We’ve seen all sorts of iPhone wannabes from China, but this SPhone is made of paper and it will be yours for just 3,999 Taiwanese dollars or $122. You may not want it, however. Not because it’s made of people but because actually, according to a Taiwanese reader, it’s made out of paper so people can burn it at funerals. That way, according to him, dead people will get it in the afterlife. And even while it may be for burning, it comes with specs:
It’s been muttered about since the first of the year, but now it’s official and in full effect: TiVo gets the Rhapsody Music Service, and users get a month-long free trial without providing a credit card, or even signing up. It’s just one click. (Okay, like two.)
It’s a match-up of make-life-easier products, albeit two of the more famous underdogs in the whole digital-home arena. I had the chance to play around with the software and shoot a gallery of screens to give you an idea of how TiVolicious the Rhapsody experience just got.
Apple was named defendant in a class-action lawsuit filed by Timothy Smith over bricked iPhone matters. Specifically, he asks that Apple be forbidden from selling locked iPhones and that it provide warranty assistance for owners of unlocked iPhones, unable to hit the more modern 1.1.1 firmware without bricking.
I’d agree with the second point, and I’d dare say that if Apple sold the iPhone unlocked but without visual voicemail support on TMO, others might actually choose AT&T instead of feeling jailed by them. These are the same lawyers, M. Van Smith and Damian R. Fernandez, who opened up the site appleiphonelawsuit.com, so this is part of that same fishing trip, which seems more justified than past class-action frivolity. I don’t agree with Apple on their recent iPhone policies, and think it’s a dicey time to buy the phone, but I’m also not a fan of overly litigious conversations between buyer and tech company, either. Clearly, this isn’t a happy time for Mac fans. [Computerworld]
Quick Apple hack updates: The iPod touch is reported to have reached a read milestone for the filesystem. The iPhone’s 1.1.1 firmware has a few apps ported to it, but it’s still not easy for general consumption. We’ll do full posts when more easily implemented hacks are finished. [TUAW]
Blank CDs are on their way out as a day to day storage medium, and by the looks of things they don’t make for a very comfortable chair either. The inexplicably titled “Panda Chair” was designed by Belen Hermosa using hundreds of disks lined in rows. It may be uncomfortable, but I suppose lying on a bed of flash drives wouldn’t be so hot either. [Designboom]
The Quantum Leap meets Early Edition flavor of NBC’s Journeyman makes it a pretty fantastic show with just two episodes in the can and the third airing tonight. But what’s with the blatant iPhone product placement?
It’s almost a character in itself, allowing the guy to Google Finder-spydeR stuff on the go, check to see what year he’s in by seeing if he has reception, and show off to people in the past. Seriously, people would look at him like a space man from the future if he showed that off. Speaking of product placement, what are some of the worst tech-product placement offenses of recent memory? Something along the lines of Jack Bauer triggering a bomb with a Treo.
If you need a little extra incentive to wake up in the morning, the Mr. Clock Radio may be just what you need. He can wake your lazy arse up in one of 30 different ways—from gentle coaxing to flat-out drill sergeant-style orders. He can even tell fortunes, read the time aloud, wink and blink, react to light or motion, and play music via AM, FM or iPod/MP3. Just remember that this little bastard costs $79.99 before you go punching him in the face. [SkyMall via 7Gadgets]
Hear that? It’s the RIAA quaking in their diamond-coated boots as yet another A-list band gives labels the finger: Pretty hate machine Trent Reznor announced today that “as of right now Nine Inch Nails is a totally free agent, free of any recording contract with any label.” Instead of futzing through the hapless middleman of an inept label, Trent’s promising “a direct relationship with the audience as I see fit and appropriate,” so we can expect more experiments in direct distribution and promotion, probably culminating in an album release not unlike Radiohead’s In Rainbows.
If two of the biggest acts in the industry can see the digital writing on the wall and totally embrace it—that the old way of doing business is broken—why can’t the labels? What Radiohead and NIN are showing is that the business model “of the future” feared by entrenched interests isn’t arriving some time in the horizon. It’s touching down now. [NIN, Flickr]
Rather than take a long and tangled miniUSB to USB cable with you wherever you go, this swiveling DOCKEY condenses it all into a small, keyfob-sized connector. It’s essentially just the two ends—USB and miniUSB—attached to a swiveling joint that lets you position your phone, PMP, or Bluetooth headset at just the right position to charge from your laptop. Sure, it’s not that great of a product seeing as it does only one thing, but if you really need it you’re going to be happy you have it—much like backscratchers, shoe horns, and smooth jazz background music on a website. [Dockey via Pinstack]
The first renderings of the final hardware cases for Bug Labs open source gadget platform are up on their website. As you can see it’s really coming along since the last time we got a look at it. It’s looking halfway decent now, although a little clunkier than I would have expected. It will be interesting to see how the design evolves as the product release approaches. [Bug Labs]
