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Are the rapid advancements in technology and science, in artificial-intelligence and genetics, leading us to a moment in time—a technological singularity—where ultra-intelligent machines improve on their own designs, while we humans are free to edit our own evolution? Transhumanists believe so, and contemplate how technology might be used to enhance our mental and physical capacities.…
Allow me to geek out for a moment. I mean, really geek out—more than dressed up D&D geek out. I mean like, this is the shit you don’t share with people for fear of complete social and parental ostracism. I want to participate in a hunt for buried treasure. (Preferably lost pirate gold.) With this…
Remember kids, never plug your head in a high voltage capacitor. On the other side, watermelons are fine and fun. Click to view
Yesterday we argued that the old-school PMP might be dead, but Sony sure doesn’t think so. It’s just updated its S-series with two 2-inch LCD Walkmans that include the new 720×480 TV-out and noise-canceling features built into the upcoming A-Series. https://gizmodo.com/the-portable-media-player-is-dead-long-live-the-por-5360197 Apart from being colored differently, the NW-S640 (top left) and the NW-S740 (top right)…
The pretty player has a 2.8-inch OLED screen (240×400), FM radio, TV-out, noise canceling, and is beautifully thin at 7.2mm. Oh, and it only weighs 2.2 ounces. But unlike the failed X-Series, the A has no touch screen or Wi-Fi. https://gizmodo.com/sony-x-series-walkman-review-so-close-and-yet-so-far-5325036 Along with standard codec support, there’s also new drag and drop feature that auto-transcodes…
Unlike Opera Mobile, Opera Mini crunches pages on a server for viewing on your Java phone or BlackBerry. The beta has a snappier interface geared for touch or keypad control, and adds tabbed browsing, speed dial, and a password manager. The idea is to mirror the desktop version as much as possible. Open a new…
An Asus Eee PC gets modded for a kitchen cupboard, Facebook becomes more phone sex friendly, boring cellphone makers join forces, and black-and-white tech speculation returns in archive form in tonight’s issue of Remainders – Things We Didn’t Post…until now. Renters need not apply, but this enterprising modder shows how he cracked apart a 7-inch…
AMD’s new Athlon II X4 chips are like a Phenom II minus the L3 cache. But they’re super-cheap: $99 (2.6GHz-620), and $122 (2.8Ghz-630). Also looks like they hold their own against the $150 Core 2 Quad 8200: [Maximum PC]
Vivek Kundra, the Obama Administration CIO, just opened up a new app store for federal agencies so that they can get up on these wacky, government-approved cloud computing programs. Looks like he’s following through on his promises. https://gizmodo.com/obamas-new-cio-is-all-about-net-neutrality-and-open-sou-5165139 The app store will be managed by the General Services Administration, and in addition to business apps,…
Houses are passe and RVs are overrated. The Camper Bike is where it’s at. I don’t care if sleeping—let alone functioning—in the thing is a physical impossibility. I WANT ONE. Artist Kevin Cyr worked on the Camper Bike in 2008, though little is revealed about the technical specs, it looks like an overgrown tricycle with…
I have to agree with Hitler: The iPod touch and the iPhone need actual gaming buttons to be real game machines. The Panasonic Karma looks exactly like that: A true iPhone game console. Unfortunately, the awesome images can be deceiving. https://gizmodo.com/hitler-rants-about-ipod-touchs-missing-camera-5359337 Yes, what you see in the gallery is a cable. In reality, the Panasonic…
We figured it was coming, but now there’s confirmation that Microsoft is releasing a 250GB XBox 360. All we know so far is that it’ll be shiny, black, and part of the Modern Warfare 2 bundle for $399. [Kotaku] https://gizmodo.com/amazon-germany-lists-250gb-xbox-360-elite-package-5347369
I love blurrycam photos almost as much as my good ol’ Wacom tablet. According to this particular snapshot though, it looks like my darling is getting a new sibling in the form of a multi-touch supporting Bamboo. A multi-touch tablet like that could bring intuitive zooming, scrolling, and maybe even preset gestures. The possibilities are…
We had a tiny picture showing Zune HD color options a while back. Now we’ve got the source code revealing the names of ’em. I can’t tell eggshell from off-white, so could someone please tell me what “atomic” is? https://gizmodo.com/a-tiny-look-at-the-zune-hd-color-options-5336671 Apparently the Zune software source files had those four pictures hidden along with their corresponding…
Relatively-new startup Pliant Technology claims their 3.5-inch enterprise SSD can read at speeds up to 500 megabytes per seconds and write 320 megabytes per second. Basically, you could copy the contents of a 2 terabyte drive in around an hour. According to Computer World, the three-year-old company claims that the drive can be used non-stop…
I don’t know who that Brittany Lane is, nor have I heard of Meeting of Important People before. What got my attention is that everything in this music video, from the scenery to the instruments, is made out of cardboard. They may be a barely known band (anyone actually heard of them before?) and not…
The Android Team released the SDK for Android 1.6 a.k.a. "Donut" which, among other things, promises CDMA compatibility, screen resolution scaling and support for gestures. Even better, Donut might be available on phones as early as next month. All the stuff mentioned in the past, such as APIs for text-to speech and translator functionality, plus…
This is Machu Picchu, the famous Inca site in Los Andes. And that giant symbol covering the mountain—called Huayna Picchu—is not Sauron resurrected, but a light drawing projected from one kilometer away using PAE light canons. In fact, the canons are so powerful that the image can be seen during the day, even from that…
But hey, don’t take it from me, just watch this adjective-only version of the latest iPod event. [YouTube via Fortune] https://gizmodo.com/apple-its-only-rock-and-roll-liveblog-now-live-5355097
Don’t try this at home: in this video crazyperson Theo Gray lights a grill with the help of some liquid oxygen. Suffice to say it’s a bit of overkill, but just the kind of overkill we like. [Instructables via PopSci]
