Got a fat arse? Sorry to hear it. If jogging and salads aren’t for you, here’s a “Easy Beautiful Butt Cushion” from Japan, one that promises to slim down that behind of yours without any of that pesky effort. Does it vibrate? Force you to sit in some uncomfortable position? Is it stuffed full of magic beans? And I have no clue what that hole in the middle is for, but as it’s designed for people who take laziness to the next level, I don’t really want to think about it. [Product Page via CrunchGear via Tokyo Mango]
Apple may have strayed away from design that looks like a table lamp, but Touch Interactive is having none of that. Their Hybrid DVD Player and Display unit has the same weiner tip base as the old iMac, but instead of a levered arm attached to the display, this goes straight up and out. We may not have much use for an all-in-one DVD player unit around our houses, but dentist’s offices, rich people’s kitchens and sperm banks have much different needs than we do. [Touch Interactive via Cyber Theater]
Apparently there are nerds in space, too. This was spotted in variable star V838 Monocerotis of the constellation Monoceros and, holy moley, it looks like the Firefox logo! Whatever. I’ll be impressed when we see a celestial body that looks like an iPod. [EE Times via CrunchGear via New Launches]
Our Deep Throat at the Pentagon’s parking lot has sent us an update with new pictures and the reason why the DARPA Challenge cars have taken over the military installation today: “they are showing off.” After all, the men with the funny hats pay the bills. You can check his complete explanation here.
Playing a Neo Geo fighter on the Wii just isn’t the same unless you’ve got one of those four-button gamepads you used to find in the arcades. That’s why we must insist that you buy one of these Neo Geo Stick 2 from Play Asia for US$59, connect it to your Wii, and beat the crap out of your little brother with Mai. Your little brother may be 33 now and you may be 38, but that shouldn’t change anything except the stakes. Winner pays the other guy’s mortgage for a month. [Play-Asia via Technabob via Uber Gizmo]
Two years after initially smacking down Echostar (now just Dish Network) in court for stepping on its patent for a “multimedia time warping system” (aka a DVR) Tivo has clinched final and lasting victory against the satellite provider. Dish Network subscribers won’t have to worry about losing their DVRs or seeing anything different though, since the current boxes are designed around Tivo’s patents (probably because they knew they were gonna go down in court). Update: Echostar/Dish is actually gonna take it all the way to the Supreme Court!
The Windows Mobile hackers over at XDA forums seem to have gotten Android working on an AT&T Tilt (HTC TyTN II), meaning that eventually you might be able to get an Android phone working without actually buying a particularly “Android” phone. The stability is pretty nonexistent, but you can see that it actually works insofar as you can load it up on top of Windows Mobile and do stuff with it. Entirely replacing the phone with Android’s ROM is another story, but if anyone can do it, the nerdlingers on XDA can. [XDA Developers via WM Experts via Boy Genius]
Hirokazu Hamamura, the head of gigantic Japanese gaming mag Famitsu’s parent company, made a prediction that Nintendo will unveil the next-generation DS at E3 2008 this summer. Normally we wouldn’t think anything of some businessman making predictions, but if anyone knows what’s going on with Nintendo, it’s Famitsu (the gaming industry and gaming press are really tight over there). Kotaku says it took two years between the transition from DS to DS Lite, so a summer DS Lite to DS EXTREME transition might be possible. Our prediction is that they’ll do away with the GBA port altogether, saving space and hardware costs. [Bloomberg Japan via Neogaf via Kotaku]
Do you want to prove to your office mates that you’ve got an acerbic wit and great sense of irony? This Paper E-Mail isn’t the way to do it. Sure, it’s clever to write notes to Bob that look like emails (cc: your mom!), but is it really clever? Is it US$3.99 clever? Perhaps. Is it US$3.99 plus shipping clever? Perhaps not. Either way, you only get 50 chances per pack to impress. [ThinkGeek via Tech Digest]
The truth is out! Windows Vista’s User Account Control makes you want to put your computer through a wall because that’s what Microsoft wanted. David Cross, a product manager who designed UAC (sadly, not that one), told attendees at the RSA 2008 conference, “The reason we put UAC into the platform was to annoy users. I’m serious.”
