The Gadget: The Mint 220 Digital Music Station, which acts both as an iPod dock, but also as a wireless speaker system that syncs via USB dongle to your Mac or PC. Comes with wireless remote and uses the 2.4GHz spectrum to beam music up to 45 feet/15 meters.
Earlier this week, the NYT put together a timeline of the evolution of Olympic torches throughout the years. The guys at OObject have followed that list up with 10 of the most notable cauldron designs, and they make a good point while they are at it. While the cauldron was a part of the festivities since the original Athenian games, many people forget that the torch relay was conceived as Nazi propaganda. Kind of puts the whole Beijing relay protest situation into perspective. Like it or not, politics and the games go hand in hand. At any rate, it is interesting to see some of these cauldron designs compared side by side. [OObject]
Musical doorbells are annoying enough, but what if you gave your visitors the freedom to express themselves creatively? That’s exactly what designer Li Jian had in mind when he came up with the Pianobell. Unless you are friends with a lot of talented musicians, I don’t see much of an upside here. On the other hand, it could be amusing to torture your FedEx guy with a bizarre form of performance anxiety. Fortunately for him, the Pianobell is only a concept at this point. [Labexp via Freshome]
If you and your DVR are having trouble keeping up with all of the Olympics coverage, Microsoft is offering Media Centre users the opportunity to catch up with on-demand content. All you need to do is launch Windows Media Centre on a PC or laptop running Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate and scroll down to Online Media. There you will find a link to activate “NBC Olympics On The Go.” (Can also be activated via the NBC site). The content is said to be “up-to-HD quality,” whatever that means, so you should get a decent look at your favourite events. AU: Needless, to say, this won’t be working for Australians.
Until I loaded up this realtime Global Disaster Alert Map operated by the International Disaster and Risk Conference, which tracks biological hazards, chemical spills, fires, volcanoes, earthquakes and epidemics, I earnestly thought that it had been a pretty good day. I was wrong, and I will not be so naive as to drop my constant cynicism again. [IDRC via bookofjoe]
Handy if you want to hit on a cute waitress at a decent sushi bar or the French exchange student pulling shots at your usual coffee place with horrible abortions of their native tongue, Google Translate is now optimised for the iPhone. It stores your most recent translations on the phone so you don’t need to stay connected if you can get by with just a few canned lines. All mocking aside, we actually think it’s pretty cool, at least when what it comes up with is comprehensible. [Google Translate via Google Mobile Blog]
We desperately need you to settle an ongoing debate for us. When you refer to everyone’s favourite plastic brick building blocks in the plural form, do you say “Lego” or “Legos?” Lego is technically the correct term–but it sounds weird. I mean “I would like a box of Lego for Christmas” vs. “I would like a box of Legos for Christmas.” Words used in the English language that are the same in both the singular and plural form are always awkward–but dammit, this one is important. So we must ask: do you say “Lego” or “Legos?”
Presenters at Black Hat revealed that most, if not all, of Windows Vista’s security features can be taken out with a single browser exploit, using Java and .NET to execute malicious code. What really makes this a killer, is that it is based around Vista’s fundamental architecture, not a specific security flaw, and can be executed with any browser vulnerability. As researcher Dino Dai Zovi told SearchSecurity, “that’s completely game over.”
Summer has gone fast hasn’t it? Hard to believe that many of you will be heading back to school sometime in the next few weeks. That means it’s time to get on a schedule and prepare yourself for another semester of boring lectures, homework and tests. Sure, there is a lot of fun to be had–but the party is going to come to a screeching halt when you get out there into the real world. That’s why you have to apply yourself now so you can get a good job when all is said and done. Either that, or you have to learn how to cut corners more effectively. Since this is the Thank Giz It’s Friday roundup, we are going with the latter.
Developers have told mocoNews that T-Mobile will allow open development and distribution for all handsets across its network this fall, complete with a revenue sharing business model, akin to Apple’s App Store. What’s interesting is that T-Mobile plans to adjust the revenue percentage according to how much an app uses the network. So an app that uses streaming video will bring in less money for developers, but grant them more freedom in what they create (Apple, are you paying attention?).
