What’s Apple gonna do with all that junk? All that junk in the next gen iPod’s trunk! I’ll tell you exactly what Apple is going to do. They’re going to drive us all crazy with the suspense until it’s released. A newly released patent suggests that the next iPod release will have a touch surface on its backside, with the front display being basically a wide screen non-touch display.

Is this a good idea? Perhaps, and here’s why. Without the main display being a touch screen, it would eliminate much of the matience and cleaning needed if you were to be touching the main screen all day. Can you imagine the fingerprints that would get on that thing? The back touch surface will navigate through ghost controls that will activate when the surface is touched and will rely heavily on force activation, or the amount of pressure applied to its interface. Let’s just hope Apple has a really good way not to have this surface activated by simply placing it on a table or something. — Andrew Dobrow

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Nokia held a design competition to help develop a 4G Nokia phone. The Nokia Open is the winning phone concept and is really like no other. It features a wing like display which opens onto a spread-open LCD touchscreen. The concept only features one main button. The rest is controlled through the touch display.

Ample screen room allows for easy moving of features for whatever need you might come across at any given time. The Nokia Open looks like something out of a Sci-Fi movie that was never made. No wonder is won the competition. (more…)

For all of you world travelers or French readers, if you happen to have a chance to be in Paris, you might want to take a run by the Adidas Sport Performance Store and see this awesome looking treadmill they’ve got running. The Paris outlet has a mi Innovation Center where athletes and sneaker fans alike can go for a totally customizable experience. Even more impressive is the treadmill the store has in the Innovation Center.

This thing is not only huge, but can read a slew of biometric data from your feet alone. With this information, which includes foot size, pressure, shape, and landing stress, the customer can then design their shoe using a giant multi-touch display as your 3D show model dynamically updates itself to your specifications. When you finish with your design, a giant mirror graphs a model of the shoe onto your foot in real time. If you’re happy with your design, the shoes will be on your doorstep in 3 weeks from order date.

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