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India’s Tata Nano has been in the works for some time, but pre-orders are starting today with a MSRP of 100,000 rupees (under $2000)—officially making it the cheapest car in the world. https://gizmodo.com/tata-nano-isnt-a-music-player-or-tits-nay-its-a-2500-343811 The price jumps up to around $2400 when you factor in the additional costs associated with excise fees, transportation, taxes, etc—but the…
Some interesting analysis points out yet another reason Netflix is making the push to digital streaming. It’s cheap. Assuming that Netflix pays 3 cents per gigabyte transferred, the movie provider pays 6 cents to deliver an SD movie (1.8GB) and 9 cents to deliver an HD movie (3GB)—less if the film is under two hours,…
Not surprisingly, the “new” 17-inch iMac that turned up on Apple’s education site is actually the old polycarbonate 17-inch iMac. New, old…what’s the difference? [Apple via Techtree via Wired Gadget Lab] https://gizmodo.com/apple-leaks-announcement-of-17-inch-imac-at-899-5177816
Flip phones have been dead to me since I left Japan, so Nokia’s 7205 Intrigue for Verizon is the first one that’s actually made me look twice. The external display is a blank slate until it lights up with incoming text messages or play music (not entirely unique, but still classy) I also like the…
The Boy Genius Report claims to have details on the next iPhone straight from someone who is “pretty high up in AT&T’s food chain.” According to the intel, the next iPhone is due in June (as pretty much everyone has predicted) and it will feature 7.2Mbps 3G speeds (probably) and U-Verse support. In addition, AT&T…
What did you do yesterday? If the high point of the day involved eating SpaghettiO’s and watching cartoons, then these Lazy Sunday Pants should be right up your alley. The design features a handy pocket for your TV remote and a removable lap tablecloth that easily accommodates your average microwave cuisine. Unfortunately for the lazy,…
Imagine lumbering, blurry-eyed and beat-down to the bus stop on a Monday morning. Just then you notice that the billboard at the stop is snowing—alerting you to optimal skiing conditions at the nearby resort. Designed as a promotional tool for Tryvann Winter Park, a ski resort just 15 minutes outside of Oslo, these snowing billboards…
Do you have a dSLR? Or better still, do you have five? Right now you can get five SanDisk Extreme III CompactFlash cards (2GB apiece) for $50. These high quality CompactFlash cards feature a read/write speed of 20MB/second. And even though they now come in sizes up to 16GB, the MSRP on just one 2GB…
And the father of the year award goes to Ron Tajima, who created a Rooma/baby crib hybrid that he calls the Cradloomba. A better name might be Child Services Express. [GetRobo via Hack-a-Day]
If you shrug off Terminator and Battlestar Galactica as never-gonna-happen impossibilities, PW Singer has news for you. His spine-tingling book, Wired For War, carefully explains the robotics revolution that’s gripped our military since 9/11. If you believe Singer (shown at left with an unarmed robot), the biggest revolution happening in the world today is the…
TomTom’s two new entry-level GPS navigators—ONE IQ Routes and XL IQ Routes—are a lot like the existing ONE and XL, but with new cases and IQ route software from their pricier models. [TomTom, Thanks Dave!] https://gizmodo.com/tomtom-130-130s-330-330s-one-and-xl-redesigned-sto-385106
Can’t afford Mad Catz’s ridiculous Tournament Edition SFIV FightStick? Just build your own out of cheap fake Tupperware. Plus, it’ll tote a sammich over to your friend’s house, though I’d avoid tuna salad. [TechEBlog] https://gizmodo.com/mad-catz-street-fighter-iv-fightsticks-review-5161299
LaptopMag got a quick look at Samsung’s new N110, which is essentially a refresh of the well-liked NC10. And Akihabara News brings tidings of the NC310 (above), a hot-looking number headed to North America eventually. Starting with the N110, the improvements over the NC10 include a better keyboard and trackpad, a new glossy finish and…
Best Buy, like many other stores, has a public “price matching” policy. But HD Guru reports that according to internal docs, personnel are trained to deny price-matches and even paid bonuses for shutting them down. https://gizmodo.com/best-buy-states-the-obvious-5146320 This all comes out of a lawsuit that was just granted class action status. Internal documents, plus depositions from…
A company called Genkii is hoping to rope a chunk of the 40-million worldwide web-connected phones and iTouches into a new 3D avatar-based virtual world, Sparkle. Too bad virtual worlds died around 4 years ago. Genkii appear to have had Sparkle in the works for quite some time, but they must have spat out whatever…
I thought nothing would impress me more than the Lego factory’s interior and its breathtaking 65-foot-high storage cathedrals. And then, I saw this video of BMW’s Munich assembly line, with almost no sign of humans. I know that robotized assembly lines are nothing new, but I thought there were more people around. You know, drinking…
The Axon is a bit of a shocker from Taser. It’s not a “taser” in a traditional sense, but a POV camera cleverly squeezed into a Bluetooth-sized headset. Connecting via 3.5mm jack existing radio systems (like walkie talkies), the video signal appears to piggyback on existing transmissions, allowing remote monitoring and recording of what a…
According to the Apple Store, the company’s $100 Bluetooth headset has been discontinued. Does this mean Apple’s planning on rolling out new stereo-enabled Bluetooth headsets with A2DP compatibility for iPhone 3.0 and iPod Touch? It’s not a product that we’d really kept tabs on, refreshing its store page every 10 minutes to note whether or…
It’s rare to catch a commercial plane crashing on video, but Japanese TV NHK has aired yesterday’s spectacular crash of the FedEx airplane in Narita Airport. Sadly, the two dead pilots didn’t have ejection seats. https://gizmodo.com/combat-pilots-ejecting-after-aircraft-crash-5177025
Special forces may use throat mics to coordinate near-silent attacks on enemy bases, but Sanwa wants to bring all that convenience to your next supermarket run. Sanwa’s hands-free throat mic looks like a military headset, but it’s made for use with your cellphone (which we’re assuming isn’t part of your black ops kit, but we’re…
