Rosa Golijan

This Power Strip Has an Entire Miniature City On It

As part of a graduate show at the Kyoto University of Art and Design, students built miniature cities out of common household objects—including this power strip. They’re just missing mini-people. [Spoon Tamago via Crib Candy via Boing Boing]

By Your Accelerometers Combined, I Am Quake Catcher!

What if computers could be turned into a worldwide earthquake detecting network? With the Quake Catcher software and your laptop’s built-in accelerometer, that might just be possible. Elizabeth Cochran, an earth scientist at UC Riverside, has already managed to get about 1,000 people to install Quake Catcher and has been tracking the date submitted by…

The Whole Cosmos Seems to Live in This Furry, Glowy Pillow

Maybe the whole cosmos isn’t in this pillow, but the LEDs hidden in a zippered compartment and causing these glowing, swirling patterns sure do give the illusion that it is. At about $37, the Moonlight cushion is pricier than let’s say a pillow with the Android mascot, but I think that it’s worth it—even if…

Cash-and-Stock Bonus for Babysitting Apple While Steve Jobs Was Sick? $22 Million

First Apple COO Tim Cook received $12.3 million in stock for watching the company while Steve Jobs was on sick leave and now he’s receiving an additional cash-and-stock bonus worth $22 million. https://gizmodo.com/covering-for-steve-jobs-earns-apple-coo-tim-cook-12-3m-5436879 It’s explained that this bonus is “in recognition of his outstanding performance in assuming the day-to-day operations of the company for the…

Want a Verizon-Based Nexus One? You’ll Have To Buy It From Google

It doesn’t really come as a huge surprise, but apparently the only way to get your hands on a Verizon-based Nexus One will be to order it straight from Google. On the somewhat odd side though, it seems that the device might run HTC’s Sense UI. Looks like an updated version of the product listing…

It’s Late And You’re Bored? Come Chat In #whitenoise!

You’ve learned all you need to know about commenting and our tagpages, so it’s time to have some fun. Come join the conversations in #whitenoise. https://gizmodo.com/almost-everything-you-could-want-to-know-about-commen-5465437 If you’re lost about where to start, give the debate about whether Jean-Claude Van Damme or Jackie Chan would win in a fight a try. (My money’s on Jackie…

One Day, Robots Will Build Sturdy Skyscrapers For Us

Dubbed a “nested skyscraper,” this building is a concept design which is intended to be particularly good at resisting the effects of earthquakes and other natural disasters. What really gets my attention though is that robots are required for construction. Yes, it looks flimsy, but the elaborate design by architects Ryohei Koike and Jarod Poenisch…

The Hifiman HM-801 Music Player Will Satisfy The Pickiest Audiophiles

The Hifiman HM-801 looks like an old portable cassette player, but apparently it might just beat out most music players in sound quality. At least that’s what CNET though when they had a listen. They even found it worth $790. https://gizmodo.com/a-pmp-this-ugly-and-expensive-had-better-sound-amazing-5253234 The Hifiman was designed with audiophiles in mind, so it comes with features such…

Even Dr. Dre Is In HP’s $40 Million “Let’s Do Amazing” Ad Campaign

HP spent $40 million on their new “Let’s Do Amazing” ad campaign. For those big bucks they managed to get Rhys Darby of Flight of the Conchords and Dr. Dre. And an odd sense of humor. A really odd sense of humor. [Engadget]

Mario’s Still Fun, Even Ultra-Simplified, Extra-Pixilated 8×8 Form

Before listening to the explanation for this project, I couldn’t figure out what was going on, but once I realized that the 64 flashing squares on the Arduino-powered display would let me play Mario, it was time to get supplies. Designed by a student from Carnegie Mellon University, this has got to be one of…

HP Let’s Do Amazing Gallery

iPad Buyer’s Guide: Super Simplified Edition (Some Jest Implied)

There are six iPad configurations to choose from and some helpful guides explaining which you should get. We thought we’d keep it simple and explain our feelings in nearly decent haiku.

Sony’s Ultra Compact DSLR Camera Concept May Have Powerful Touchscreen Menus

Sony’s been pretty tight-lipped about its ultra compact DSLR camera concept, but someone did share screenshots of what appears to be a rather nice menu system designed for a touchscreen. It looks like it’ll gives almost complete control to fingers. Based on those screenshots, it looks like you can control just about everything—from depth of…

Pioneer’s DJM-2000 Shows Why Every Digital Mixer Should Come With Multitouch

Pioneer is known to make digital mixers that leave us drooling and wishing for some DJ skills. First they gave us the CDJ-2000 with its beautiful LCD screen, and now they’ve given us the DJM-2000, a multitouch screen-having per-frequency-mixing beauty. https://gizmodo.com/pioneer-cdj-2000-lets-you-mix-with-the-help-of-a-big-b-5361368 Sure, there have been multitouch DJ rigs before, but the DJM-2000 is not only…

Rock-Paper-Scissors Playing Glove Learns Your Weaknesses

Once upon a time being alone meant you were unable to play a decent game of rock-paper-scissors, but now you can finally amuse yourself with just your own hand. Granted you’ll have to actually make a glove like this first. I don’t know if self-proclaimed “glove hacker” Steve Hoefer was lonely or bored when he…

We Think Google Reader Play Is Perfect For Tablets, But What About TVs?

We thought that Google’s Reader Play is perfect for tablet computers, but the New York Times’ Nick Bilton has other ideas. He thinks that the feature is perfect for TVs and other larger screens. [NYT] https://gizmodo.com/google-prettifies-rss-with-tablet-ready-google-reader-p-5490460

It Only Gives You 32GB, But the OCZ Onyx Is Still An SSD Under $100

32GB, 64MB cache, and read and write speeds of 25MB/s and 70MB/s aren’t terribly exciting when it comes to a solid state drive, but the OCZ Onyx still caught our eye because it’s among the first SSDs to slip below $100. [Hot Hardware via CrunchGear]

This Fuel-Injection System Might Increase Fuel Efficiency By Up To 50%

The most fuel efficient hybrid for sale in the US gets 51 MPG, but a startup called Transonic Combustion claims they can improve that. They claim their fuel-injection system will get 64 MPG. Transonic’s fuel-injection system is supposedly better because it “uses supercritical fluids and requires no spark to ignite the fuel. The supercritical fluid…

Complain About Cellphone Use During A Movie And Get Stabbed With A Meat Thermometer

Next time someone complains about your habit of using a cellphone in the movie theater, just casually tell him this story of a man who got stabbed with a meat thermometer after making a similar complaint. It was 9:00 PM on a Saturday night and people were watching Shutter Island in a Lancaster movie theater…

ASUS Cine5 Crams Five Channels Into Slender PC Speaker

ASUS calls the Cine5 “the world’s most compact five-channel speaker,” but who cares about that when the thing actually looks good and supposedly provides ultra-realistic surround sound? Sadly we don’t know when it’ll be available or for how much. [Asus]