stuff 10-25-06

Internet Explorer 7 vs. Firefox 2

http://tinyurl.com/y22x7k

AND:

America's Next Top Web Browser

http://tinyurl.com/ybe3ob

Periodic Table of the Shower


From the folks at Think Geek comes the perfect housewarming gift for
your mad scientist friends: The Periodic Table of the Elements shower
curtain.

It’s bold, bright colors and large fonts make it easy to read and
are sure to allay any anxieties about forgetting the atomic number of
Lawrencium while shampooing your hair. In fact, you may just be able
to find some of those strange ingredients listed on your shampoo
bottle on your new handy scientific reference tool/splash barrier.

Perfect for subtly making the not-so-scientifically-oriented person
seem just a little brainier to their visitors.

http://tinyurl.com/ymfro7

Mathmos Thaw


A very peculiar old man stopped me in the street yesterday. Amidst
the spitting and swearing, I made out the following words: "Watch
yourself sonny, fire and ice don't mix." "That's strange," I replied,
"I've just bought this new Mathmos lamp, which seems to state
otherwise." So, I invited him home, made him a cup of tea, and
together we filled the mould from the lamp with water. We then stuck
it in the freezer, and passed time playing scrabble while we waited
for the water to turn to ice. We then removed the ice from the mould,
and placed, as instructed, a little candle in the centre.
"Incredible," the man said with a toothless grin, "I guess they're
right." Mathmos are always right, I smugly thought to myself. With
that I waved him goodbye, and just as I was closing the door I heard
him shout at a neighbour, "Watch yourself sonny, fire and ice don't
mix." What an odd man.

The Mathmos Thaw is available now for £20/$50.

http://tinyurl.com/y9tyny

The Self Shelf


Is it magic?

The Self Shelf looks like a big paperback and attaches to the wall
via a hidden bracket, so books look like they're floating. Check out
the book on the bottom -- that's the fixed shelf. Clever, eh?


Available in Khaki, Turquoise or red spines, it's suitable for most
decors, and worth the $29.95 just for the look on your friends' faces.

Available from firebox.com.

Also, for the first week of the US launch of the firebox site, there
is promotional flat rate shipping of $9.99 no matter how much you order.

http://tinyurl.com/ye9v36

(Video) Steve Mark’s Toroidal Power Unit - Free Energy?


According to Steve Mark, the Toroidal Power Unit “supposedly
harnesses the power of the electromagnetic field of the Earth, via an
unconventional toroidal wire configuration, with no moving parts. The
device’s operation is accompanied by a slight gyroscopic mechanical
force, and slight noise.” Video after the jump.
Well narrated by Steve Mark, shows three devices. Small (6″ diam x
2″ high x 1″ thick toroid) solid-state prototype is shown powering
a 100W bulb directly, and through an inverter: a 3-amp drill, a
television, a vacuum. Harnesses power of electromagnetic field.
Larger unit puts out 7 amps; could power an electric vehicle
http://tinyurl.com/yc2wtk

Sporting gloves and boots with 16X times more grip in the dry and 8X
in the wet
from Sports (68 articles)

October 25, 2006 There’s nothing as important as a competitive edge
in the high-stakes game of world class sport and the recent launch of
a new manufacturer in the sportswear industry with a seeming
significant advantage will be interesting to watch. Simon Skirrow has
spent three decades in the global sports industry, including many
years at Adidas in charge of global marketing, promotions, product
and sales, and his new company, SS Sportswear was established less
than three years ago to bring its Nomis grip technologies to market.
Independent tests show that Nomis Control Leather Technology gives up
to 16 times more grip and control on the ball in the dry and eight
times more grip and control when the leather gets wet. Not
surprisingly, quite a few professionals have trialed the technology
and a few have walked away from lucrative contracts with competitor
products to stay with the Nomis technology, most notably Liverpool
star Harry Kewell amongst more than 40 professionals that have begun
wearing the boots. Nomis is available in both boots and gloves in the
UK, USA, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Germany and the internet
and the company is seeking further international distributors.

http://tinyurl.com/ylqvzv

Grancrete – could a new concrete solve many of the world’s most
pressing problems?
from Good Thinking (222 articles)

Page: 1 2

October 20, 2006 The United Nations estimates there are almost a
billion poor people in the world, 750 million of whom live in urban
areas without adequate shelter and basic services. An ingenious new
building technology from scientists at Argonne National Laboratory
and Casa Grande LLC could help alleviate and perhaps even solve that
major humanitarian problem by providing affordable housing for the
world's poorest. A tough new ceramic material that is almost twice as
strong as concrete may be the key to providing high-quality, low-cost
housing throughout developing nations. The ceramic is called
Grancrete, which, when sprayed onto a rudimentary Styrofoam frame,
dries to form a lightweight but durable surface. The resulting house
is a major upgrade to the fragile structures in which millions of the
world's poorest currently live. Using conventional techniques, it
takes 20 men two weeks to build a house. A five person crew can
construct two grancrete homes in one day. There’s also plenty of
commercial upside in developed nations, making low-cost buildings
viable for a variety of purposes – we can see inflatable technology
marrying with Grancrete construction to evolve an entirely new way of
building lavishly complex structures that would be impossible any
other way.

http://tinyurl.com/ylr474

Stratellite first structural float test
from Aero Gizmo (265 articles)

October 20, 2006 Sanswire’s vision for mass deployment of its
specialized Stratellite airship have moved a step closer when its
Sanswire 2A technology demonstrator completed its first outdoor, low
altitude, float test. The company’s concept of placing a
communications platform into the stratosphere can fundamentally
change how the world delivers wireless telecommunications, and the
way we communicate. Advances in composite structures, photovoltaics,
man-made fabrics, electric motors and energy storage technologies
have propelled today’s stratellite far above the great, rigid
airships of the early 20th century from which it is descendent, and
have put the near-space altitude of 65,000 feet within reach. The
solar-powered Stratellite is an advanced rigid composite lighter-than-
air vehicle designed to operate either as an unmanned autonomous or
remotely piloted system at stratospheric altitudes in geostationary
locations. Due to their operating altitudes of 12-13 miles from
earth, as opposed to satellites that operate from a distant 22,000
miles away, Stratellites can provide a superior and fully reclaimable
method for operating advanced wireless communications and monitoring
services. With payload capacities measured in tons, and the ability
to return to its base station on command, the Stratellite provides a
cost-effective delivery system for broadband voice, data and video
services, reducing reliance on “near real time” capabilities of
satellites and the slow download speeds of copper based terrestrial
networks.

http://tinyurl.com/yc35hq

I SPOKE ON THIS ONE BEFORE.... ITS STILL A BAD IDEA:

Residential Cruise Ships - how to change the scenery outside your home
from Holiday Destinations (32 articles)

October 20, 2006 We’ve looked at luxury homes on wheels (A, B, C, D,
E), relocatable homes that get delivered to the location of your
choice (A, B, C, D), mobile homes that float (A, B) and even
relocatable homes that hang in the trees (A, B). As the world becomes
geographically untethered, we expect the market for taking it with
you will just grow and grow. If you love the serendipitous discovery
of travel but long for the creature comforts and space of home, the
Residential Cruise Ship option might be for you. One of the first
such concepts we covered in our first print issue four years ago was
the Freedom Ship (A, B) and the first fully-operational residential
cruise ship was the Residensea. Now there’s a US$650 million dollar
private residential cruise ship project underway named the Magellan.

http://tinyurl.com/yblj39

The Firefly – handy if you never use it
from Outdoors (77 articles)

October 19, 2006 This product is simple, cheap and effective. Guyot
Designs’ Firefly costs US$22 and converts any standard wide mouth
bottle into a lantern. It's perfect for any outdoor adventure,
whether in the backyard or in the backcountry. The Firefly's unique
design allows it to be used right side up, upside down, or hanging
from the nearest handy branch. The lid contains an LED light which
creates a warm glow throughout the bottle and as light levels can be
varied, it can double as a low level night light for those nights
when the moon is obscured yet it’s bright enough at its highest
setting to read by. The electronics are sealed, so you can even turn
it upside down or let it swing in the breeze from a nearby tree
branch without fear that the electrons and water will fizzle it all
out. The good thing about having kit like this is that you still win
if you never use it, cos it means you’ve never been stuck without a
ready supply of electrons.

http://tinyurl.com/yzgndp

Sub-$500 LaptopDo you love the Earth? You'd better, or she's gonna
kick your ass. To save yourself a Gaia ass-kicking, consider the
Everex StepNote NC1500, a laptop with a 15.4-inch screen and a 1.5-
Ghz VIA C7-M processor. This, Everex claims, makes it the world's
most energy efficient notebook. While it's not going to win any speed
contests, it's pretty efficient on the bank account at $498.The cute
puppy is an optional extra: consult you're local humane society for
prices. – RICHARD BAGULEY

Everex NC1500 [Everex]
Everex StepNote NC 1500: $500 Green Laptop [CrunchGear]

http://tinyurl.com/yfdjb5

Ruby meets AppleScript with RubyOSA
Posted Oct 26th 2006 10:27AM by Jordan Running
Filed under: Developer, Macintosh, Apple, Open Source


Most days I'm totally happy with my Windows PC, but some days I want
a Mac.* I've got a thing for scripting of all kinds, and the days I
most want a Mac, it seems, are when I see someone doing something
really cool with AppleScript, like RubyOSA. To quote its web site,
"RubyOSA is a bridge that connects Ruby to the Apple Event Manager
infrastructure. In big words, it allows you to do in Ruby what you
could do in AppleScript." It fetches information from OS X apps about
their components and then maps them directly to Ruby classes and
methods. While AppleScript isn't exactly fugly, I'm a big Ruby fan
and seeing it do stuff like this really gets my vitals up. I would
love to say "I wish someone would do this kind of thing for Windows
apps," but the tragedy is that Windows has no standard scripting
interface like AppleScript, and certainly none that is widely
implemented.

*For the record, some days I want to ditch everything for Ubuntu
instead. And now, back to your regularly scheduled not-quite-so-uber-
geeky programming.
http://tinyurl.com/yg9p76

How to Hack the Vote and Steal the Election
Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday October 26, @12:06PM
from the vote-early-vote-often dept.
divisionbyzero writes
"Many people have asked for it so that the government will have to
deal with it. So here it is: a guide to stealing an election that
uses electronic voting machines written by Jon Stokes over at
Arstechnica. From the article: "In all this time, I've yet to find a
good way to convey to the non-technical public how well and truly
screwed up we presently are, six years after the Florida recount. So
now it's time to hit the panic button: In this article, I'm going to
show you how to steal an election.""
http://tinyurl.com/ygkn9r

COOL SOFTWARE FOR ALL YOUR HARDWARE HACKS:
Temperature & Environmental Monitoring
http://tinyurl.com/zswxl

e-puck Open Source Robot
by Alan Parekh @ 5:01 am. Filed under Cool Gadgets

These are open source robots called e-puck, look like lots of fun.
A little out of the hobbyist budget at $700, but for a research
platform that is cheap!

“The main goal of this project is to develop a miniature mobile
robot for educational purposes at university level. To achieve this
goal the robot needs, in our opinion, the following features:
* Good structure. The robot should have a clean mechanical structure,
simple to understand. The electronics, processor structure and
software has to be a good example of a clean modern system.
* Flexibility. The robot should cover a large spectrum of educational
activities and should therefore have a large potential in its
sensors, processing power and extensions. Potential educational
fields are, for instance, mobile robotics, real-time programming,
embedded systems, signal processing, image or sound feature
extraction, human-machine interaction or collective systems.
* User friendly. The robot should be small and easy to exploit on a
table next to a computer. It should need minimal wiring, battery
operation and optimal working confort.
* Good robustness and simple maintenance. The robot should resist to
student use and be simple and cheap to repair.
* Cheap. The robot, for large use, should be cheap (450-550 euros)”

Via: Robot Gossip
http://tinyurl.com/ybhuod

Animated Knots
Best knot teacher


All knots are knotty and hard to visualize the first time. This free
website is the best knot teacher yet. It beats any of the beginner
books I've seen, as well as all the other knot websites. The key here
is the stepped animations synchronized with instructions, which you
can run at any speed. Replay them till you get them right. Animated
Knots is the next best thing to having old Pete next to ya. Once you
get the basic ones down, try some of the harder ones. There are 75
cool knots animated in total.

-- KK

Available at Animated Knots

http://tinyurl.com/ydosuw

Histomap of World History
Compact timeline of global history


Not a map really, but a 5-foot-high chart showing in one glance 4,000
years of human history on a global scale. Thirty years ago I saw this
on the wall of someone's dorm room and it flipped me out then, and
every time I've seen it since. Its beauty is how Mr. Sparks divies up
world power (somewhat crudely) into its main factions graphed in each
increment of fifty years since 2000 B.C.E. Different civilizations
are color-coded so one can easily trace the flow and ebb of culture
over the centuries.

It has three uses for me: whenever I am reading about some historical
event I can instantly see what else was going on in the world at that
time (for instance, what was happening in France during the Ming
Dynasty). I also get a very intuitive sense of the rises and falls of
civilizations, a pattern that no other chart or book has been able to
give me. And hanging on the wall, it never fails to elicit gaps of
shock when visitors recognize our modern place in the chart. At ten
bucks, it's a bargain education.

-- KK

Rand McNally Histomap of World History
John B. Sparks
1952, 66 x 11 inches
$10
($17 with shipping)

Available from North American Montessori Teacher's Association

http://tinyurl.com/ykr9w7

Chamba Ware for the Kitchen

October 26, 2006 12:48 PM - Kara, Newport, Rhode Island


We’ve expressed our feelings on Teflon. We also brought you the news
earlier this year about eight U.S. companies eliminating the harmful
chemical from their products. In addition to the good ole’ cast iron
pieces we found some new cookware recently at VivaTerra. Handmade
from clay, this Chamba ware dates back to the age of the Incas. It's
unglazed, lead free, heats evenly and a great multi-tasker - going
from stovetop to oven to table with style. It cleans easily and can
be used for years and years to come. Available at ::VivaTerra

http://tinyurl.com/ygddj2

WORTH WATCHING THE LAST 2 SECONDS:

Flight of the Pole Dancer

Welcome to PopSci's newest blog feature, "The Breakdown." Each week,
we'll pick a YouTube video that involves a minor crash, explosion or
other nonfatal mishap and invite one of our experts to explain, in
scientific terms, what went wrong. In this week's edition, physics
whiz Michael Moyer analyzes the case of the tumbling pole dancer...

Newton’s First Law of Motion states that bodies in motion tend to
stay in motion. The same holds true for rotating bodies and, as we
see in the video below, doubly true for rotating, gyrating bodies.

Consider the body of the body in question. After a quick shake of the
head right and left, she leans backward to begin her rotation around
the pole. Her pivot points include her right hand, held fast to the
pole, and her left foot (disastrously clad, we will soon learn, in
three-inch heels). She now has a sizeable amount of angular momentum
moving counterclockwise around the pole, and this can be halted only
by an external force.

Unfortunately for our young dancer, the outcropping of wall her rear
end soon encounters does not provide that force. Instead it simply
serves as a new fulcrum, shifting the center of rotation from her
hand to her hip. This does two things: Like a figure skater pulling
her arms in, shifting the center of rotation closer to her center of
mass acts to speed the rotation up. More important, it also means
that her right hand must begin to rotate around the wall as well.

The outcome is predictable. A hand rotating away from the pole cannot
continue to hold onto the pole, and without that grip, our dancer
loses her balance in a most sudden and undignified fashion. Lesson
learned: Newton can still represent. Can you think of a YouTube video
you'd like explained? Send us a link in the comments section. —
Michael Moyer

http://tinyurl.com/y2kwva

SNOW CRASH IN THE ONLINE WORLD.....

Braving a new world

Real world fashion and music companies have already established
footholds in the 3D virtual reality world Second Life. Now publishers
are moving in and creating a virtual literary scene, discovers
Michelle Pauli (aka TeaAndOranges Snookums).
http://tinyurl.com/yfcw4x

hursday, October 26, 2006

Snow Crash comes to the Metaverse
Penguin Books has launched an in-game publishing venture in the
online world Second Life, leading with Neal Stephenson's seminal Snow
Crash -- naturally, since Snow Crash's Metaverse inspired Second Life!
"It was the obvious entry point," says Penguin's Ettinghausen (avatar
name Jeremy Neumann) as he shows me around the virtual sampler of
Snow Crash. "We are always looking for new ways to connect with
online communities and Second Life is undergoing a huge amount of
growth. However, it is still a small community when compared with
MySpace or iTunes and we wouldn't want to bring authors in who didn't
have a connection with that world yet."
Penguin worked with the London-based virtual world design agency
Rivers Run Red to create an in-world version of the book - this
offers readers excerpts of the text, an audio clip and a link which
clicks through to a dedicated Second Life page on the Penguin
website, complete with the opportunity to buy the book at a discount.
They are now developing a virtual bookshelf of other Penguin titles
for the Second Life resident.
Link (via Futurismic)
http://tinyurl.com/y2rvcn

Politics From Mac Geeks

This is from one of the mac related blogs I read, its actually quite telling:

http://tinyurl.com/yhrasd

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21

Thank God for George W. Bush

"W" has taken it in the teeth for his war on Iraq, but, to be fair, let's look at Saddam's Hussein's rap sheet:

- He surrounded himself with lackeys so stupid and/or cowed that he never heard any criticism of even his cruelest or most idiotic decisions,

- He literally believed that God was "on his side" and that rationalized any actions he took, no matter how heinous, against those who worshipped a different god,

- His party controlled the media, so they fed his people a steady diet of misinformation about how great he was and how evil his enemies were,

- He rigged elections to ensure he stayed in power while still seeming democratic; winning with results that turned out to be statistically almost impossible. His cronies in government (including members of his family) ignored, overrode, and silenced any complaints about the voting process,

- He had no concept of "civil rights": he spied on his own people when it suited him and stifled free speech when it bothered him, and kept his country in a perpetual state of high alert that was very close to martial law,

- He unilaterally branded those he even suspected of treachery "enemies of the state" and had them arrested without any due process or charges,

- He had these "enemies" thrown into gulags and tortured until they confessed, or just tortured to scare his other "enemies", real or imagined,

- He amassed a huge arsenal of weapons of mass destruction that, if unleashed, could decimate any country he decided was his enemy, which was an ever-growing list,

- He squandered his country's riches on wars and on pampering his rich friends, at the cost of his people's education, health, and well-being,

- He drove his people to war to expand his empire, killing thousands of his own soldiers in the name of "safety" for his people,

- On his order, over three thousand Americans have died in Iraq.

So I say, thank God for men like George W. Bush, who are willing to say to tyrants like this: No, sir, this will not stand. I will do anything in my power to depose you and bring freedom to your people and safety to the world.

"The United States is committed to worldwide elimination of torture, and we are leading this fight by example. Freedom from torture is an inalienable human right. Yet torture continues to be practiced around the world by rogue regimes, whose cruel methods match their determination to crush the human spirit." -- George Bush, 2003

Thank God. If only there were more men like that.

--

I know some of you are tired of me making political posts. I am, too. Really. But I don't think I have the luxury of ignoring politics any more. We are on the verge of losing our country, and I refuse to stay silent because I might alienate some people by yelling about it. It's time to yell about it. On October 18th, two days after my birthday, Bush signed a law throwing habeas corpus to the winds, and explicitly ALLOWING Americans to torture their unlawful prisoners: "enemy combatants" which *he* is allowed to define.

Maybe his Secret Service will read this and decide *I* am an enemy combatant that needs to be silenced. They could; there is nothing to stop them. Their jackboots could kick in my door some night, haul me off without charging me with any particular crime, torture me until I tell them whatever they want to hear, and then trumpet to the world how successful they are at eliminating terrorists like me.

In eighteen days we have a chance to elect a majority in both the house and senate who will oppose Bush for the next two years, and stop this insanity. I am urging you to do what you can. Even just showing up and watching for voter fraud would help. Take a laptop to your polling place and blog what you see. We've had the last two national elections stolen from us, and if we let it happen again _we_ are to blame.

This is the *real* national emergency. Compare the number of Americans who have died for no reason in Iraq (2,279), by Bush's order, to the number who died in the 9/11 attacks (2,973). What are we doing? How is this worth it? Why are our priorities so far out of whack?

Why are we giving up our civil liberties, spending trillions on wars, and sacrificing our kids' lives at Bush's behest? Every year more Americans die of cancer (190x), AIDS (4x), heart disease (309x), and car accidents (20x) than died in 9/11. What are we so afraid of? Why are we willing to spend trillions to depose a puffed-up dictator on the other side of the world but not a couple million to educate our kids in music and art?

We have let the fear of violence against us turn us into animals. We're so frightened by those images of jets crashing into skyscrapers that we've forgotten that being the victim of a terrorist attack is, in fact, among the least likely of the bad things that can happen to us. We have to stop.

stuff 10-19-06

http://www.mapsofwar.com/
VERY COOL FLASH ITEM, 5000 years of history in 90 seconds

“Swarm” Robots


Researchers at the Free University of Brussels have developed a new
type of robot that gather in “swarms” to “move an object too
heavy for them to manage individually.” Video after the jump.
In experiments, six of the cylindrical robots were able to drag an
object across the floor of a room. Working autonomously, they locate
and assemble around the object and either grab hold of it directly or
of another robot nearby, before slowly dragging it towards a target

http://tinyurl.com/vxyez

Indoor Plantwall Puts Bloggers Back in Touch with Nature


Bloggers don't get much sunlight in their day-to-day routine, so this
plant wall is about as close as we'll get to "being outside." Created
by the folks at Green Fortune, the wall can be custom made to fit any
space (including our bloggy sweatshop downtown) and best of all, it
waters and fertilizes itself. That's the kinda brush with nature we
like. – LOUIS RAMIREZ

http://tinyurl.com/y79dmc

diy projector redeux
posted oct 17th 2006 8:44pm by will o'brien
filed under: home entertainment hacks


my latest how-to is up over on engadget - i'm writing up my build of
a hd projector - this one features dvi-d with hdcp support along with
component, vga and on board tuner. this is one of those projects
where you can make all sorts of compromises, but i've gone all out on
the hardware. pro lenses, electronic ballast, 6500k lamp... if you've
been considering building one of these, you should check it out. when
it's done i'll give it a good going over - is the picture quality
worth the effort? peace of mind at using a $50 lamp instead of a $300
one?
http://tinyurl.com/yxssqd

VERY COOL:

Hybrid Solar Lighting
by Alan Parekh @ 5:24 am. Filed under Insane Equipment
http://tinyurl.com/y26l3v

Lifesaver And Lifesaver Plus Seat Belt Cutters.






Both models cut through seat belts, clothes, etc. High impact
plastic. lifesaver measures 4-3/4" x 1-3/4". Stick-on velcro provided
for mounting. Lifesaver Plus is 6-3/4" x 1-1/4". Features combination
0-2 wrench. Surgical stainless steel blade (replaceable).
(its five bucks)
http://tinyurl.com/tpuft


Swedish fire steel.
It is marketed as the Swedish FireSteel and it was developed and
designed by and for the Swedish Department of Defense, who wanted
personnel in the field to be equipped with an easy and reliable fire
starter that would work regardless of weather, altitude and adverse
conditions. The steel and magnesium of the FireSteel gives a very hot
(+3.000°C or +5,400°F) spark that ignites grass, paper, tinder, etc
even though it rains or snows. The spark is so bright it can also be
used as an emergency signal. It is available at several shops, among
them Friluft.se where the FireSteel model above (good for some 12,000
ignitions) is SEK 175:- (USD 22:40) including a tin of Maya Dust
igniting wood. From Light my fire.

4 October 2005
http://tinyurl.com/y3lyqc


Bodum thermo insulated glassware.
Insulated mugs and beakers are smart, but not exactly news. And
besides, they look like the kid's no-spill mugs. Or worse. But here
is a series of glasses (and they are actually glass) from Bodum that
are not only smart, but also good looking. The glasses have double
walls of insulated, heat resistant laboratory grade glass that is
thinner and lighter than ordinary glass. A set of two 12 oz (35 cl)
glasses is USD 19:95 (ca SEK 150:-) at American Bodum. We are
actually getting our jacket on right now, to run down to the NK to
get in line for when the first shipment hits the store. Via Übergizmo.
http://tinyurl.com/vvygh

Solar "Membranes" Cover NJ Shop

October 19, 2006 8:00 AM - Mairi Beautyman, Berlin, Germany



In Elmwood Park, New Jersey, the KTS Machine Shop is reportedly
producing 100 percent of its electrical energy with building-
integrated photovoltaic "membranes." The shop is the guinea pig for
renewable energy firm Open Energy Corporation's first installation of
SolarSave Roofing Membranes since receiving UL approval and Class A
fire rating. To create a 25-kilowatt system, the building uses 56
membranes, which are completely waterproof, UV stabilized, low
maintenance, and hail and wind resistant, says the manufacturer. Even
better: A 20-year warranty covers roof material and energy
performance. The membranes also recently took home the Cool Product
Award from the Pacific Coast Building Show. This is not the first
time this firm has hit our radar: Check out the Suncone, a prototype
solar collector here. ::Open Energy Corporation via ::Officeinsight

http://tinyurl.com/y549lo

AWESOME COMMERCIAL: the follow up

Apparently they released the 'Making Of'
http://tinyurl.com/yfnjnf

AWESOME COMMERCIAL

Having worked in the advertising world, I can tell you that sony is
being an awesome client. Most clients do not have the vision to do
amazing commercials like this.

While the commercial is cool and visually stunning, it is not
groundbreaking in its form. Points for most but not all categories
in my mind:

http://tinyurl.com/ydm4yn

It is the newest (paint) Bravia (new Sony TVs) commercial.

I so want one (cooking)

Actually I want one built into my stove top, but that costs THOUSANDS.
http://www.overstock.com/?page=proframe&prod_id=2013888
this would do as a way to get used to it, too bad i have no cash
right now.
(PS its an induction cook surface)

Ergonomic Keyboards

We manufacture revolutionary ergonomic computer keyboards and offer
innovative input accessories for personal computer users.

http://tinyurl.com/3fwh5

and then there is the OVERPRICED ergo keyboard.... I know, I know,
some would say it is worth the price.... it costs more than a cheap
computer but some would say that its ok.... I don't:

The DataHand Ergonomic Keyboard
Reduce Pain
Improve Comfort
Reduce Typing Fatigue
Completely Adjust to Each User
Close Workers Compensation Claims
Offer the Lightest Key Touch on the Market
DataHand Ergonomic Keyboards:
Feel the Difference


The Comfortable and
Productive Answer
to the Traditional
Keyboard and
Mouse

DataHand Announces That Its Next Order of DataHand Ergonomic
Keyboards are on hand and special priced at $675 each.

Please place your order on the website or by calling 1-800-875-7171,
ext. 206.

http://tinyurl.com/6oyf9

stuff


MacGyver - The Complete Series Pack
ENTERTAINMENT | DVD | 
Patch up a Jeep's radiator using only water and egg whites. Recharge
a lead-acid battery with wine. Make a rocket-propelled flare out of
bamboo, fertilizer, a strip of cloth, a tin can, a metal rod, a
funnel, and a wooden spoon. You'll learn these and many more tricks
with the MacGyver - The Complete Series Pack Gift Set ($200; Oct.
24). The set includes all seven seasons of the TV show featuring the
most resourceful ex-secret agent ever.

http://tinyurl.com/l3al8

Save some data with HDD Regenerator


I currently have 780 gigabytes of data storage in my desktop, and
ever since a 500gig Lacie d2 Extreme backup drive failed on me I have
lived in mortal fear of trying to rebuild my file archives. For just
such emergencies I keep a pretty extensive collection of data
recovery tools around the house, and today I added a new weapon to
the arsenal.

HDD Regenerator scans a hard drive to detect and repair bad sectors
that have become damaged, but not so far gone as to be destroyed.
Most competing utilities have the same feature set, but they aren't
able to provide the same results consistently. My crew has
recommended this software with the highest accolades, and the most
common comparison has been to magic. Your sixty dollars gets a
scanning application to use from within Windows, and a utility for
creating a bootable floppy or CD for recovery work when the system
drive is so far gone as to be unusable. It is able to scan internal
and external hard drives, and can be used for disk repairs on the iPod.

The goal with this type of recovery software is to repair the
integrity of the disk in order to copy the important data off as soon
as possible. Though the company website claims to regenerate 60% of
damaged hard drives into proper working condition, my cautious method
is to:

1.) Use the utility to scan and repair the drive;
2.) Make a backup of the important data;
3.) Reformat the repaired disk;
4.) Lastly, always rescan the drive to verify that it's safe to trust.

I know that it's a long process for repairing and verifying bad
sectors, but an ounce of prevention...

http://tinyurl.com/kwm9c

Xogen - Tap Water as Fuel?


Xogen claims to have developed a process to split water and deliver
hydrogen on demand to a burner tip, combustion chamber, or fuel cell,
without external pressurisation or storage while consuming modest
amounts of electrical current.” Video after the jump.
They have joined up with Tathacus Resources Ltd. to develop a home
heating apparatus. Their claims have, however, met with scepticism
from some quarters

http://tinyurl.com/fxnru

Metal Storm Weapons: Million-Plus Rounds Per Minute


The Metal Storm Weapon system is “based on an electronically fired
gun-and-launcher design with multiple rounds stacked in a single
barrel — the only moving parts are the bullets themselves.” Video
after the jump.
O’Dwyer constructed a triple-barrel, a nine-barrel, and a 36-barrel
firing prototype design that he lovingly named Bertha. “The reason
for the 36 barrels was simply to indicate to ourselves and to others
the future versatility of this system, in that with the 36 barrels we
had 540 rounds on board and, based on the 45,000-round-per-minute
rate per barrel, that gave us a maximum firing rate of 1.62 million
rounds per minute,” the inventor says
http://tinyurl.com/hlyl3

Air Sabre Throwing Star
By Tiago
Leave a Comment »


I have always wondered where the ninjas got their cool throwing
stars, and now I know =] This one for example it’s called Air Sabre
and in the description we can read - Not a Toy. Very Sharp. - which I
consider to be a good thing.
It’s made of silver, has a 5-inch diameter, and comes with a small
leather bag. For $7 bucks I consider the Air Sabre Throwing Start to
be a good purchase for the wanna-be-ninjas and all the alike(s).


throwing star, air sabre, silver
http://tinyurl.com/z4hg8
http://tinyurl.com/kq24b

Comprehensive Projection of World Oil Exports
Posted by kdawson on Tuesday October 10, @03:23PM
from the firewood-futures-market dept.
Prof. Goose writes,
"This article is a comprehensive assessment of world oil exports,
defined has the total amount of liquid hydrocarbons that are
surpluses in producing countries. This assessment is made by
projecting into the future fixed change rates that reflect current
trends in liquids production and consumption in all countries where
presently the difference between the two factors is positive. The
outcome of this assessment is rather worrisome."
Here is the money graph through 2020.
http://tinyurl.com/fahab

todays notables (nothing major)

a bag, too bad its NOT worth 150 or 200 bucks (almost no daily use
bag is):

Body Ninja Bag
STYLE | BAGS | 
Everyone knows that Ninjas rule. The Body Ninja Bag ($150) can be
used as a general day pack or as a cool diaper bag for dudes. Made of
washed Japanese canvas, the bag is meant to be worn across the back
Ninja-style. Come on, you know you want to be known as the Ninja Dad.

http://tinyurl.com/rbngz

AND an AWESOME chess set... too bad I am physically incapable of
playing chess (it causes my brain to ooze out my left ear):

D&D Chess Set
GEAR | GAMING | 
Hark back to the days of your d20 childhood with the D&D Chess Set
($200). This premium-quality chess set will have you remembering the
name of your favorite elf lass from a long night of role playing as
you play the side of the Good or Evil Dragons in the ultimate classic
strategy game. Classic D&D dragons are highly detailed in the playing
pieces which
move atop a chessboard crafted in a
walnut finish. Variations on the rules of
chess give this collector's set an even
greater D&D feel.

http://tinyurl.com/rty6w

thats it, nothing else caught my attention today, across the hundreds
of web sites.... there was something on elephant sized camels, but
they turned out to be extinct and anyway, my wife won't let me have a
dog let alone a camel.