Their answer, given in patent filing US 2009/0095729, is a simple one: make all free-standing gadgets like kettles, toasters, juicers and food mixers in the shape of tall cuboids that can easily be pushed together on a worktop, with no wasted space between them. As the controls could be recessed in their flat lids or on the front panels, no space-wasting side access is required. The patent also suggests connecting the appliances together—presumably using a common power supply.

You know what this means right? Bedroom, office, living room and dining room squareness are still wide open. I’m calling dibs bitches! [Patent via New Scientist via Boing Boing and Fast Company]

Like its predecessor, the newest gCubik is a strange device—more of proof-of-concept than anything else. It’s purpose is to give the impression, via its six touchscreens, that it contains a 3D model. Cleverly, it does this while remaining a “naked-eye” tech, which means that the effect succeeds without glasses, from all angles, or even from multiple angles simultaneously. It pulls this off with a complex lens system, which reflects different images depending on the viewer’s perspective, much like a simple hologram toy.

The lens arrays accounts for the low resolution, but the effect is still evident and very cool. And the newest model is much, much closer to the handheld design implement that its creators originally envisioned: all surfaces are now touch sensitive displays and accelerometers, meaning that the cube can be rotated in all directions, viewed from all angles and interacted with in a number of ways. Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, the agency behind the project, only had the somewhat gimped model (video below) to show, but say the device will soon be able to simulate objects that respond realistically to movement.

In other words, you will soon be able to buy a box that can convincingly simulate another, smaller box within itself. This, I think, is called “progress”. [Tech-On]

Paco, a prefab mobile studio, takes all your living needs and puts it into a single three-square-metre cube. Designed by Jo Nagasaka, the cube is supposed to be a sleek home away from home.

It’s actually pretty amazing what Nagasaka and Schemata Architecture (his firm) have been able to put in such a small space. There’s a kitchen, a folding table, secret toilet, umbrella-style shower attachment and sleeping hammock.

The cube also features a “convertible” top, which can open up to allow in ventilation and natural light. While it’s not a place you’d quite want to live in forever, it’s certainly an incredibly functional get-away. Too bad the price tag is ridiculous: $US68,000. [Paco via Cscout Japan]

The TouchCube works just like its more antiquated brethren, but instead of grinding the actual spinning cogs (manual labour is for suckers!), a simple swipe of the finger in a straight line or an ‘L’ shape (for rotations) does the trick. There’s an accelerometer built in that ensures only the upwards-facing surfaces respond to your touch, so you can still hold the thing.

And it wouldn’t be a touchscreen Rubik’s cube without a few improvements: namely, the TouchCube can solve itself as you watch, and even teach you, step by step, how to do it. So you can be one of those kids we all marveled at in school (Ben Shepple, this one’s for you) who could solve a cube in a matter of seconds. Built-in memory will also save your cube’s state if you need to take a break.

Techno Source has spent three years hard at work in their underground puzzle and wonderment factory to bring us the TouchCube, and now, behold, it can be ours. For $US150 this fall. We’ll try to do some hands-on solving later this week at NYC’s massive Toy Fair-be on the lookout for more. [TouchCube]

Sure, those incredibly similar menu icons are still there at the bottom, but that spinning cube is more Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop than iPhone. Novell’s been spinning their Linux desktop OS like a cube-shaped top for years, and this S-Class cube interface from LG reminded me of it today.

Says LG of their cube:

A cube-based layout provides four customisable home screens for direct access to all features. Music, movies, pictures and more are within reach, thanks to intuitive, touch-based 3D menus. The rich 3D graphics give S-Class a life-like look that makes it natural and easy to navigate.

Of course, that spinning, natural and “easy to navigate” 3D cube might not perform quite that way when the phone is loaded up with apps, music and other memory-hogging info, but we’ll know for sure when this guy officially launches at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on February 16.

[Unwired View]

According to the description, the Yoshimoto Cube transforms into two stellated rhombic dodecahedrons. Which is a fancy way to say “the Yoshimoto Cube transforms your brain into pineapple jelly”. [Reddit]