I was at a fraternity house hanging out one night. One of my friends had his iPhone plugged into the speakers so we could have music. We had the usual speaker system, a receiver and some speakers. I was standing near the receiver when All the sudden the iphone cut off and started to smoke. The room filled up with what must have been hazardous smoke. After picking up the iPhone that was still extremely hot, the entire battery had been ejected from the phone and was sitting on the floor. The house smelled like burning electronics for the rest of the night and the iPhone left a square-ish burn mark on the table it was sitting on.

Fortunately, it sounds like the cloud of acrid, poisonous fumes proved to be only a minor inconvenience for the partygoers. Who knows? It might have even enhanced some of their experiences. [Thanks Bobby!]

Of course, none of you people had as much fun as I did at my Windows 7 party. But these still look pretty fun.

Take some pictures of the celebrations and send em to us at contests@gizmodo.com with Windows 7 Party Pics in the subject. We'll then post a gallery of all of the fun (?) photos. Come on, let's see it!

The gang and I had pulled two all-nighters setting up. The later it got, the less patient we were with each other. There was plenty of shouting. The pancake machine and coke machine fought each other for amperage. Minutes were melting away as fast as our resolve was in the hot, improperly ventilated room.

Then the party started. Upcycle was 99% done with setup, but some pieces were all not together yet. We were missing some signs on devices, so they appeared mysteriously, without context and without description of how precious some of them were. It was kind of cool, since I'd took the most valuable off platform, since our security ropes were not yet installed. At that point, Nick Denton, owner of Gizmodo, told some guests to feel free to touch some. I groaned a little groan, but thought nothing left on display wasn't attached or replaceable.

Then we dropped a scoop: An internal leaked video from Microsoft, detailing how their unseen and unreleased tablet will work. As the video played on the 103-Inch Panasonic, the post hit the site. I introduced the crowd to Chris Mascari, Director and unsung hero of gallery, introduced Arc Attack. As their song of lighting and geek tunes played, I recalled an earlier incident that could have knocked the power out on the block. Their 240 volt came from a freshly run line, directly to the power box off the street, hacked together by reader Phil. The issue with running it straight from there, however, is if the transformer box shorts, the block could go black. Good thing, then, the Arkeg game/beer machine was using a garbage can full of ice water to cool its drinks right next to the live, black cables as thick as a baby's wrist. We mopped up, drink in hand, and with no hands left to use to cross our fingers.

By now, so many people had shown up, and having a private list and door man wasn't a bad idea; the hum of the tesla coils generated more than electricity: they generated interest from strangers off the street. Even without the added traffic, my friends were here. Sonia Zjawinski, Nick Bilton, Jenna Wortham, Sam Grobart and David Carr of the NYTimes made it. Arik Hesseldahl From Biz Week. Brooke Hammerling from Brew PR. Mary Pilon from the WSJ. Nick Douglas formerly of VW fame. Bre from Make. Dennis Crowley from Foursquare. Richard Rushfield from Gawker, formerly the LA Times. Richard Blakeley, king of TV B Gone and things that make you look fat. Lockhart Steele, my original managing editor at Gawker Media and real estate and culinary media mogul. Noah Robischon, from Fast Company and my second managing editor at Gawker. Sons of Ventura, CA, Brendan Gahan (from Mekanism) and his friend Ian Campbell, son of surfboard making legends at the Campbell Brothers. Elizabeth Spiers! John Mahoney from Giz/PopSci and Seth Porges from Pop Mech. John Biggs from TechCrunch/Crunchgear. Sarah from College Humor (Adam Frucci's sweetheart)! For starters!

A man from a company asked to put up a poster next to the gadget he lent to the Gallery for display. I said no, because you don't hang ads up next to art in museums and this was a museum in my mind (however small). He was a little miffed, maybe, but I think he got it by the end of our talk. By being selective here, and only showing the best, everything about the Gallery becomes more powerful.

The heat was building, and it became apparent that the gadgets and the people were clearly winning the war against conditioned air. The coke machine was spitting out one drink every 5 seconds, each bottle an oasis of sugar and carbonated coldness. (David Carr of the Times wrote a terrific blog post about the night, wishing the AC would have been as functional as the rest of the gadgets.)

Arc Attack played its encore, and I was seeing it from the streets, on the outside. Our photographer, Nicky Digital, was ushered in by my boss, Nick Denton, for a closer look. That didn't go over so well. Joe from Arc Attack, who is master of the coils, shut them down and in a stern voice, lectured Nicky for almost killing himself by walking too close to the coils. "No one comes inside while the tesla coils are on!"

As the last people streamed out the door, I though of how much Gizmodo Gallery is a charity. Not only for the groups we are raising funds for. But for all the help we received in making Gallery happen. Readers Mike and Martin were astoundingly capable with running cable and setting up hardware. And Chris Mascari, Director of the Gallery, went beyond what he needed to to make things happen, bringing in his family, Alyssa and Danny and friends to build furniture, wire LEDs in displays and bring us pizza when we were hungry. And Panasonic, Pioneer, HP, Toyota, Coke, O2, Lego and all the other companies that went out of their way to help us make this happen. It's all very humbling. But I'm just glad I didn't get electrocuted.





Gizmodo Gallery 2009
Groupe
267 Elizabeth Street
New York, NY 10012

Gallery Dates:
September 23rd-27th

Times:

9/22 Tuesday
Media Day by appointment only. For info please contact gallery@gizmodo.com.

9/23 Wednesday
12-8

9/24 Thursday
12-8

9/25 Friday
12-8

9/26 Saturday
11-8
9-? - Live Musical Performance

9/27 Sunday
11-6

Read more about our Giz Gallery 09 here, follow @gizgallery on Twitter and see what else we'll be playing with at the event. And special thanks to Toyota's Prius — without their sponsorship, there would be no Gizmodo Gallery.

Games2U puts PS3s, Wii and Xbox 360 games inside of a van and delivers it, letting 20 people play no matter where you are. We can imagine it being useful for kids' birthday parties, tailgating parties or funerals; especially since the company also offers laser tag and giant hamster balls.

And if you think this is a good and viable business opportunity, they even offer franchise options to set one up where you live. [G2u via Kotaku]

Panasonic claims that they did this for safety reasons, and from the horror stories of batteries exploding in phones that have really cheap third-party batteries, we're apt to believe them. But you have to ask yourself, do you want to save $30 or do you want shards of plastic in your eye? The choice is yours. (And if you choose $30, don't update your firmware.) [Panasonic via Slashdot]

Zune is throwing an epic party for our Snowmodo event on Saturday April 4th at Northstar. They've lined up Grammy nominated Morgan Page to play some music and there will also be food and drinks available for all of our attendees. Zune has also made custom Snowmodo Zunes just for our event , which we'll be giving out as prizes in our raffle!

Zune Party Details
Where: TC's Pub in Northstar's Village. The pub is located right next our event room. For location details please refer to Northstar's site. [LINK]
When: Party starts at 3 pm with Morgan Page starting his set around 3:30 pm.
How To Get In: Only Snowmodo attendees who have Snowmodo wristbands will be allowed in. That means you'll have to stop by our event room at-least once during the day to pay the $5 admission fee and receive a wristband and raffle tickets.

On a music related note, Giz's own musicphile Adrian Covert has compiled an Official Snowmodo Soundtrack filled with three different playlists of riding music. Most of these songs will be pre-loaded on the demo Zunes available at our event. So if you don't want to load up our playlists on your own player, stop by the Zune table at Snowmodo, grab a demo Zune and go hit the mountain. I personally suggest Pheonix - 1901, need I say more...

Night Runs - Uptempo - Hip Hop

• Black Star - Respiration [amazon] [zune]
• Camp Lo - Luchini (This Is It) [amazon] [zune]
• Clipse - Keys Open Doors [amazon] [zune]
• Busy Signal - These Are The Days [amazon] [zune]
• Benga and Coki - Night [amazon] [zune]
• The Bug - Poison Dart [amazon] [zune]
• Souls of Mischief - 93 til Infinity [amazon] [zune]
• Wu-Tang Clan - C.R.E.A.M. [amazon] [zune]
• Outkast - B.O.B. [amazon] [zune]
• The Knux - F!re [amazon] [zune]
• J Dilla - Two Can Win [amazon] [zune]
• The Cool Kids - One Two [amazon] [zune
• The Streets - Blinded By The Lights [amazon] [zune]
• Madvillain - America's Most Blunted [amazon] [zune]
• Cypress Hill - I ain't goin out like that [amazon] [zune]
• JayLib - Raw Shit [amazon] [zune] [zune]
• Pharoahe Monch - Simon Says [amazon] [zune
• El-P - Delorean [amazon] [zune
• Company Flow - Lune TNS [amazon] [zune
• Beastie Boys - Sabotage [amazon] [zune] [zune]
• Cannibal Ox - Iron Galaxy [amazon] {zune]
• Zion I - Critical [amazon] [zune]
• Dilated Peoples - Worst Comes to Worst [amazon] [zune]
• Talib Kweli - The Blast [amazon] [zune
• Ghostface Killah - Run [amazon] [zune

Short Runs - Agressive - Rock

Cursive - Red Handed Slight of Hand [amazon] [zune]
• K-Os - Born to Run [amazon] []
• RJD2 - The Horror [amazon] [zune]
• M83 - America [amazon] [zune]
• Bloc Party - Banquet [amazon] [zune
• Birdy Nam Nam - Trans Boulogne Express [amazon] [zune]
• Phoenix - 1901 [amazon] [zune]
• Peter, Bjorn and John - Lay It Down [amazon] [zune]
• Wavves - Beach Demon [amazon] [zune]
• The Walkmen - The Rat [amazon] []
• Digitalism - Pogo [amazon] [zune]
• Studio - Self Service [amazon] []
• The Faint - In Concert [amazon] []
• Black Flag - Rise Above [amazon] [zune]
• Bad Brains - Sacred Love [amazon] [zune]
• Sex Pistols - Holidays in the Sun [amazon] [zune
• DFA 1979 - 1979 [zune]
• Red Hot Chili Peppers - Give it Away/Under The Bridge [amazon1 amazon 2] [zune]
• Nirvana - In Bloom [amazon] [zune]
• TV on the Radio - Wolf Like Me [amazon] [zune

Longer Runs - Mellow - Electronic

• Skream - Summer Dreams [amazon] [zune
• Daft Punk - Voyager [amazon] [zune]
• Burial - Raver [amazon] [zune]
• CFCF - Arctic [amazon] [zune]
• Kanye West - Coldest Winter [amazon] [zune]
• Junior Boys - Double Shadow [amazon] [zune]
• Dan Deacon - Of the Mountains [amazon] [zune]
• LCD Soundsystem - Someone Great [amazon] [zune]
• Cut Copy - Out There on the Ice [amazon] [zune]
• M83 - Run into Flowers [amazon] [zune]
• Royksopp - Eple [amazon] [zune
• Animal Collective - My Girls [amazon] [zune]
• The Zombies - Beechwood Park [amazon] [zune
• Boards of Canada - Roygbiv [amazon] [zune
• Ellen Allien and Apparat - Way Out [amazon] [zune
• Black Moth Super Rainbow - Don't You Wanna Be in a Cult? [amazon] [zune]
• Zomby - U Are My Fantasy (Street Fighter II Theme Remix) [amazon] [zune]
• Booka Shade - Night Moves [amazon] [zune
• The Avalanches - Since I Met You [amazon]

For complete Snowmodo event details please head over to our Snowmodo Event Information post.

The trial has been going well for everybody's favorite Swedish internet pirates, with the prosecution showing signs of a lack of familiarity with the techie aspects of the case, and the dismissal of the term IRL. So to mark this triumph, the Pirates threw a big ol' party with free champagne for everybody!

Several local DJs presided over the festivities, with sneaky references to the trial's events thrown in. Streams of the IRC channel where torrents are uploaded were projected on the walls, and the Pirates bragged that local police had voiced support for their cause. They even received awards from political youth groups.

Even though the Pirates themselves were never in much legal danger, it's nice to see their spirits are still up. You can see more pictures from the party here. The trial starts up again on Tuesday, and we'll report any exciting updates. [Torrent Freak]

The Rockterscale measures how hard a party is rocking via four different signals. One, if someone wearing the Hat of Rock and is thrashing their head around to music/a seizure, the party is deemed rocking. If people are dancing on the floor mat, that is also seen as a sign of rockage. Third, a crash barrier that senses if people are being pushed into it, a sign of a rocking party with a rocking amount of violence. And lastly, there's a webcam on the ceiling monitoring the total amount of movement of a crowd.

Alternately, the system can let you know when there's a riot going on, as it's basically the same signals. [SlipperyBrick via New Launches]

Hopefully we can all meet up again in the future. And a special thanks to the Hotel Sax for throwing such a successful event.

Photos by Stephanie Kapaldo and Adam McCrimmon.

Hopefully I'll have a chance to meet you all there. (This is what I look like. OK, this is what I really look like.) Even if I appear passed out at the bar, feel free to tap me on the shoulder and introduce yourself. See you tonight!

International Dance Party: The LED light says "Dance to Start the Party." When you do, the party box detects your dancing and drops the motorized face to reveal two 600-watt speakers. Throw in a laser light show, disco ball, fog machine, sirens and thumping techno and you have yourself an instant party in a box. [IDP via Link]

Porta Party: The Porta Party project puts a fun spin on the port-a-potty concept by changing the exterior to resemble an iPod and replacing the toilet with an iPod dock and a disco ball. A word of warning though—if things get out of hand, partygoers may become confused in a drunken stupor and use this thing in horrifying ways. Make sure to have a mop handy. [Nick Rodrigues via Link]

Party Button: The Party Button may not be portable, but it is definitely instant. If you have the skills, you could rig one of these up yourself and set the mood with one push of a button. All you need is about $650 in parts and the instructions outlined in the following link. [plasma2002 via Link]

DJ Mobile Car: Inspired by the Popemobile and the song “God is a DJ” by Faithless, Dutch artist Olaf Mooij tricked out his car to become a rolling PA system. Details are scarce, but we do know that it features two turntables and several huge speakers that look more like rockets. It can also be rented for events. [Olaf Mooij via Link]

Toilet Tunes: Reinforcing the "anywhere" part of this feature we have a device with a wireless sensor that attaches to the bottom of your toilet lid. When the seat is raised, the sound machine plays music. Not only can you dance to it, it could also be used to help with a rough one by soothing your bowels into action. It can even be used to mask any unpleasant noises—as the video in the following link illustrates. Available for $30. [Toilet Tunes]

Skeleton Disco Ball: Maybe techno and pop music isn't your thing. If you prefer the upbeat vibe of European death metal you could replace the traditional disco ball with this skeleton version with glowing red LED eyes. Available for $40. [FrightCatalog]

Dance Charge: UK based cellphone provide Orange has developed an armband capable of charging your cellphone with the infinite power of the dance. As you bust a move, the kinetic energy translates into electricity for your phone. [Orange via Link]

Glitter Gun: Pull the trigger and decimate the crowd with a weapon of mass fabulousness. Instead of bullets, this gun fires glitter shots. Available for about $8. [Drinkstuff via Link]

WIndup Robot: Even if you are stuck behind a desk at work, this little robot will pump up the jams. Available for around $11. [I Want That via Link]

Peekaboo Pole Dancing Kit: Saving the best for last, the Peekaboo Pole Dancing Kit is completely portable and sets up in minutes using a three-piece, spring-loaded design. Wherever there is a stripper, there is most definitely a party. I suppose it goes without saying, but the woman in this picture would do quite nicely. Available for $76. [Find Me a Gift]

The case, which hooks up to the back of your SUV, also has a built in CD stereo and Sirius Satellite Radio, a battery charger and a 12-volt power adapter. A locking door ensures that those dickwads at Alpha Gamma Phi won't try to make a grab for your beer while you're gone. Party-A-Cargo offers three different versions of its frat-friendly fun box, ranging in price from $2,895 to $3,795. [Born Rich]

8-11pm

Harlot
46 Minna Street
San Francisco, CA 94105
[Upcoming]