Friday, May 18, 2007
BitTorrent Pirate Lands In Clink
11:45PM Seamus Byrne | Among the many comments trailing our essay on the coming N-format war, some said that a non-DRM approach was best, but that the only type currently available was the piratical kind, a la BitTorrent. Well, it seems there’s a downside. Today a Hong Kong man became the first person to be jailed for BitTorrent- related video piracy. (Note: He is not the actual pirate shown in our illustration.) Yep, Chan Nai-ming got three months in jail, a month each for Daredevil, Miss Congeniality and Red Planet. I mean, Miss Congeniality I understand, but Red Planet???? The Court of Appeal were swayed in the end not so much by the man’s behavior but by his online handle, “Big Crook.” Excuse me while I change my screenname to “InnocentGuy2077″. – Wilson Rothman Hong Kong online movie pirate loses appeal [Reuters] More »
Velcro 2.0 Can Support 8x More Weight Than Current Version
11:30PM Seamus Byrne | You’d think an invention like Velcro couldn’t be redesigned, but don’t tell that to Leonard Duffy. The 66-year-old architect has created a new Velcro he dubs “slidingly engaging fasteners.” The fasteners don’t make that tearing noise when you unfasten them, they don’t wear down, and they can support 8x more weight than today’s Velcro. They can be used on anything from sneakers to ski gloves to a waterproof cast (shown above) that Duffy calls the Unitary Wrap. I don’t think I’ve used anything with Velcro since I was a kid, but the thought of a removable, waterproof cast sounds pretty cool. – Louis Ramirez The New Velcro [Pop Sci] More »
TViX HD M-4000SA: Hard Drive Case Plays HD DiVX, H.264 and Full DVD Movies
11:04PM Seamus Byrne | The TViX HD M-4000SA is a case for 3.5″ SATA hard drives that can output 1080i video through component and DVI outputs. It’s going to be available in Korea from May 30 but, like all DViCO stuff, it won’t be late before is available elsewhere for around $230. What I like best about the TViX HD M-4000SA is its DVD Jukebox ability: It allows you to store ISO and IFO format DVD images, which you can browse and playback, keeping access to the DVD menus. Being the movie junkie that I am (with more than a thousand original DVDs here), that means all my Russ Meyer Kubrick, Wilder and Coppola can be easily available from one place, with no painful ripping necessary. And even when that can make you run out of space quickly, you can always expand the space using either bigger drives or external USB 2.0 units. Full specs and a picture of the back with the optional terrestrial TV receiver after the jump. More »
Dell’s Display Port Prototype Will Allow for Resolutions 4x Better Than HD
11:03PM Seamus Byrne | Feast your eyes on Dell’s sexy new LCD. It measures about half an inch thick and packs a resolution that’s 4x sharper than the current HDTV resolutions. It’s part of Dell’s new Display Port technology. The new interconnect will let you daisychain multiple monitors and connect other peripherals via one bi-directional cable. As you can see from the pic, it’ll also allow for embedded peripherals around the display (this one has speakers built-in on the side). The tech can also be used with notebook displays. It’s expected to come out later this year and if this is a sign of what’s to come, we can’t wait. – Louis Ramirez Dell Shows Off Super-Slim Display Port LCD Monitor [Gearlog] More »
Carry This Hammock With You, But Not Too Far
10:51PM Seamus Byrne | It’s getting to be hammock season, and we want to assist you in your lazy, hazy and crazy activities for the summer, so what better idea than to show you this Discovery Deluxe Portable Hammock? Well, “luggable” might be a more accurate word, because the thing weighs 22 pounds. If you can deal with that, it’s well over 8 feet long so it’s probably sizable enough to accommodate even the tallest Gizmodian siesta seeker, as long as you don’t weigh more than an eighth of a ton. Take the jump for one more pic of this slacker’s device in (in)action. More »
Archport Classic: Uber-Hip Sneaker with Secret Compartment
10:46PM Seamus Byrne | Behold the Archport Classic. *Cough*. Stylish, isn’t it? I see it as the kind of shoe that Max from Hart To Hart would be wearing if he was still alive and they had commissioned Hart To Hart: The Geritol Years and he was schlepping around an old people’s home waiting for Jon and Jen (”She’s gawjus“) to bring him soft fruits and news of Freeway. The Archport Classic is not just any old shoe, however. As well as being excellent for “working out at the gym or just hanging out” it’s got a secret hidden compartment, the Archportâ„¢ cartridge, for you to stash a door key and three credit cards (or similar-sized items, should you be uncreditworthy) or cash. Available in white or Widow Black (Omigod, call Jen and Jon, they murdered someone at the old folks’ home!) it’ll cost you $79.99 and get you all the envious looks your cataracts can handle at Sunset View. – Ad Dugdale Product Page [Amazon via Red Ferret] More »
Another Sony Ericsson Slider on the Way?
10:45PM Seamus Byrne | What this? Another Sony Ericsson cellphone on the way? Here’s a group of pics that popped up in Eastern Europe today, depicting a sleek slider that looks a bit like the S500 the company announced 10 days ago. The price on this baby is said to be in the range of $550. It appears to be a bit wider in stature than the S500, and its speculative spec list tells us it’s thinner than the 14mm S500, listing its thickness at 12.5mm, but like the S500, it has a 2-megapixel camera. That’s a 2.4-inch 320×240 screen you see there, and it’s also packing UMTS/HSDPA connectivity. Expect to hear more about this phone in the days to come. – Charlie White galleryPost('seslider', 4, 'Sony Ericsson Slider'); New Sony Ericsson Walkman Phone (Shinobu?) Slider Coming Soon [Unwired View] More »
Dahan Unveils the T-View, 120 Inches of Touchability
10:07PM Seamus Byrne | Korean company Dahan has come up with a monster ten-foot touchscreen with an amazing 10 millisecond response time. The T-View runs in Windows 2000 or XP, uses Rear projection and a surface mirror system, and corresponds to multi-finger touch – rather how I imagine Hugh Hefner does. As for price and availability, who knows, but a straw poll at Gizmodo suggested you’d need around a kazillion dollars. There are a couple more pics after the jump. More »Interactive Brainstorm Table Works in Mysterious Ways
10:06PM Seamus Byrne | There was precious little information accompanying this video that landed in our tip box this morning, but as you can plainly see, it’s a light table-like device that immediately scans whenever you set upon it, and it lets you resize, move and animate objects together using gestures. It looks like there’s a camera above that can immediately take a picture of whatever you set on the table. It’s somehow able to cut out the image as it’s being scanned. Now if they could just tweak that display to be a bit less washed out, they might be onto something here. Excuse us while we have a brainstorm trying to figure out how this thing works. – Charlie White Interactive Brainstorm Table [Fresh Creation] More »
