The architects hope the design will draw attention to the preservation of oceans and ecosystems, and encourage greater collaboration between Asian and Pacific countries. [Peddle Thrope via MyModernMet via DVICE]

The design is a rough map of the city’s neighbourhood as distinguished by “air boundaries”.
The data is collected from 27 air monitoring stations; every 15 minutes the map lights up in order of highest to lowest air quality. [Living Light via bldgblog]

The Polaris really looks like a multimedia mobile phone that was gently placed into a rolling dock (yea, I know we are all thinking Sony’s Rolly). But it could do a lot more than follow you around and play your tunes. Apparently it could monitor its owner’s health, process diet data and record physical activity. According to CrunchGear it was jointly developed with Flower Robotics who also conceived this mannequin bot.

Crunchgear scored this club remix video of the phonebot:

I bet this robot would have told me about 10 minutes ago that I should stop eating cookies for breakfast. [CrunchGear]

According to iRiver Fans (where we also found these apparent press images), the E200 has been slimmed down to 9.9mm, versus the E100’s 11.3mm.

The current model’s 2.4-inch (262-color) display has also been bumped up to 2.8-inches on the E200. According to Engadget, it may also be a brighter OLED screen.

There’s not too much else to report-the touch-sensitive controls and interface are said to be the same, so I’m left feeling kinda myeh, unfortunately. [iRiver Fans via DAP Review via PMP Today via Engadget]

It’s quite interesting, with well-thought-out logic that points to NK obtaining parts and knowledge from Russia. In short, they probably don’t have quite as good a capability for delivering the payload as previously thought. [The Bulletin]

Curtis describes the project like this:

This Google Earth project offers an extensive mapping of North Korea’s economic, cultural, political, and military infrastructures. Through the topic menu, users of this program have easy access to geographical information on North Korea’s agriculture projects, aviation facilities, communications, hospitals, hotels, energy infrastructure, financial services, leisure destinations, manufacturing facilities, markets, mines, religious locations, restaurants, schools, and transportation infrastructure. In addition to locations of economic interest, this map also displays anti-aircraft locations, the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and Northern Line Limit Line (NLL), incarceration facilities, political monuments, political residencies, military bases, and nuclear facilities.

As you can see, it really includes everything you can think about, from nuclear power plants to military communication towers to ostrich farms to not-secret-anymore prison camps. And of course, all surrounded by all kind of crap and poverty, all courtesy of Kim Jong-il, one of the biggest asses in the history of evil dictators.

How did Curtis get all this info? Easy—and risky: Using his own trips and a network of curious amateur spies who have been visiting the country through these two years. Truly impressive work. [Get it here via Gadling—Thanks Genevieve]

Coincidence?

[Thanks Howard!]

It’s as if thousands of preteens sharing naughty videos cried out over a direct line into Samsung’s R&D department.

The Samsung SCH-W760 is a pretty typical slider for Korea (the only place it will most likely be released), but it features a 3MP camera that can shoot video calls in the dark. The system uses an old technology, infrared, to capture your black and white video transmission in the absence of visible light.

Just don’t do anything we wouldn’t do, you young adults of Korea. In other words, always pretend that your end of the video transmission is broken and that you’ve “never done this before.” [Telecomes Korea via unwired view]

What’s worse than the fact that I actually stood there and filmed the entire routine is that it was one of the highlights of the Australian CeBit show. Seriously – for the average gadget fan, there was not a lot more than cheap, ugly electronics that you wouldn’t even buy cheap in China. If you were thinking about going tomorrow, I’d save yourself the price of entry…

The ears apparently act as a controller, and he gets 9 hours of play time off its 2GB storage. There’s no way you’re going to buy this, so just enjoy it for what it is: a bunny MP3 player with glowing ears. [Soricom via Boing Boing Gadgets]