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New Zealand news sources report that Megaupload co-founder Kim Dotcom was released on bail today almost exactly month after he was arrested. The only catch is that he can’t stray too far from his house or use the Internet. Ouch. After being repeatedly denied bail, Kim Dotcom is finally out of jail. CNET noticed that…
Paleontologists are working on building building giant robot dinosaurs out of 3-D printed bones. For science. Short of finding a mosquito trapped in amber and opening an ill-fated velociraptor-laden theme park, that’s the coolest possible way to study dinosaurs. Forbes reports that Professor Kenneth Lacovara at Drexel University is heading up the new endeavor, which…
The creativity that went in inventing McDonald’s miracle flavored rice is so beyond my little human brain that I’d have to be high as a kite to understand the magic. But oh the magic. The culinary geniuses at RocketNews24 cooked rice with a Big Mac, fries, chicken nuggets, sauce and coke to deliver what has…
This isn’t the review of the BlackBerry PlayBook 2.0 software. That comes tomorrow. Rather, these are just some early impressions and comparisons to the 1.0 software running through my head as I get acclimated with the thing. These opinions that may or may not change with time and familiarity. https://kotaku.com/blackberry-playbook-review-5791814 But for now, let’s get…
Selling out! The biggest fear of any musician. And maybe it sucks for purists and for people who don’t like money or something but for the rest of us? Getting paid to do what you love to do is the dream. Artist Growth is an app that helps real musicians organize themselves. Like a responsible…
Crop circles are so 1990s. Nowadays, my favorite mysterious, creative phenomenon is snow art. Did aliens make it? Does it indicate some old druid structure hidden beneath the snow? Or is it just down to some insanely creative artist? Err, yeah, you guessed it: it’s the last one. In fact, these abstract images in the…
I really wish this Imperial AT-AT Volkswagen Van were real. Because then I would be able to stomp on all those hipster Ewoks who live around me. Especially that guy who smells like Chewbacca and is always sitting at the coffee place without ordering anything. [Jack Schofield via Twitter via Nerd Approved via Geekologie]
In a poetic turn of virology, the scientist who discovered hepatitis C in 1989 has now also discovered a vaccine that will hopefully treat and prevent the disease. Not only is it poetic, it’s an accomplishment that many thought was impossible. Because hepatitis C is more virulent than HIV, no one was confident a vaccine…
A newly discovered Apple patent application describes a system that would make it easier for Apple Store employees to diagnose water damage in your phone so that they can deny you a replacement. AppleInsider spotted “Mechanisms for Detecting Exposure to Water in an Electronic Device”. The patent describes a circuit-based system for detecting water damage…
The Wall Street Journal and NSA are bleary-eyed with terror over the newest cyber bogeyman: Anonymous is going to cause a blackout! Except they can’t, and they won’t; they’re saying so themselves. So why the misinformation? https://gizmodo.com/nsa-anonymous-could-cause-power-outages-through-cybera-5886805 According to the WSJ, “The director of the National Security Agency has warned that the hacking group Anonymous…
Taser rolled out a new line of body-wearable cameras for law enforcement today, the Axon Flex line, designed to be worn on sunglasses and record then upload video to the cloud from the officer’s point of view. They’re delightfully frightening! The 3.2-inch cameras store two four to six hours of footage at a time (which…
It’s not the first attempt at adding multi-user tracking to large format touchscreens, but Gunze’s use of electrodes around the edge of the display looks like it could be more accurate than recording each user’s shoe preference. https://gizmodo.com/foot-recognition-is-the-new-face-recognition-5879705 Distinguishing multiple users isn’t always necessary on a product like Microsoft’s Surface, but when it comes to…
Confession: I’m not a big Star Wars fan. I know it’s against nerd culture and geekdom to admit such a thing but hey, here I am, in the flesh, an unabashed Star Wars non-lover. Sure I thought the movies were enjoyable but I only watched them once *gasp*. But even without loving the movies, you…
Unlike Amazon.com, which is both ugly and hard to use, the iTunes Store is only the latter. Behind all that Apple sheen is a hellish shopping labyrinth—but a makeover might be coming soon. 9to5Mac claims—yeah, anonymous sources and whatnot—that the iTunes Store is getting a total redo. While details are extremely vague (“The new design…
NASA scientists are now firing 46-foot-tall two-stage rockets against auroras because they hate them and they smell bad. Or maybe because they want to test how extreme space weather can affect digital communications between ground bases and spacecraft or satellites. https://gizmodo.com/a-raging-solar-storm-is-hitting-the-earth-right-now-5878656 Especially now that we are getting close to a new high in solar activity.…
It apparently took Francisco Prieto three years to complete this animation of a monster Lego Millennium Falcon build. Which sounds about right, given how my much time my 10 year old self spent on the most pathetic of improvised Lego vehicles. * Yes okay I know a parsec is a unit of distance not of…
Comcast is about to launch Xfinity Streampix, a new video-on-demand service for Comcast subscribers. Will this really keep people from quitting cable to sign up for Netflix? Oh great, yet another video streaming service. Streampix will allow Comcast customers to access what appears to be a huge pool of content on their TVs, tablets, and…
What happens when you spin steel wool in the air? You can accidentally start a forest fire. Oh, and the photos turn out amazingly! https://gizmodo.com/shooting-challenge-steel-wool-5885452 Winner – Waiting Out the Storm I’ve been wanting to take a photo like this with raining sparks for awhile now. Originally I had planned on using some 4th of…
With my girlfriends help spinning the wool and me across the small frozen pond out back we were able to capture this shot containing the wool trick and the glow of the city lights behind her and the trees. Took a few tries but we had a lot of fun with this technique. – John…
