Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Entertainment
VuNow PoD Media Streamer Is Cheap and BitTorrent-Ready
11:45PM Mark Wilson | While even Blu-ray players are getting into the media streaming business, Verismo Networks has announced the $US100/$US150 VuNow PoD, promising everything from YouTube to BitTorrent in a clean Apple TVesque interface. More »
Software
Android Paid Apps Coming In Early Q1, 2009
10:45PM John Herrman | The lack of a payment system in Android’s marketplace has kept at least one major player from participating in Google’s whimsical mobile phone adventure, but the company says paid apps are coming soon, soon, soon. More »
Gadgets
Nextar Does Solar Gadgetry Right With Sun-Powered Handsfree Kit
9:00PM John Herrman | Honestly, most of the solar gadgets we see aren’t terribly practical, and often rely on a primary, wired power source. Not the Nextar NXBT handsfree kits—these are the real thing. More »
Music
30GB Zunes Failing Everywhere, All At Once
8:10PM John Herrman | Right, so this is a weird one: we’re getting tons of reports—tons—about failing Zune 30s. Apparently, the players began freezing at about midnight last night, becoming totally unresponsive and practically useless. Update: The easy official fix here. More »
Computers
Rumour: Apple Launching Giant iPod Touch Next Fall
5:11PM Matt Buchanan | Citing “three independent sources close to Apple,” one who has “actually held the device,” TechCrunch says Apple is planning to release a giant iPod touch device with a seven- or nine-inch screen next fall. More »
Vehicles
Google Street View Captures Prototype Porsches
12:15PM Jason Chen | First Google Street View captures a person peeing on the street, and now they drive right by a bunch of Porsche prototypes in Colorado. More »
Software
T-Mobile G1 Getting Android’s Cupcake OS Update
11:44AM Jason Chen | HTC’s confirmed to Engadget that the “cupcake” OS Update will be available to the T-Mobile G1 some time in the future. No specification on when the over-the-air update will hit, though. [Engadget] More »
Robots
Unreal Snooping Bot Can Grow from 25 Inches to 20 Feet
11:22AM Jesus Diaz | So weird. This iRobot Packbot has a Situational Awareness Mast built-in, a surveillance system which can grow from 25 inches (63cm) to 20 feet (6m) lifting 200 pounds (90kg), on its top configuration. The mechanism is very ingenious: More »
Vehicles
11:11AM Nick Broughall | Remember back in June how Air New Zealand announced it was going to be trialling a biofuel mix in a 747 aircraft based on the jatropha plant? Well, they did it, and according to The Register, everything went off without a hitch. The plane used a 50-50 mixture of the biofuel and regular fuel in one engine, while the other three all had regular fuel running through them. They tested out a series of mid-air manoeuvres like engines stops, restarts, and got full power from the biofuel mix.
More »
Air New Zealand Successfully Trials Weed Biofuel
11:11AM Nick Broughall | Remember back in June how Air New Zealand announced it was going to be trialling a biofuel mix in a 747 aircraft based on the jatropha plant? Well, they did it, and according to The Register, everything went off without a hitch. The plane used a 50-50 mixture of the biofuel and regular fuel in one engine, while the other three all had regular fuel running through them. They tested out a series of mid-air manoeuvres like engines stops, restarts, and got full power from the biofuel mix.
More »
Random Stuff
10:53AM Nick Broughall | If you’re heading out to watch the midnight fireworks tonight to say goodbye to the year that was 2008, be prepared for a slight delay. And when we say slight, we mean slight – one second, to be precise. Boffins at Greenwich will be adding a single second onto the year 2008 to adjust time for the minute slowing of the earth’s rotation. According to AP, the move has reignited the debate between GMT and atomic time as the worldwide standard for timekeeping – atomic clocks are precise to the nanosecond and don’t need sporadic adjustments of a second to maintain accuracy. However, they don’t take into account changes to the planet’s rotation, either and in hundreds of years midday would actually be closer to 1pm than today’s 12pm. In any case, if any of you have an X-men like ability to slow down time and you’re wondering why tonight’s fireworks don’t kick off until 12:00:01, now you know.
[AP] More »
2009 Will Arrive One Second Late To Its Own Party
10:53AM Nick Broughall | If you’re heading out to watch the midnight fireworks tonight to say goodbye to the year that was 2008, be prepared for a slight delay. And when we say slight, we mean slight – one second, to be precise. Boffins at Greenwich will be adding a single second onto the year 2008 to adjust time for the minute slowing of the earth’s rotation. According to AP, the move has reignited the debate between GMT and atomic time as the worldwide standard for timekeeping – atomic clocks are precise to the nanosecond and don’t need sporadic adjustments of a second to maintain accuracy. However, they don’t take into account changes to the planet’s rotation, either and in hundreds of years midday would actually be closer to 1pm than today’s 12pm. In any case, if any of you have an X-men like ability to slow down time and you’re wondering why tonight’s fireworks don’t kick off until 12:00:01, now you know.
[AP] More » 