RSS Feeds
Press
Gizmodo Sues The Onion for Libel, Asks Drew Curtis for Legal Advice
Posted by Jesus Diaz at 10:00 PM on December 22, 2007
TAHOE, Nevada (Agencies) — Popular technology blog Gizmodo.com has sued the leading international newspaper conglomerate The Onion for libel, following the latter recent article on Microsoft Corp.'s (MFST) Zune 2 MP3 player's roaring success.
In declarations to the Reno Gazzette Journal this morning, Gizmodo's editor-in-chief and dictator-for-life Brian Lam categorically denied that he referred to the second-generation Zune as having "great design." "The Onion just made that whole thing up" Mr. Lam said, "what I really said was that the Zune 2 is an amazing piece of innovative engineering, a technological breakthrough that will affect all technology breakthroughs to come. The design, however, it a little bland." Visibly angry, Mr. Lam accused The Onion of systematically "getting things wrong."
If you enjoyed creating the 
This clip is rich. If you've taken a journo class, you know that companies send these video junkets out to lazy local news producers all the time that sorta look like news but are really just PR propaganda. This one's just hilariously blatant RIAA fodder though, with awesome bits like, "Prices that are extremely low indicate a CD is pirated." Because low CD prices are totally ridiculous. 
You know how your coffee cup keeps getting stolen at work? Walk into the break room with this bad boy and firmly proclaim that "this sh*t is going to stop right now." You will feel like a real badass until the police arrive. The cup is a concept design from Simone Brewster, so it is not something you will be able to pick up in your local Pier 1—but if you are into violent drinking vessels, you can always get yourself a 
The Life|point HD touch panel takes home automation to the next level by allowing users to watch high-definition video, pause live TV or even check out four television streams at the same time—all from one device. The system also features an iPhone-esque point-and-slide navigation feature that can be used to control instant news, traffic and weather as well as the lighting, security and temperature control in your home. 
The Gadget: Startup Zoombak is offering two new GPS-enabled trackers that use GSM cellular networks to report their whereabouts. One is for pets, intended to be worn in a nylon pouch on the collar of your dog (or large cat?). The other is for cars, so you can keep tabs on your teenager, at least until they wonder what the device with the blinky green light is doing.
Dell's 
For those who can't wait to get their hands on the actual Bug Labs hardware, the Dragonfly SDK is now available for download with virtual hardware, so you can start working on your own apps and genius implementations for the hardware. [
Unfortunately, there is not much in the way of information (or pictures for that matter) of the Tardis bedroom that Steve Baker of Sittingbourne, Kent, built for his 10-year-old son George, but the image included here should give you the gist. Obviously the kid is a rabid Doctor Who fan —an obsession that is only encouraged by the fact that everyone notices that he looks like a miniature David Tennant. Watch your back David—George will probably be after your job one of these days. [
If we had to find one way for the iPhone and Windows Vista to interact, it probably would have been via SideShow, Vista's secondary-display technology that gives you a small portable control board that you can tote around. The people at Ikanos Consulting have been fooling around with a SideShow webserver and are creating an iPhone-compatible version (along with DS, Wii, PSP, PS3) to control your PC wherever you have access. It's not available for download yet, but a beta should be coming soon. [
The ski resort of Les Deux Alps wants to give visitors a chance to experience what it is like to be caught in an avalanche and learn how to survive without all of that messy "white death" business. The "Robocoaster," as it is called, was the brainchild of of local businessman Marc Dode, who lost a friend in an avalanche several years ago. The simulator is encased in a large dome that features two cabins and a large fan to blow cold air. 
Still 
Like late-night white knights, Jon Stewart and Colbert are returning to save us from rerun/reality TV/web 
In order to combat the rising number of mobile phones smuggled into prisons, the UK Government is considering installing the Boss II scanner chair in every jail in England and Wales. The Boss makes every inmate its bitch thanks to three sensitive sensors that can detect internally hidden metal items as small as a pin or a sim card. Two Boss chairs are already being used in local prisons and have helped detect 21 mobile phones since April. 
If you're one of the lucky ones who are getting a 
Wisconsin State Senator Jon Erpenbach wants to pay to keep non-violent youth offenders out of adult court by funding rehab programs for juveniles declared delinquent by taxing another class of (usually) non-violent delinquents: gamers. His proposed one per cent tax on game consoles and games actually doesn't tack an obscene penalty onto the receipt—$4.50 on an Xbox 360 Elite. We like the idea of the program but not singling out gaming to foot the bill in principle, 'cause it ties gaming to being a bad seed in two ways: 
At 6:08 AM GMT on the 22nd, activists Donna Sheehan and Paul Reffell hope you will join them in their quest for world peace—by having an orgasm. Yes, the two have organised Global Orgasm 2007 with the hope that through "the largest possible instantaneous surge of human biological, mental and spiritual energy" we can "effect positive change in the energy field of the Earth". Since manual stimulation is so 2006, we've rounded up ten gadgets that will help you contribute to the cause:
Lousy, lousy puns aside, these USB shoes can store 1, 2, or 4GB of your data, making it not only stylish, but fairly useful. They come in basketball and futbol varieties, meaning that if you're more of a baseball fan, you need to wait for the next version. On the other hand, if you're a baseball fan you're used to waiting anyway—since that's essentially 90% of the game. [
Nielsen's survey of the state of console gamer HD setups reveals nothing too shocking, though I suspect the numbers are slightly inflated since participants were from the top 20 U.S. markets, over 18 and played at least one hour a week, skewing it toward more affluent, older and less casual gamers. The quick conclusions though, followed by a longer breakdown w/ fun charts below: A huge proportion of gamers have gone HD, with PS3 owners leading in higher setups—71 per cent gaze at some sort of HDTV, and 54 per cent are enveloped by surround sound, with the 360, and surprisingly, the Wii not too far behind.
Somewhere between 2006 and today, I stopped considering Apple an underdog. And I'm not just talking about their iPod numbers nor am I talking about their no-where-close to Windows marketshare. I mean, screw marketshare, really: Does Porsche outsell Honda? Apple busted out some serious products like the iPhone and iPods and made aggressive growth in their notebook lines. That's not to say they had it easy. But I think all in all, Apple deserves a solid A for their products and excellent damage control. 
• A security researcher published code that is capable of bricking most HP and Compaq laptops. That doesn't sound too good. [
Way to go, Caddo School Board. You've won yourself the Gizmodo luddite of the week award. See, when a student films the principal of your Huntington High School fighting another student, the correct response isn't to ban cellphones, it's to make sure principals don't fight with students. It was only after the student showed the clip to local media that you actually did something about the situation, putting the principal on paid administrative leave. As a side note, we would also have accepted "resigning and putting people not completely retarded onto the school board" as a correct response. [
Fantastic. Not only are people trying to stop you from skipping ads on your DVR, Microsoft's patent will stop you from skipping ads on video you watch on your computer. The technique uses DRM to prevent any sort of playback until you watched the appropriate number of ads, and would essentially allow content providers like NBC or other networks to place their shows online and make sure they get their ad time's worth. Although we're in favor of any method that would get more people to put shows online, the fact of the matter is we're used to skipping over commercials via our DVRs anyway. To BitTorrent we go. [
Someday, 3D images could actually catch on, and if that ever happens you'll be ready with this Loreo 3D Lens in a Cap that lets you snag stereoscopic images with your digital SLR. Inside this Viewmaster-like contraption are a couple of focusing lenses that gather images from two slightly different angles. Therein lies the 3D magic. 
The three methods for running Windows on a Mac (Boot Camp, Parallels and Fusion) have been around for a while, but Mactech's numbers seem to be the first we've seen on how the three stack up on Leopard. The results weren't that surprising. 
If you're jittery about an electric blanket frying your brain, here's the ChiliPad from T2 International to keep you warm all night long, using technology normally seen in cooling systems for overclocked PCs. Water flows through soft coils in this mattress pad, either heating your bed up to 105° in the winter or keeping you nice and chilled at 65° in the summer. If you're a cool cat sleeping with a hotty, each you can control your own temperature via a remote control for each of its two zones. You'll pay $US479-$999 depending on your mattress size. Hey, this could save some money on heating and air conditioning. [
Nokia's "First Access" service that would let N81 owners play the 2nd Generation N-Gage games has been delayed until 2008, citing issues that they discovered via their 1000 global testers. We actually tested this new N-Gage platform earlier this year, and found it kind of to be like an Xbox Live Lite for mobiles. It seems (from 
Well, Redmond, it's been a funny year, hasn't it? Even if you ignore those Apple commercials, it's hard to ignore the fact that Vista was probably one of the main reasons people switched to the Mac OS, or to third-party Linux-based systems. We'll get to the big V—and that other mighty stain Windows Mobile—in a bit, but first you deserve much credit for some impressive feats in gaming, entertainment and home networking.
If you have a Tassimo single-serve coffee brewer and can't get enough of Starbucks coffee, now those little TDisc pods are available with four different varieties of Starbucks brew. Tassimo has teamed up with Starbucks to offer Breakfast Blend, House Blend, Caffé Verona and Africa Kitamu coffees in pod form. We went to our local Starbucks and got a steaming cup of Breakfast Blend coffee, while our comely assistant brewed up a cup of the same blend back at the office in this Braun Tassimo brewer. Let's do a taste test.
Is this RAM Wing 100 yacht by Levi Designs a catamaran or a monohull? It's both, starting out in front is a catamaran and ending up as a monohull in the stern. The most remarkable aspect of this design concept is its tremendous speed, 100 knots with a range of 2000 nautical miles. That's not bad for a giant 328-foot boat that'll have a submarine, twin helipads, a motorcycle/car garage and swimming pool on board. It gets its speed from halfway flying, skimming the waves because of the lift from its catamaran bow. Gorgeous, but will it ever be built? [
