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Apple Patents Head-Tracking Auditorium-Effect Wearable Display
Posted by Kit Eaton at 12:45 AM on November 7, 2008
Apple's patents are nothing if not copious, and occasionally confusing: this new one is in the latter category. It's for a goggle-like display system with an in-built head tracking system that changes the display from a somewhat boring "normal" static one into a dynamic view that recreates the feeling of being in an auditorium, baseball park or movie theatre. It could even track the viewer's eye movements to calculate their intended gaze and overlay fake audiences in front of the "screen" with accompanying audio effects. You know, crumpling sweet packets and the like. Lovely. [Electronista]
This remote-control car has an infrared follower system built in, so you steer it simply by pointing the IR beam from the controller somewhere ahead of the car, and it works out where you want it to go. So yes, it's a simple remote control for those who can't be bothered to learn how to steer their toys with a joystick or wheel and throttle remote. Or kids. Ah... now I understand. The "magic dot" can be up to five feet ahead of the 9-inch car and it'll still work, and you get about 20 minutes of racing, cat-bothering action from one charge of its batteries. Available now for US$49.95. [
A few days ago, a story about an "artist" (advertising student) using DHL to create the biggest GPS drawing in the world surfaced and, like most cool stories, it turned out to be a 
I've been a big fan of Delicious Library for a while, using it to conveniently keep track of what movies, games and books we own and where they are in the house in a visually appealing and searchable way. It revolutionised my DVD storage system, allowing me to shove them into multiple 50/100 disc spindles and then easily being able to see which one they're in just by using my computer. Now with version 2.0 out, Delicious Monster has added three things Gizmodo readers will love, the ability to track gadgets, the ability to track tools, and the ability to track toys. It's still fantastic.
In January we brought you some info on the 
Get a load of this racket. A company called Marilyn Light Bag has developed a series of purses equipped with a GPS tracker in the event that it is lost or stolen. A device, the product page claims, can not be deactivated by a thief. The real kicker here is that the first two months of GPS monitoring are free, with a US$15 charge for each month thereafter. So, essentially you are paying for your purse in perpetuity—all in the hopes that you might be able to recover the bag if it should ever vanish (but the contents may be another story). Prices start at US$30. [
In our Gizmodomobile (a sort of cross between the Batmobile, those cars from M.A.S.K. and every other awesometastic vehicle you've ever read about, dreamed about or just imagined), sometimes we need to disable all 238 installed GPS tracking devices to go off the grid (namely while we park for hours on end outside of Bill Gates' mansion). You know what would free up our hands for our thermal binoculars? This GPS Tracker Defense.
Walt Mossberg has had a look at the SPOT satellite messenger, a GPS gadget aimed at adventurers and thrill seekers. Not only does it call in the emergency services if you're stuck and there's no phone tower for miles, but it also sends out position updates to keep friends back home updated on your expedition. It locates you via GPS, and transmits data by satellite to a control centre, which routes messages on for you, and its three buttons couldn't be simpler—"OK/Check," "Help" and the one you'll hopefully never click, "911." More juice below.
When Spidey tosses one of those sticky spiders to a getaway car, suspicious villain or hot chick he plans to 
Japan is going to start tracking their defence officials through hi-tech, James Bondish means—GPS-enabled phones. After a retired defence official admitted to playing hundreds of free rounds of golf (bought by a defence contractor) while on the job, officials of the officials have gotten upset, and decided that members of the defence ministry need to be accounted. For now, the compromise is that defence officials will carry special phones in times of emergency only, which seems like a fair compromise. But that's not stopping those crying over spilt golf. 
