Thursday, August 16, 2007
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Starfish Self-Modeling Robots Learn to Walk in a Sad Way, Hold Potential to Kill Humanity
11:50PM Jesus Diaz | University of Vermont’s Josh Bongard just won the 2007 TR35 Young Innovator award for his self-modeling robots. His starfish can learn how to walk with no programming at all, just knowing the properties of their parts. The results —as you will see in the video after the jump— are quite pathetic to watch, but I am sure that impression will change when they evolve into giant machines to kill us all. More »
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Logitech Unveils Pure-Fi Dream and Anywhere iPod Docks
11:50PM Wilson Rothman | Though Logitech has had a few iPod docks in the past, it never seemed to be a major initiative. Now, the company is getting in the game for real with the debut of the all-new Pure-Fi Dream Bedroom Music System ($249.99), a clock/radio-based dock with some delightfully nerdy features (motion sensors!), and the revamped lithium-ion battery-powered mm50, now more respectably dubbed the Pure-Fi Anywhere Compact Speaker System ($149.99). galleryPost('LogitechPureFiDocks', 4, 'Logitech Pure-Fi Docks'); More »
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Happy 25th Anniversary, Compact Disc
11:28PM Mark Wilson | Today the compact disc (or ‘CD’ as the hipsters are calling it) turns 25. I know how you feel, CD. After 24, when you can rent a car and trash the shit out of it for only like an extra $50 in insurance, it’s all downhill. But since Philips and Sony developed your form and birthed you in Langenhagen, Germany, over 200 billion CDs have sold. The secret to your success? I think it’s not the “futuristic” silver finish, but a sweet spot of form factor that, while not as small as today’s MP3 players, drove the success of DVDs and possibly next-gen DVDs as well. Happy anniversary/birthday Mrs/Mrss CD. Would anyone like to share their special CD moments with the rest of the class? I remember buying the Jewel ‘Pieces of You’ for make out music. I honestly don’t remember if I ever “used” the CD. [pcnews] More »
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Personal Protection Launcher Lets you Powder the Nose of your Attacker
11:24PM Addy Dugdale | With a range of 40 feet – that 25 feet more than a Taser – the Avurt IM-5 personal protection launcher will keep away anyone you don’t want too close. It’s simple to work: fire at the chest of a large, blonde man in a stadium, pull the trigger and the man will be too overcome by coughing to do anything to you. More »
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Netflix Lowers Prices for DVD Rentals by $1 … Again
11:17PM Charlie White | Netflix just lowered its prices on the “three DVDs out at-a-time” plan again, taking it down a buck to $15.99 a month. Our jaws dropped as we saw the above notice in our inbox, because it was just three weeks ago when Netflix had lowered the price to $16.99. Hey, keep those price reductions coming, Netflix! Pretty soon, they’ll be giving them away. We have a price war on our hands between Netflix and Blockbuster, folks, and it looks like we movie buffs will be the winners. The burning question now is, will Blockbuster match this price reduction by Netflix? Blockbuster now offers three DVDs at a time for $16.99 through the mail only, or $17.99 to get your movies through the mail and then get free in-store exchanges. Incidentally, the company just crippled that “total access” plan, limiting it to five free in-store exchanges a month with a charge of $1.99 each afterwards. That may be one of the first things to change back to the way it was before. The next front in this war will be movie downloading, which just heated up with Blockbuster’s August 8 acquisition of Movielink. That buy might give Blockbuster access to lots of content from the major studios, putting the onus on Netflix to improve its “Watch Now” service, which suffers from a paucity of selections. How low can these prices go before the by-mail movie rental services are completely unprofitable? Will this be a situation like a gunfight where both participants shoot each other and die? More »
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Meebo’s Goes iPhone Compatible With Fully Optimized Mobile Client
11:00PM Jason Chen | We wrote about Meebo’s iPhone compatibility right after the iPhone was launched—and it wasn’t so great. Consider that a thing of the past. Meebo’s just launched and iPhone-only IM webapp that’s just as good as Meebo for the desktop. We’ve actually tested it on our iPhones, and can say it’s the best chat app on the iPhone yet, partially thanks to the fact that it is tied in to the Meebo on the desktop. You get the standard Meebo IM networks you get on the desktop. You can even log in to the same Meebo account and use the same settings, including away messages and previous messages. Actually chatting is great as well, allowing you to keep the keyboard up while chatting, which is super convenient. They wanted to make this as light as possible, which means some features are stripped out (like adding contacts). But all the important ones you need to hold a conversation are there. [Meebo] More »
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Microsoft Puts New RAM in Xbox, World Goes Crazy
10:50PM Mark Wilson | The Internet is buzzing about Microsoft’s announcement to replace NEC’s 10MB of 90nm embedded DRAM with TSMC’s 10MB of 90nm embedded DRAM in their Xbox 360 console. After all, there is a new company involved! And we’ve been expecting Microsoft to start implementing smaller chips in their Xbox which should lead to lower power consumption, cooler operation…etc. But this ain’t it folks. The update means essentially nothing, except probably that Microsoft found a better deal on this particular component from someone else. We don’t mean to come off rude—there are just a number of outlets carrying this story, implying it will provide a direct benefit to the consumer but not explaining what that benefit will be. To sum it up: none. [press release] More »
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Rocket Belt Conference in Niagra Falls a Soaring Success
10:20PM Addy Dugdale | Want to see a video of Eric Scott showing off his jetpack at this year’s Rocket Belt conference, held last weekend at an air base in Niagra Falls? Thought so. More »
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People Selling iPhone Sexy Touch Time in India
9:40PM Jesus Diaz | According to fellow Indian journo and Giz reader Aswin R, someone in India is selling sexy touching time with the iPhone using Facebook’s marketplace. Not selling the iPhone itself, just 15 minutes to “see/touch/feel” the JesusPhone under supervision. I guess some people would do it, maybe hoping to cure some illness. Like acne. Or bunions. It only costs 500 rupees, which is 12 US dollars or 166.66 Deku Nuts. More »
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