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According to those lucky enough to have a Nook, firmware 1.1 is live now. Forums are full of sporadic claims like faster page turns and tweaked file handling. Have you noticed anything special? Updated Because in the words of our own Wilson Rothman, “It feels like not much has changed.” The only thing he notices…
With any luck, your PC isn’t next to your oven, so these S&J Co “eggy” speakers won’t be thrown in a pot of boiling water accidentally. Mind, I don’t know what type of bird lays black eggs… Dubbed as being ultra-portable, these speakers come in two magnetized halves and connect to PCs via USB. I…
I’m surprised something like the Swig & Jig hadn’t been invented yet, but so glad that someone finally got around to making a liquor cabinet that throws a party every time you take out a drink. The cabinet, a creation of Alex Vessels and Katherine Keane for NYU’s ITP Winter Show, features several compartments to…
A SCOTTISH NERD named Charlie Stross opined on the FUTURE OF PHONES on his text blog, joining the overly washed millions of other future-abusers in imagining what it will be like when iPhones and gPhones can do convincing augmented reality, wirelessly stimulate the male G-spot, et cetera. The only difference was that Stross is incredibly…
A couple of new netbooks have hit the “just announced” pool, and while MSI’s Wind models don’t usually grab me, the U130 and U135 do, thanks to the inclusion of Atom’s new Pine Trail processors. Pine Trail was officially let out of the bag today, and comes in four flavors: the N450, D410, D510, and…
If this PS3 ad were a bit more honest, it might read, “Destroy 7000 enemies along with your relationship with your wife.” By Mexican ad agency Diagonal, this new series of posters are part of Sony’s latest, slightly less esoteric branding initiative for the PS3 in which the console actually does things rather than, I…
When Matt and I demoed Project Natal at E3, we were both pretty impressed. But there was one tiny quirk that we both noticed: lag. https://gizmodo.com/testing-project-natal-we-touched-the-intangible-5277954 I say “quirk” because it wasn’t some sort of painful, game-ending problem. But when steering with a virtual wheel during the Burnout demo, both of us noted that the…
Dell’s Inspiron Mini 10 is joining the coming wave of netbooks that will use Intel’s next-generation Atom n450 processor. It’ll give you a longer battery life, but may not have much of an impact beyond that. The n450 clocks in at 1.66GHz, and is about 60% smaller and 20% more efficient than its predecessor. Despite…
Rest easy, territorial Yelpers: According to TechCrunch, a late-stage change of heart (or circumstance) led Yelp to walk away from a reported $550m offer from Google this weekend. https://gizmodo.com/google-reportedly-deep-in-talks-to-buy-yelp-5429307 No word yet on exactly what drove Yelp to back down, but there are really just two main possibilities here: • Yelp was uneasy with whatever…
This is awkward. It appears that HP’s new webcams, which have facial-tracking software, can’t recognize black faces, as evidenced in the above video. HP has responded: We are working with our partners to learn more. The technology we use is built on standard algorithms that measure the difference in intensity of contrast between the eyes…
Have you guys heard? Verizon needs to charge a $350 ETF on smartphones to survive! Otherwise they won’t be able to pay for their network! Wait…that doesn’t make any sense. Yes, Verizon has responded to the FCC’s inquiry with just what you’d expect: some pretty vague excuses. You see, they need to charge such a…
Ford’s not the first car company to offer an in-car Wi-Fi solution, but by integrating it with their next Sync update, it looks as though they’ve come up with a method that’s simple and inexpensive—two words I love. https://gizmodo.com/lightning-review-autonet-3g-in-car-wi-fi-router-5139774 The Sync system will let you plug in your own USB mobile broadband modem, and that’s…
An ornery-looking bipedal educational robot, intended to teach Japanese schoolchildren about humanoid machines, is unveiled at the Nippon Institute of Technology. Lesson one, for the children: robots are nothing to be afraid of. Lesson two: except this one. [PlasticPals]
It’s lunch (in the UK, anyway), I’m feeling worse for wear after last night’s drink-a-thon, and it’s only four days until Christmas, so this Stella Artois app is looking very attractive to me. Even if I don’t drink beer. It’s one of the first times a big brand like Stella Artois has used augmented reality…
An iPhone, 2lb block of pepper jack cheese, plenty of crackers, green olives placed in a petite dish, superfluously badass cleaver-style cheese knife and one of those bikini girls in a Santa hat. Hold my calls until New Year’s. [iPhoneSavior]
Last June at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, Apple’s Worldwide Developers conference brought us the iPhone 3GS. Now, another “Corporate Event” at the Moscone Center seems to have been booked by Apple for June 28, 2010 through July 2, 2010. Plan your wireless contracts accordingly. [Moscone Center via AppleInsider]
With four faces, this Navigator watch from Storm offers the time, date, temperature and a compass, and even makes you a sandwich if you ask nicely. Ok, we made that last bit up, but it looks pretty neat with its quad-faces, right? Encased in stainless steel, the Navigator comes in either blue or silver options…
The follow-up to the slick ICD Vega tablet—still not out yet—has been shown off, with the Ultra running Android 2.0 and boasting an NVIDIA Tegra T20 chip. The 7-inch size is one of the smallest tablets we’ve seen, too. https://gizmodo.com/sleek-vega-tablet-with-android-2-0-touchscreen-and-3g-5403914 The tablet was outed by Engadget’s Joshua Topolsky on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, and…
Tapulous, developer of the Tap Tap Revenge series of iPhone apps, is raking in $1m a month from sales through the App Store. Over 20 million downloads have been recorded, with over 600 million games played. To say that Tapulous, with just 20 employees, has been buying in the luxury three-ply toilet paper for their…
Psst, Droid owners. Here’s how to hack Android 2.1 onto your happy little Motorola friend. The Android 2.1 firmware update doesn’t bring much to the Droid plate, apart from added speed (the video below shows one modder unenthusiastically exclaiming “I’m amazed by how fast it is”), three new homepage screens, and Google news and weather.…
