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Yesterday, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law a bill that will make California the first state in the nation to create a live donor registry for kidney transplants. The bill also requires California drivers to decide whether they want to be organ donors when they renew their drivers’ licenses. According to one notable supporter,…
Cisco’s rumored telepresence-at-home system is now official and it’s called Umi. The set up comprises a set top box, a remote, and a 1080p camera that sits on top of your TV. It’s the new way to visit grandma! According to Engadget, the Umi will place video calls at 1080p and record them at 720p,…
You know what they say: Where there’s smoke, there are people taking pictures of smoke. And for this week’s Shooting Challenge, we want to see beautiful, billowing smoke. The Challenge Take a photo that features the fine details of smoke as its subject. You can contextualize the smoke (in other words, it can be part…
One moment it’s a phone in your hand. The next, it’s a full-fledged turn-by-turn nav unit with an active internet connection. What happened? These apps, is what. iOS GOLD MEDAL: MotionX Drive The first wave of iPhone turn-by-turn apps was expensive and luxurious. The second was cheap and barebones. Since, members of both classes have…
It sounds too good to be true, but researchers at the University of Cincinnati are convinced that they’ve developed a revolutionary electrofluidics display that combines the color and video capabilities of an LCD with the low power consumption of e-ink. The technology, which was seven years in the making, sandwiches reflective electrodes between two layers…
This Russian Army’s Mil Mi-8 helicopter is in a surprisingly good state, considering it crashed against the east side of Mount Elbrus, the highest mountain in Russia and Europe. It was found by alpinist Ilya Yahsin at 15,748 feet. While it looks pretty broken, the $10 million helicopter—which was produced in 2009—is in good shape…
Even if you hold your laptop up to your face like a flip phone, talking into your computer is lame. You want to use Google Voice like a real phone—with buttons and stuff. We’ll tell you how. Getting Started If you don’t have it already, you’re going to need a Google Voice account. It’s easy.…
If you don’t want your living room flailing to be in vain this November, plan on moving your coffee table—leaked manual pages show that Kinect’s camera requires 6 to 8 feet of clear space to function. [Kotaku]
He says he’s not obsessive—we’ll leave that for you to decide. But Nathan Shedroff certainly has an obsessive eye for good design, prompting him to amass an multi-year collection of stuff you would have found aboard the jet. The enormous collection, picked from eBay offerings over between 2004 and 2007, has landed Sherdoff enough cutlery…
The toxic red sludge spill in Hungary that killed four people Monday could take a year to clean up, authorities there said. Meanwhile, workers are still trying to stop the spill from spreading to the Danube and Raba rivers. So far, at least seven towns have been hit, and 7,000 Hungarians have been directly affected…
Now, I’ve walked around this maze before so know how tough it is, but cheating using your cellphone’s GPS? You may as well stay at home playing GTA or something. The Daily Mail spoke to employees at Longleat Safari Park* in Wiltshire, England, who’d noticed that many people are now using their phones to find…
A pilot internet voting program in Washington D.C. for this November’s elections has been scrapped. Why? Well, officials invited hackers to give the system their “best shot,” and some college kids did—and pulled off a pretty good prank. During a trial period of the web voting system last week, the Board of Elections and Ethics…
I’m excited. HP Senior Vice President Eric Cador has announced new Palm’s WebOS 2.0 phones for early 2011. I hope that means CES, because the new operating system looks great. [Reuters]
Ugh! Dictatorships! Always spoiling our fun! That cutesy URL shortening service you might use (bit.ly, perhaps) is riding on Libya’s .ly domain suffix. And Libya ain’t pleased—one shortener, vb.ly, was recently shut down for violating Libya’s oppressive laws. Ben Metcalfe, (former) owner of pro-porn URL shortening site vb.ly, found that his domain was abruptly deleted…
Poor Adam Guerbuez. The self-styled online marketer posted over four million spam messages on Facebook in spring of 2008 and was slapped with a $100 fine for each message. With the exchange rate, he owes $1,068,928,721.46. Guerbuez, who hails from Montreal, was initially hit with the fine by a California court in 2008. The Quebec…
When WolframAlpha first showed up on the iPhone last October, it spent a good six months costing $50. That was not sane! With the launch today of the app’s Android version, they’re locked in at a perfectly rational $2. For a compendium of factoids, weather patterns, computational models, and yuks? I’ll take it. [Thanks, commenter…
While some people live in spectacular houses that grow from water, dream beaches, luxurious jungle bases, and even awesome subterranean lairs, others have to buy a $68,000 closet home, described as the world’s smallest apartment. The apartment is in a great place, however, in the Piazza di Sant’ Ignazio. Ironically, right behind Palazzo Grazioli, a…
If you were hoping to make any modifications to your T-Mobile G2, my apologies. Because the phone apparently ships with a rootkit that will override any changes you make to Android and reinstall the original firmware. That ain’t right. UPDATED: According to the New America Foundation, “one of the microchips embedded into the G2 prevents…
There are a lot, lot, lot of lawsuits shooting around the mobile industry these days, and you can see them all at a glance in this tidy infographic by George Kokkinidis. Just look at Nokia go! [Design Language via DF]
Initially, they applauded the erection of three wind turbines. Now, the inhabitants of Penobscot Bay, Maine, rue the day the $15m wind facility was built a mile from their homes, due to the sheer noise the 123-foot blades make. The NY Times has looked into the concerns of people from locations such as Penobscot Bay…
