Here's a video displaying all commercial air traffic in the world during a 24-hour period. Seriously, I'm moving to New York City tomorrow and seeing the flight density in this computer simulation scares me a bit. Thankfully, it's a big planet with plenty of space to fly. But then, pilot friends tell me that sometimes they get close enough to wave at each other, so maybe it's not as big as to accommodate the 7.4 billion passengers that will travel by air in 2020. [Zhaw via Dark Roasted Blend]

Read More »

This is a giant exterior light assembly that looks as angular as a stealth fighter, and bit like a Star Trek shuttlepod. By designer Jeroen Molenaar, it's got some artistic merit and sure, it lights up outside places really nicely... but who cares? It's a giant light fitting that looks like a spaceship, and that's all you need to know. [Jeroenmolenaar via BBG]

Read More »

To those who'd like to support a real world cause while defending the princess from Bowser's latest kidnapping, this limited edition Pink Ribbon DS Lite raises money for the cancer charity Susan G. Komen for the Cure. For every unit sold, Nintendo passes $US5 to the organisation. $US5!!! Whoa. That's big money!

Read More »

If Android sputters out and fades away, Google might have another plan to shake up the phone industry. In a patent filed and 2007 and published this week, Google details plans for an "Instant Bid" system for dealing with wireless connections. The concept is pretty straightforward: devices broadcast their request for service, and available networks automatically return a list of price offers for that service. The system makes perfect sense for locations with competing Wi-Fi hotspots, but the application specifically talks about telecommunication devices. That's where things get interesting.

Read More »

This is the new XM25 Individual Air Burst Weapon. It looks straight out of the Marines' gun locker in Aliens, and in fact, it can take out an Alien if they actually existed because, according to the US Army, it is capable of killing anyone behind walls, beyond hills or even below a trench. The XM25 is not just a concept: three prototypes will enter the final testing phase on the field next month, which means it could be deployed very soon. According to Christian at Defense Tech, even Army officials seem to be amazed at the firepower and precision of this weapon:

Read More »

For those of you who were skeptical of the Griffin AirCurve wire-free iPhone amplifier/dock thingy comes this USB dock that is a genuine neato solution. Dubbed "Simplifi," for once it's a product name that tallies with the product's purpose: it's a combined iPod/iPhone dock that has a CF card slot, a Memory Stick/SD/xD card slot and two powered USB ports. See how useful and clutter-reducing that'd be perched on your desk? It's out now for $US69. [Griffin via Wired]

Read More »

The 2008 International Science and Engineering Visualisation Challenge has just concluded with some pretty astonishing imagery in the winning slots. This picture, dubbed "Glass Forest," is a scanning electron micrograph of diatoms (weird unicellular algae) clinging to a marine worm, and won the photography category: to my eyes it looks half like a palm tree and half like a Star Trek effect. The illustration category winner is even more amazing.

Read More »

Reader Mike Chung sent us these pictures of his MacBook Pro battery, which has almost failed for the second time? Why do I say almost? I mean, it's clear that the battery has ballooned into some sort of slimy, Alien-like monstrosity. Well, apparently this battery is still alive and working.

Read More »

Reuters is claiming that the long, long-awaited Nokia 5800 XpressMusic Touchscreen "Tube" will be launched in London on October 2nd, according to their sources. This confirms the rumour that we floated Wednesday, when the first actual picture of the device surfaced. (It's mostly screen. Surprise!). As with most of the glut of new touchscreen phones out there now, the key to Tube's success as well as the most exciting part of the launch will probably be the device's software, which is rumoured to be a touchscreen revision of the venerable Symbian S60 OS [Reuters]

Read More »

This is Samsung's promo video for the upcoming M8800 mobile phone (aka Pixon) with 8-megapixel camera. In fact it looks very much like a compact camera from the rear, and its 3.2-inch screen bears the same TouchWiz interface as the Omnia. That screen is a 400 x 240 pixel touchscreen with touch keyboard and handwriting recognition, and the phone has AGPS, accelerometer and FM radio. Read on for hands-on photos and full specs.

Read More »

Alps Electronics has decided to take the occasionally annoying sensitivity of some capacitive trackpads to a new extreme, demoing a technology that can accurately sense fingers without coming in direct contact with them. The system is able to sense movements at an admittedly modest range of 3cm, from which distance users can control applications with a range of gestures.

Read More »

Check out the Hong Kong Apple store online and you'll see a couple of lines of text that'll tempt, tease and beguile you if you're dreaming of an unlocked iPhone 3G: "iPhone 3G purchased at the Apple Online Store can be activated with any wireless carrier. Simply insert the SIM from your current phone into iPhone 3G and connect to iTunes 8 to complete activation." About $US700 will get you an unlocked 8GB version, and the 16GB is just $US800. Handy for the dev team, no doubt. [Hong Kong Apple Store via Slashphone]

Read More »

Pansonic's line of Toughbook laptops is already pretty extensive, but it's getting more so: Panasonic's just come up with the 8-series of "business-rugged" notebooks. The F8, T8 and W8 all come with a Gobi 3G mobile broadband system built in for roaming internet access. The F8 is being called the "world's lightest 3G-ready notebook with a 14.1 inch wide display and an internal optical drive," weighs 1.7 kg and has spill-resistant keyboard and integrated handle. The W8 is an ultraportable with 12.1-inch screen, 7-hour battery, and the T8 is similar but with tablet PC options. All are designed to withstand more than the usual share of knocks and bangs, and rugged businesspersons will be pleased to note they're out November for $US2,100 for the W8 and T8 and $US2,500 for the F8. Extensive press release below.

Read More »

We're on the home straight (sorry couldn't resist). With just 3 sleeps to go until Top Gear Australia graces our screens, another sneak peek has hit You Tube. If the preview is any indication, the local version of the popular UK program should make for entertaining viewing.

Read More »

ZDNet is telling the world that Microsoft megastar and man-mountain Steve Ballmer will be heading to Australia in November to speak at the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) at the Four Seasons Hotel in Sydney.

If you want to hear the PC-man scream at you about the latest Microsoft innovations and the digital economy, you'll need to pony up some cash - CEDA members can volunteer to be lambasted by Ballmer's well-renowned shouting for $143 each, while non-CEDA members will need $199.10 (because that 10 cents makes a difference) to enjoy the experience.

Let's just hope his presentation is light on the Vista innovations, and heavy on the Windows 7 innovations...

[ZDNet]

The days of loud, obnoxious motorsport may well be coming to an end, with Honda announcing that they will be debuting their 100% ethanol powered V8 engines at the Gold Coast Indy race in October.

The ethanol engines use a plant-based fuel which burns cleanly with less air pollution, as opposed to the traditional methanol engines used by Indy cars. Yet they still manage to squeeze out the performance, with cars capable of hitting 160kph in less than three seconds.

Generally ethanol isn't considered to be a suitable replacement for fossil fuels as it requires vast amounts of plant life to convert into fuel, and that can eat into the plants being used to feed us. However, last year Honda uncovered a tech that can just convert the inedible bits of food into fuel, kind of like Mr Fusion in the Back To The Future II DeLorean (or not).

Hopefully we'll see this tech develop into the consumer (and time travel) space.

Read More »

Just a reminder that you've only got four days left to enter WDs competition to win a 640GB hard drive. It's quite possible the easiest competition you'll ever enter, and the prize is one of those things that you always need more of - storage.

Now I don't know about you, but every time I think I need to buy more storage, I tend to find something else to spend my money on. Like car rego. Or Xbox games. Or food. That's why this comp is so fantastic - if you win, you won't constantly have to burn stuff to disk because you wasted your storage money on pizza and beer.

To enter the comp, just click here and follow the instructions. Simple.

[WD Bizarre Storage Competition]

Some of you P2P fans may want to know about a new coalition called Arts + Labs. It may sound like some kind of open-source hippie think tank, but it's actually a powerful alignment of film and music copyright owners (NBC Universal, Viacom and the Songwriters Guild of America) and tech firms and ISPs (Microsoft, Cisco Systems and AT&T). It's a group that could put together a pretty serious anti-piracy system without much trouble. Saul Hansell at the NY Times says the group claims that "network operators must have the flexibility to manage and expand their networks to defend against net pollution and illegal file trafficking which threatens to congest and delay the network for all consumers." Hansell interprets this as a call to filter packets, and put the kibosh on any dubious transfers.

Read More »

Last weekend I was up in the Hunter Valley at the Media Connect Influence forum with other leading technology journalists, networking and checking out some of the latest technologies. And, through my ability to ride a virtual horse better than anyone else on Sunday night, I won a pair of Sennheiser PXC 450 noise-cancelling headphones.

While the headphones aren't exactly new, they're still impressive enough for me to want to share the experience with you guys. While I haven't had much of a chance to really test them out properly, I have had enough of a hands on to tell you that these headphones are like a rugby union prop - they're big, but they get around and they perform well. Really well.

Read More »

A sink-in-a-drawer is a great idea, right up to the point when you realise what a bad idea it is. Sure, you know, makeshift loft studio in lower Manhattan, no room for toilet and sink in the bathroom—why not put it in a drawer, and slide it away when you're destined for the throne? But by now you already know the catch: Unless you have a nice little space-time fabric rip, you're going to be taking up floor space in the room adjacent to the bathroom, maybe a kitchen or a closet where small amounts of room are more cherished. Sure, some of you have unused dumbwaiter shafts that would be perfecto, but for the rest of us, the idea is just dumb. [Better Homes and Gardens via Apartment Therapy]

At UCHI this week, Sony were showing off their latest Blu-ray players, the BDP-S350 and the BDP-S550. And while we've seen these players on Giz before, it's good to know that Sony are finally releasing some BD-Live capable players here in Australia. What's more, they're actually at mass market price points: $449 for the S350 and $649 for the S550.

But the announcement of these players in Australia wasn't the most exciting piece of Blu-ray information gained from the event - that mantle went to the hint that the next generation of players would include wireless networking capabilities.

Read More »

I hate rumours and I hate rumour sites. Or better said, I hate stupid rumours and dumb rumour sites. But I specially hate useless people who try to fabricate them and fail miserably. Like this MacBook Pro, which is a gross Photochop done by someone who actually doesn't have a clue about what perspective means. Still--even while this obvious fake has multiple perspective vanishing points and bad clone stamping all around--the fact is that, if they did one for real, I would buy it. [Nowhereelse via Engadget]

Do you think the original KITT's dashboard was so overloaded with useless indicators and LEDs so dumbstastically stupid that it made The Hoff look like a Physics Nobel Prize in leather pants? Then you still haven't seen this. Can anybody please tell us what the hell is the number in the middle of that christmas tree dashboard means?

Who isn't ready for Windows 7? That wiser, stabler, more streamlined OS with Vista's good looks but an even prettier Start button and an alleged 15-second boot time? Heck, even Bill Gates is excited to get on to the next version. You can get your hands on a "pre-beta" version of Windows 7 by attending the Professional Developer Conference (PDC) in LA October 27 to 30, or the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC), also in LA shortly after, from November 5 to 7. Go get them, and then report back to us with some new info. [Vista Blog; screenshot from WinFuture.de]

A bus driver in Honolulu, Hawaii was suspended without pay recently after he was discovered playing video games while driving. Photos taken by a concerned passenger caught him red handed with his PSP, and she complained that he would play at stoplights and "with two hands... at times, while he was driving in traffic." As baffling as all this is, I am even more surprised that he wasn't fired on the spot. And why didn't anyone speak up with a "hey dumbass, keep your eyes on the road before you kill us all?" [KITV via Kotaku]

We've seen some of the BlackBerry Storm's older UI in blurry shots and videos, but it's obviously gotten a recent facelift—especially the keyboard, which used to look absolutely gross. Storm Reviews has a load of pics of the freshest UI off of Vodafone's version, and it looks pretty good, though I find the italics for the keyboard font to be oddly annoying. [Storm Reviews via BGR]

Read More »

As hot as a girl playing the Wii can be (Very NSFW link!), it is imperative that you wait for some real private time before touching yourself in an impure manner. And for the love of God—do not keep the Wii controller in your hand when you do it. Actually, it is best to just leave it in another room altogether. As you will see in this sketch from the BBC TV comedy show The Wrong Door, nothing good can come of it.

Read More »

Motorola Q11 Spotted, Looks Barely Distinguishable from Q9
That doesn't necessarily make it a bad phone though - the Q9 was fantastic, once you got past Windows Mobile...