1. Ethiopia’s Burgeoning Skateboard Community There’s something special about skateboarding’s ability to bring out the best in people. The skateboarding community in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa is raising funds and awareness for the country’s first public…
Those of you who’ve seen The Wolverine, remember that crazy self-adjusting gurney thing that Master Yashida was lying on? That might not be as far off a piece of technology as you’d think. A team of researchers at MIT Media Lab’s Tangible Media Group have created this mind-blowing Dynamic Shape Display with a similar vertical-pixel-grid set-up:
Called inFORM, the system provides a fascinating way for one party to physically manipulate objects at the other’s location. It has to be seen in action to be believed:
inFORM est un dispositif impressionnant pensé par le groupe de recherche The Tangible Media Group permettant de créer une interaction du digital avec le monde environnant, permettant par exemple de faire bouger un objet à distance. Une création absolument époustouflante à découvrir en vidéo dans la suite.
The Sliding Pointer is the next-gen in laser points. It breaks away from the traditional pointer design and is fashioned as a ring. It has two different kinda points that it beams: a circular ring and straight line. Both of them can be used to make your presentation more profound. Easy to use, one can now focus more on the talk and slides rather than fumble with a puny gadget in the hand!
Do you have a tech-friendly organization devotee on your holiday shopping list? Then you are in luck because this is among the easiest, most fun groups to shop for. A tech geek — for lack of a better term — is always willing to try out a new gadget, system, or tool, just in case it’s an improvement over what she/he is already using. As a tech geek, I’m speaking from experience.
The following are several gift ideas that are likely to make the tech geek in your life happy:
The Doxie Flip Scanner. The newest addition to the Doxie family of scanners (released just a couple of weeks ago), is a delightful little device. This portable (about 6.5 x 10 x 1 inches and 1 lb 7.3 oz.), battery-powered, flatbed scanner is perfect for scanning photos, books, sketches, manuals and so much more. It easily fits into almost any bag and saves scans to an SD card for easy transfer. Here’s a cool tip: If you have a wireless-capable Eye-Fi card, skip the middle man and scan directly to your computer over Wi-Fi.
New Trent Travelpak. The Travelpak is a portable recharging device that can supply extra juice to anything that accepts a charge via USB. That means iPhones, iPods, iPads, tablets, cameras and smartphones of all kinds. It stores enough power to keep most smartphones going for a days under normal use. And, it’s barely bigger than a phone, so it fits into a bag or pocket easily. Useful and portable? That’s a winning combo to me.
BookBook Travel Journal. This one is for the iPad-wielding traveler. The BookBook Travel Journal from Twelve South is a tidy, organized, and absolutely fantastic-looking carrying case for an iPad and myriad of accessories. You can store the tablet plus a charger (like the awesome PlugBug), set of headphones, keyboard case, stylus, notebook, and pen. Twelve South makes fantastic products (check out similar carriers for the iPhone, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air) and the Travel Journal is no exception. Tidy, attractive, and best of all, useful.
CoverBot Dual USB High Output Car Charger. Here’s another wonderfully unobtrusive device that will keep all your favorite tech geek’s devices charged. The CoverBot Duo is a car charger with two USB-ready ports. Each is fully powered, so you can get two devices up and running at the same pace. As with the New Trent Travelpak, the CoverBot Duo works with any device that will accept a charge via USB.
Philips HF3500/60 Wake-Up Light. Now this is just cool. The Wake-Up Light wakes you up by growing gradually brighter over a 30-minute period. This process, according to Phillips, stimulates your body to wake up naturally, as opposed to the jarring audio alert of most alarm clocks. Phillips sent us one to review and we’re glad they did. Additionally, once fully illuminated, it easily lights up a bedroom. Replace that lamp and save some space on your nightstand, too.
BLaNKcraft Cable Manager. With two iPhones and an iPod in the house, I spend way too much time plugging, unplugging, replacing, or searching for cables. It’s worse when we’re traveling, as one pocket of my bag ends up holding a rat’s nest of white cable. The BLaNKcraft Cable Manager can rescue your tech geek from cable chaos. This handmade, leather strap is so simple and so clever that I just love it. Bind your cables with the snap, tuck it into a bag, pocket, or drawer and you’re good to go. As an alternative, the Cord Taco is another great choice.
Tile. This clever little fob attaches to your valuables (up to 10) and lets you track their location with an iOS app. Lose the keys? Misplace a wallet? Don’t know where the kids’ backpacks have gone? You’re a tap away from solving the mystery.
Automatic. This is among my top gadgets of the year. The Automatic is a little device that plugs into your car’s data port (check if your car is supported here) and shares a host of useful information. For example, if you car’s “Check Engine” light comes on, the Automatic will tell you what’s wrong via the companion smartphone app (iOS and Android). If it detects an accident has occurred, it notifies local authorities. It remembers where you parked and even helps you drive in a more economical manner. It even supports multiple drivers.
The Quirky Plug Hub. Finally, here’s another great way to rid yourself of a rat’s nest of cables. Put a power strip inside and use the three holes in the top to thread six plugs through neatly. You don’t have to look at the ugly plug unit once it’s tucked inside. Take things a step further and add some labels to those plugs so you’ll know what’s going where.
Audio Phones is a surround sound cell phone that uses a 5.1 multi-channel audio system. The concept addresses the need for innovation in the field of sound technology in Smartphones. Unless you pair the phone with great portable speakers or headphones, you feel shortchanged in the audio department.
In short, Audio Phones is a surround-sound cell phone that produces clear, pure, and overwhelming sound performance. Inspired by the stingray, the phone has been designed as such that each audio output point is hidden under a raise in the phone’s surface.
A power amplification module and six speakers (high pitch, left channel, right channel, left rear, right rear, and subwoofer) are integrated.
Each of the speakers is separated as an individual sound chamber, functioning independently yet in coordination to produce the effect of a home theatre system.
The curves at the top, bottom, and four corners of the phone make it comfortable to hold.
The inner shell of the phone is made with translucent material.
The sealing ring for each sound chamber is made with optical transmission material.
Colored LED tubes are installed on the main board, and flicker with the rhythm and genre of music under the control of the programme.
They can emit a single color or many colors at once, creating a unique glow.
The user can select an outer shell from multiple colors and material options.
News: Lady Gaga wore the world’s “first flying dress” at the launch party for her latest album last night.
Lady Gaga was strapped into a white fibreglass suit shaped to look like a haute-couture gown and flown by six battery-powered rotors at the event in Brooklyn.
The rotors lifted the singer half a metre off the ground and propelled her forward several metres – as shown in the video below.
The high-tech outfit named Volantis was designed by the popstar, London company Studio XO and TechHaus, the technology division of the star’s Haus of Gaga creative team.
Its rotors are surrounded by white cylinders arranged hexagonally and connected to a central node above the suit, which rests on the ground using a circular stand when not in flight.
Lady Gaga unveiled the project at the ArtRAVE party for the launch of her third studio album ARTPOP.
“I wanted to make today about something even more important to me,” she told attendees at the event. “That something is the youth of the world. Benjamin and Nancy [the dress’ engineer and designer] are here with me today. Their minds are just so boundless. I will be a vehicle today for their voices… Youth all over the world.”
For an average person on a busy day, the 10-hour talktime that your Smartphone says it will provide seems like an empty promise. Fact is, you run out of battery even before you make that most important call of the day. Emails need to be checked and answered, SMS and IM’s keep pouring in and all of these are a juice drain. Truth is, you need a BOLT! The world’s smallest portable battery backup and wall charger combined!
I asked the team at Fluxmob, what led them to create the BOLT, and their simple answer was “passion about mobile technology.” It makes perfect sense if you ask me. This is an era where Smartphones are not just gadgets but an extension of our personalities and a tool that makes life simpler for us. We no longer need to stay strapped to our desktops to answer emails. Overseas Skype calls are made in a jiffy, stand-alone cameras are redundant and more importantly my designer friends get to sketch on the go!
All these factors make BOLT a true grab and go solution. It has been intentionally designed to replace your standard wall charger. It automatically charges with your phone and is ready to go when you are. Add a simple adapter and carry the BOLT across the globe with you!
Team Fluxmob summarizes their story very eloquently, “As the speed of our gadgets increases, there is one component that has seemed to flat line. Battery life. There are portable batteries on the market, but none of them met our expectations. To remedy this, we set out to create something smart, simple, and accessible to consumers.” Thus began the BOLT inception.
As strong believers of packing light, especially if you’re always on the go, and need to be prepared for life’s daily challenges, the team created a charger that reflects their minimalistic lifestyle.
Existing portable batteries on the market are typically geared for emergency charging. What this means is that either the batteries are too big to be practical or they don’t hold enough charge to be useful everyday. And since a majority of the other battery backup on the market can ONLY be charged via USB, BOLT’s design eliminated this issue.
A yearning for a simplistic solution pushed for the creation of BOLT, the world’s smallest battery backup and wall charger combined.
The design was based on a classic design from 1911 and manufactured using laser-sintered powdered metals. The firm says the gun “functions beautifully and has already handled 50 rounds of successful firing.”
It’s made from over 30 components printed in stainless steel and an alloy called Inconel 625, and has a selective laser sintered (SLS) carbon-fibre and nylon hand grip.
“We’re proving this is possible,” said Kent Firestone, vice president of additive manufacturing at Solid Concepts. “The technology is at a place now where we can manufacture a gun with 3D Metal Printing.”
Firestone said the point of the project was to prove to quality and suitability of 3D-printed parts for real-world applications, and even its superiority over traditional techniques: the printed parts are less porous than cast parts and could be made more made complex than machined parts.
“The whole concept of using a laser sintering process to 3D-print a metal gun revolves around proving the reliability, accuracy and usability of metal 3D printing as functional prototypes and end use products,” said Firestone. “It’s a common misconception that 3D Printing isn’t accurate or strong enough, and we’re working to change people’s perspective.”
The firm chose to build the 1911 45ACP firearm because the design is in the public domain and says it is licensed to produce firearms parts.
“We’re doing this legally,” said Firestone. “In fact, as far as we know, we’re the only 3D Printing Service Provider with a Federal Firearms License (FFL). Now, if a qualifying customer needs a unique gun part in five days, we can deliver.”
Here’s some more information from Solid Concepts:
Solid Concepts, a world leader in 3D Printing services, manufactures the world’s first 3D Printed Metal Gun.
Solid Concepts, one of the world leaders in 3D Printing services, has manufactured the world’s first 3D Printed Metal Gun using a laser sintering process and powdered metals. The gun, a 1911 classic design, functions beautifully and has already handled 50 rounds of successful firing. It is composed of 33 17-4 Stainless Steel and Inconel 625 components, and decked with a Selective Laser Sintered (SLS) carbon-fiber filled nylon hand grip. The successful production and functionality of the 1911 3D Printed metal gun proves the viability of 3D Printing for commercial applications.
The metal laser sintering process Solid Concepts used to manufacture the 30+ gun components is one of the most accurate additive manufacturing processes available, and more than accurate enough to build the interchangeable and interfacing parts within the 1911 series gun. The gun proves the tight tolerances laser sintering can meet. Plus, 3D Printed Metal has less porosity issues than an investment cast part and better complexities than a machined part. The 3D Printed gun barrel sees chamber pressures above 20,000 psi every time it is fired. Solid Concepts chose to build the 1911 because the design is public domain.
The 3D Printed metal gun proves that 3D Printing isn’t just making trinkets and Yoda heads. The gun manufactured by Solid Concepts debunks the idea that 3D Printing isn’t a viable solution or isn’t ready for mainstream manufacturing. With the right materials and a company that knows how to best program and maintain their machines, 3D printing is accurate, powerful and here to stay.
Here it is, another sweet iPhone 6 concept. Interestingly by pushing the display to the edge, a 4.8″ display has been fashioned. I prefer this bling touch to the minimal one that is seen in the iPhone 5s. What do you guys think? Aye or Nay?
– Yanko Design Timeless Designs – Explore wonderful concepts from around the world! Shop CKIE – We are more than just concepts. See what’s hot at the CKIE store by Yanko Design! (The iPhone 6 – Ahhhh! was originally posted on Yanko Design)
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
BookBook Travel Journal.
BLaNKcraft Cable Manager.
