Gearfuse

While I’m not a New Yorker, I live in close enough proximity to the city that this is pretty exciting. New York City has installed an LCD screen at the Bedford Ave L station subway stop, testing a system that could one day allow patrons to see exactly where their train is.

Updating every 15 seconds, the screen accompanies boards installed earlier this year which tell subway riders when the next train will be at the station. If this little testy-poo goes well, the city plans to expand the system to other lines.

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…just to hear the resulting racket that ensues. These stairs are actually a working oversized piano, sort of like the one from the movie Big, but in stair form.

I’d love to see Tom Hanks attempt “Chopsticks” on this baby.

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Ah, yes. Functional jewelry. For people who’ve just migrated to the big city (as in, New York) and haven’t found themselves acclimated, consider dropping $23 on designer Tiffany Burnette’s wristcuff-thingy. It’s a metal cuff bracelet with the entire map of the subway on it. And by entire map, I mean Manhattan minus the ghetto areas uptown. Made in New York, for New Yorkers.

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Living in New York, it’s quite frustrating when you just miss a train and are forced to wait for 25 minutes until the next one shows up. The latest iPhone update apparently can tell you when the next train departs when you use Google Maps. This is a really neat feature that I praise Google for doing. The real question is, will this feature hit the T-Mobile G1 anytime soon?

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It appears Google is advertising its Maps service on the New York City subway. I found these pictures on my buddy Nick’s Tumblr, thus leading me to believe that Google would prefer you to use the Maps service over Hopstop. Too bad it’s stuck on the shuttle train.

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I’m assuming only Japan could come up with something this twisted.

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Toasted bread is the way to go but sometimes I’m in the mood to toast an entire sandwich. Pork roll, egg and cheese on sliced Rick Astley bread can get a little sloppy when you try to cram it into a toaster. I’m not talking about those awkward toasters either, I mean your basic, run of the mill toaster.

That’s exactly why the toaster bags were invented, it gives you the ability to toast your sandwiches like Subway so you can be just as much of a lard-ass as Jared was before he started actually working out. It’s called the Toastabag and for just $18.95 you get two reusable bags that’ll toast anything you shove in them. Or you could try aluminum foil. I’ve done it and it (sorta) works.

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This past weekend, during the Defcon hacker convention in Las Vegas, several MIT students who were prepared to give a talk regarding the security of Boston’s public transit system were stopped. A judge ruled to ban the presentation after the city realized a gaping vulnerability was about to become exposed. For now, the talks have been stopped, but now everyone has focused attention to Boston. The city must have quite the security flaw going on.

Though the talks were stopped, Defcon attendees received the key data on a CD. It’s only a matter of time before the system is duped and Boston is forced to plug it’s security holes.

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Here’s an interesting little hack that will make those of you in London light up with glee. Some wisecrack DIYer went and dissolved an RFID-based Oyster card for the Underground. The result? A lot of wires and an RFID chip left behind. As you can see in the video above, the card continues to work flawlessly and can now be implemented into your hand, wallet or whatever you want to stick the chip in.

Although the method really doesn’t change anything about the card aside from appearance, it does open the door to some possible . Maybe you could replace the chip inside of a card with a different RFID chip your friend at the government lab re-programmed? The possibilities are (probably not) endless.

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There’s no hiding the fact that I am completely and utterly useless when it comes to walking long distances. And I don’t think I’m alone. Our legs suffer atrophy from being at our desks so long, but walking is needed sometimes. The Paraseat offers a way for us lazy heads to stop every twenty seconds or so to take a break.

The Paraseat is actually a portable seat with a handle that is made to latch on to poles, including those on the subway! You might look a little funny, but you’ll have the last laugh when the other people left without a chair start buckling in the knees. — Andrew Dobrow

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