By and large, America’s water infrastructure is on the cusp of disrepair. Environmentalists and public health officials have been chattering about this for years, but now the problem has become more urgent and the US needs to overhaul much of it in a hurry. More »
After siring sci-fi satirist Kurt Vonnegut Jr, Kurt Vonnegut Sr dabbled in tobacco smoking, pipe cleaning and innovation. The result: this patent for an easily-cleanable, tubular-stemmed tobacco pipe for “a maximum of digital cleanliness”. That means clean fingers. [Atlantic]
When it was time to design new offices for a steel pipe factory, a clever guy decided to use the factory’s product as a major part of the new additions. Puns about pipe dream designs aside, it looks pretty good. More »
Only university kids smoke out of hand-blown bowls with swirly colours. Adults spend their hard-earned money on well-designed products made of stainless steel, acrylic and leather. This thing is the perfect compliment to the Volcano. More »
If the idea of 7000 odd kilometres of cable being laid on the ocean floor kinda gets you hot and steamy, this video has a heap of cable porn for you to watch and enjoy. Not to mention a soundtrack that could replace the global need for coffee…
I’m down at the official launch of the PPC-1 international broadband pipe this morning. Official bits all kick off at 11am, There should be plenty of news, so I’ll be trying to liveblog it. In the meantime, you can watch the cable being laid in the ship here, and the cable arriving in Sydney here to get you all excited…
Update: It’s starting! More »
Today the Pipe International PPC-1 was switched on, providing Australia with its first “carrier neutral” submarine cable. But while we wait for all the ISPs to start selling us huge data caps at bargain basement prices, let’s take a gander at some of the stats of the cable. More »
On Tuesday, our good friend and ex-Giz editor Seamus was down at Collaroy in Sydney to welcome the arrival of a new underwater cable that promises to boost Australia’s internet capacity by 50 per cent and offer competition to the Tier 1 telcos for cheaper broadband. More »
