This has to be one of the best street pranks ever. Spotted on the streets of Manhattan, some urban prankster had the ingenious idea of altering the “stop” hand of a traditional crosswalk light to resemble a hand flipping the bird instead.
Want to cross the street? Fuck off! No really, just go away. Viva las vandalism! This is so New York City.
Prefer ripping apart older electronics than purchasing new ones? You’re gonna love this mod. Essentially, you’ll be ripping an Eee PC apart, jamming into into a wood frame and placing it on your wall. How is this better than dropping $100 on a digital photo frame at Best Buy? Simple: You can easily display slideshows of pictures from Flickr, Picasa, Photobucket and other online photo services. All you gotta do is hit the eBay circuit to find a used Eee and you’re good to go.
While I’m not a Yankees fan, one can’t deny the popularity and rich history of one of the most famous baseball teams ever. Their new stadium is still being completed in time for the 2009 season that starts next month and it’s shaping up to be quite the experience. Shown above is the 103-by-58-foot 1080p display that will show fans replays, home runs and a whole lot of advertisements. It has features like picture-in-picture and can show four different video sources at a time.
Additionally, the new Yankee Stadium will feature a stadium-wide LED ribbon created by Daktroniks. It will display game info and light up like a wild rock concert when need be. And did I mention the 550 Sony BRAVIAs scattered around? It’s going to be a good year for baseball fans in New York.
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OK, the first part might be total wishful thinking, but the touchscreen mirror part is definitly on the upcoming wave of the future. The Fraunhofer Institute for Microelectronic Circuits and Systems unveiled their touchscreen mirror system at the Cebit IT trade show this week, and let me tell you, it’s totally going to change the way you brush your teeth and trim your balls.
While the technology behind the mirror’s creation isn’t what you would call “new” or even “new-ish,” the system is still pretty cool sounding. Are you tired of having to remind Grandpa to wash his dentures? That’s the way of the past. In the future, your mirror will remind all of the elders in your life to wipe their own asses and maybe, if we could be so lucky, will guide them through changing their own damn diapers. I mean, really, what could they have possibly eaten?
Forget netbooks. Displays and portability are both overrated. You need peripherals with entire PCs shoved into them and you need them now, hungry man. Lucky for you, ASUS had just enough time to whip up a keyboard with a whole goddamned computer shoved inside it. Standard 1.6Ghz Intel Atom CPU, 1GB of RAM, etc. Not a powerhouse, but hey, it’ll do.
The kicker is that the Eee PC Keyboard has a small five-inch touchscreen you can use in conjunction with an external display. It even has HDMI out! Wow! I hope you’re as wet as I am, ’cause I’m ready to drop the $400 on this bad boy.
The LA Times is running a piece about how flat-screen televisions aren’t energy efficient and how California is going to impose rules on energy consumption and all that other hippie shit. I call bullshit. Know why? Because less than 5 years ago, no one had a flat-screen HDTV except the extremely wealthy. Everyone had those old, shitty, big ass CRT television sets. Using Google, I compared a 30-inch Samsung flat-screen display to a 32-inch Samsung CRT. Here’s what I found:
Samsung SyncMaster 305T - 30″ Display
Power Consumption Operational: 130 Watt
Source: http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=Samsung+SyncMaster+305T&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&cid=2349199014125518526&sa=X&oi=product_catalog_result&resnum=4&ct=result#ps-sellersSamsung TXM3298HF - 32″ CRT
Power Consumption Operational: 190 Watt
Source: http://reviews.cnet.com/direct-view-tvs-crt/samsung-txm3298hf/4507-6481_7-20461179.html?tag=mncol;rnav
Now don’t get me wrong, there is a 2-inch margin of error here and a bunch of other shit you could throw at me, but it’s a general fact that those old CRTs are way less efficient than newer, thinner television sets. Perhaps California should try going with the flow instead of fighting the tide.
Vince stumbled upon this DIY kit while searching Google for Voltron wallpaper. This do-it-yourself touchscreen kit is available on eBay and said to work with both the Acer Aspire One and Asus Eee PC 900/901.
You can buy it now for $95.95 coupled with a $25 dollar shipping fee. There’s no soldering required and it comes with drivers to support Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. Touchscreen Minesweeper? Count me in.
Don’t you hate it when you buy something just to have it become old and outdated the moment it arrives at your door? That’s what happened with my Acer Aspire One netbook but I’m not too worried about it. You see, this kind of thing happens to me all the time. So much, in fact, that it doesn’t even bother me. I welcome it.
Personally, I’m fine with my netbook’s 8.9-inch screen. The company behind it, however, wants to kick the size up a notch. According to Scott Lin, Acer Taiwan president, Acer plans to launch 10-inch Aspire One netbooks in February or March next year. That might warrant some consumers to hold out just a bit longer. As for myself, I have no regrets.
The team at PhoneWreck has gone and done something that no other Verizon Wireless subscriber dare not do: dissect the Blackberry Storm bit by bit. Head on over for the full review to find out what that crazy new “clickscreen” looks like under the hood. From what I can gather, it looks like the screen uses a single button to recognize typing movements. And take a look at that huge stepper motor for vibration functions; it’s huge! Anyone who likes getting inside popular electronics should most definitely view the Storm from the inside out.
50 seconds into the above video, you’ll see CNN’s Wolf Blitzer speak with Jessica Yellin. Only, Jessica isn’t in the studio. She’s “thousands of miles away” and appearing via a full-body hologram instead. Watch the full video for Jessica’s explanation. Apparently, over 35 high-def cameras are used inside a tent. Wild.
Is the 21st century upon us? I’d like to think so. Still not as cool as Time Traveler, though.
