The Musical SpongeBob Digital Thermometer. According to the box, it “plays SpongeBoob SquarePants Theme” while in use, and it is for “oral, underarm and rectal use.” According to me, I’m not sticking this in any place.
Here’s a really great image looking back at the royal roots of the three Nintendo big boys; Mario, Link and Donkey Kong. There isn’t any monochrome character love from the old days proper, but it is quite an extensive time line nonetheless, which culminates in the modern day incarnations of our beloved superheroes. Things we have learnt from the image include the fact that Donkey Kong once had breasts bigger than Pamela, Link has been know to walk about without his hat and Mario hasn’t always had enough pixels for a well defined mustache. It is all rather shocking stuff; brace yourself and jump in for the money shot. [Fubiz via Notcot]
The Absolut Quartet is an impressive electromechanical sculpture, which was put together by Dan Paluska and Jeff Lieberman. Using ping-pong ball cannons to play a marimba, robot fingers to tinker wine glasses and a central computer to control, well, the whole lot, the two creative minds have created the first—to our knowledge—ping-pong ball based orchestra. It may not be our music of choice to chill out to, but we can’t helped but be dazzled by the majestic union of technology and music, once again. Check out the video above for some ping-ponging, ding-donging, da la la la, ting ting musical madness. Be sure to pop down to 186 Orchard st. in NYC to see it in the flesh. [MAKE]
Firefox has just hit 500 million downloads worldwide; it is an impressive statistic and we think everyone who works on the project should get a pat on the back. As if their contribution in creating a kick-ass browser was not enough to the world, the Mozilla team is celebrating by raising funds for 500 million grains of rice, which they will give away to poverty stricken nations.
It was only a matter of time before Microsoft officially discontinued manufacturing the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on, but it took them a few days longer than we expected. Their statement is finally out, and it signals Microsoft’s official withdraw from HD DVD on the console front.
Paul Knight uses this weird machine to change the appearance of iPhones and iPods into spy plane black titanium nitride-coated machines, which are quite more beautiful than the originals. It uses “plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition” to modify the nature of the surfaces, a complex chemical process used to coat objects like luxury watches, drill bits or aircraft blades. The finished gadgets are simply stunning.
The Ulysses spacecraft, which was launched way back in 1990, has been visiting the planets of the solar system for some 17-years, but now the Ulysses looks like it is doomed. A critical error has occurred in the mechanism that prevents the fuel from freezing, and that means the Ulysses is soon to be heading to spacecraft heaven.
The iPhone is a beautiful machine with amazingly clean lines and smooth surfaces. But how does an iPhone that’s suffered the normal daily wear and tear hold up…under a US$30,000 optical microscope? Not so bad, actually. And its frosted metal back casing looks just wicked.
These shots are pretty and all, but for the true iPhone enthusiasts, a US$250,000 scanning electron microscope reveals even more:
There’s a rumour going around the tech finance pubs about Sony using Sharp panels in its future Large LCDs.
The promised MGM films have just arrived to Xbox LIVE Marketplace. 360 owners will be able to enjoy films like the first four Rockies, The Terminator, Species, or a personal favourite, Wargames—with most supporting HD quality. If only MGM and Microsoft could team up to release more than just 19 movies from MGM’s rich library, we’d really be on to something pantsworthy. [Xbox via firingsquad]
