Tech news, analysis, culture, business, security, and more
We raved about the Sony Ericsson W760’s whizzy Walkman interface when we first talked about this phone in January, and now over at Cellphone Signal they’ve got information suggesting the cellphone is coming to the US with AT&T. The confirmation comes from this leaked photo of a W760 bearing a teeny tiny little AT&T Deathstar…
Aiptek’s last HD camcorder we showed you did 720p recording for a budget $170. But time and technology waits for no man, so Aiptek’s newest cam now records at 1080p. The AHD 300 actually manages 30 frames per second at this resolution, but if you’re into slightly high-speed filming, it can even stretch to 60…
Graphene looks like it’s going to be one of the “wonder materials” of the future, and a science team at Cornell University has just demonstrated the world’s smallest balloon made of it. They stuck sheets of graphene over microscopic wells (1 to 100 square micrometers) cut into silica glass, trapping gas inside. By varying the…
A local Beijing paper has revealed that some of the amazing fireworks in the Olympics opening show were digitally-crafted fakes, inserted into the live TV feed. The Beijing Times quotes the head of visual effects, who says that the 28 giant footprints that stomped through the air above the city, ending at the stadium, were…
It’s been a month since the iTunes App Store went live, and in an interview with the Wall St Journal, Steve Jobs has put the apps downloads figure at over 60 million. With the mix of free and paid apps, that brought Apple around $30 million. That’s obviously encouraged Steve: He’s enthusiastic that maybe “it…
The November 15, 1959 edition of Closer Than We Think, (syndicated by the Chicago Tribune, written and illustrated by Arthur Radebaugh), predicted “bloodless surgery.” With the development of an “atomic knife,” tomorrow’s hospital operations may be as easy on the patient as relaxing in an easy chair – no incisions, no bleeding. The technique has…
In light of this thrilling aviation story out of Ireland today, let’s rethink this whole banning of the in-flight cell phone conversations, shall we? Sure, allowing for calls during that 6-hour red eye from San Francisco to Boston will bring out the jerkoff in a lot of people, but then again one of those jackasses…
Here I was, moments from having red LEDs surgically implanted into my retinas, when this DIY Terminator sunglasses hack comes along and rescues me from a lifetime of pain, blindness-and utter coolness. GEARFUSE soldering maestro Vince Veneziani said he did this in about five minutes, but newbies might want to take their time and save…
University of California scientists today announced that significant progress has been made toward developing “metamaterials” for use in a legitimate invisibility cloak. The researchers, led by mad scientist Xiang Zhang, were able to demonstrate for the first time that they could cloak 3D objects with these materials. As the article notes, and as we’ve shown…
Those upcoming crazy fast Intel Nehalem chips we’ve profiled a bunch of times this year got an official name today, and in typical Intel fashion the subdued moniker does little to betray the speedy goodness housed within. The chip set will be called Core i7 in its first generation of products, and is also the…
PSP modder jube808 has equipped his PSP with a DIY touchscreen, as part of his efforts to add features he feels Sony dropped the ball on with his beloved handheld. The on-screen keyboard looks pretty responsive, and can be used with fingers or a stylus. Such a mod is probably making PSP homebrewers salivate with…
Apparently not satisfied with keeping Bobble Steve confined to an app inside the phone, an intrepid bobblehead sculptor has constructed this mighty fine looking iPhone dock, complete with a super-detailed Steve-o frozen in “keynote reveal” stance. No word on whether Bobble Jobs’s focused product announcement energies will interfere with any radio or magnetic fields on…
If you’re like me, you probably have an old, broken-down NES somewhere in your house, gathering dust while you try to decide whether you should keep it for nostalgia’s sake. How about turning it into a lunchbox, which will allow you to bring those warm early gaming memories with you to work or school every…
Play Wii with man’s best friend if you have to. But please, please, never ever play with a dog behind you. Seriously. Don’t. Biff. Don’t do that, Biff! Stop it! DON’T! BIFF! BAD DOG! BAD! (NSFMH* video ahead, probably illegal in some states.) * Not Safe for Mental Health I’m afraid this beats the Jesus…
The Beijing National Stadium, nicknamed “The Bird’s Nest,” has already become an icon in the country of 1.3 billion. But for some farmers close to Hangzhou (located in the southeast of China), the Herzog & de Meuron structure was just too darn far away… so in a fit of DIY ingenuity, they built their own…
There are plenty of RC cars and motorcycles out there today, so what Silverlit did with this 1:12 scale red racer is throw on a working driver and let him have some say in where the sportbike is going. Thanks to an onboard gyro, the rider actually leans from side to side, just like those…
Qingbar probably hopes that its MP101 Mini Projector for the iPod/iPhone gets picked up en masse by business travelers looking to turn their seat backs into mini-movie theaters, but we think the image quality might deter all but the blindest travelers from abandoning their tiny screens. According to the specs and the image below, what…
Google StreetView has been a peculiar bird since its inception earlier this century. It’s been banned for voyeurism, the trampling of privacy rights, and other infractions, but then again it’s also been known to capture a few nose pickers or two-so it’s a wash as far as I’m concerned. Today, we received word it has…
3-D images? Peshaw. Those are so 2007. What humanity needs now is what MIT researchers hope to provide very soon: super realistic “passive 6-D reflectance field displays” that not only look great, but also respond to stimuli, like lighting conditions. And, not only will these uber images do all that and a bag of chips,…
Lego. Mindstorms RCX. Donkey Kong. Rolling barrels. Donkey Kong throws rolling barrels. Mario jumps. And jumps. And jumps. All synchronized. Dan Kressin even generated the game start tune with Lego. After seeing it in action-and hearing the rattling noise it makes-I want this on the wall of my bedroom, as my alarm clock. Videos and…