Ghost Rider's hog was nice, well, you're right. But this is even better, despite its lack of flaming tires. [Intel via Mystic Gadgets]