If you have ever wondered what it would be like to see yourself as a doll, now you have that chance. CloneFactory, based in Japan, is giving people the opportunity to create a doll resembling the customer. After a digital composite, the company is able to make the doll any way you would like, with outfits to go with it. They will even give your doll an expression. It is a little pricey to have this done for you. For a high cost of $1750, you can have a scary resemblence of yourself turned into a doll.
Danny Choo, director of and presenter of Culture Japan, took this oppurtunity to get a doll made of himself. After a few days, he had his doll, which was dressed up like a stormtrooper.
Normal lightbulbs usually last for about 1 year, or 2500 hours, depending on how much you use the light. How about a lightbulb that has lasted 110 years.
In Livermore, California, A Firehouse has a lightbulb that’s been burning since 1901. Made by The Shelby Electric Company, it is a handblown bulb with carbon filament. Currently running 4 watts, it runs on a separate power source, and is never turned off. It is currently the longest burning lightbulb in history. However, there are a few that are still going as well. They sure don’t make them like they used to.
Livermore, California is so proud of the shining light, that they have a website dedicated to the “Centennial Light“. Make sure you stop by the Bulb Cam to see the light bulb still going.
In a groundbreaking bit of public policy the Pentagon has now deemed acts of CyberTerrorism now constitute an Act of War. Computers have been around for about 60 years, virii for about 30 or so, but now the first piece of policy directly related to declaring hurting digital information has come to pass.
Hold on neophyte Nueromancers, grab your Decks and jack into the future. Information is power, and attacks by other foreign bodies on our infrastructure, endangering our people or removing capabilities can now be retaliated against. I’m unaware of distinctions made in other countries, but this seems old hat. I guess because I’m a huge fan of cyberpunk novels.
There were some quick clarifications put forth. Such as not every attack will be retaliated against, but we could. The attacks would have to we have politicos posturing saying we will send missiles down smokestacks in retaliation. Not a good sign, however there is some talk of ”equivalence”, meaning that cyber attacks that cause death and destruction can be shown force in kind.
While I can’t seem to find the report people are referring to others have brought up questions like how will we know when a hack is a lone antagonist with a laptop and when it is an agent acting on orders from a country. The language is apparently vague enough that all options can and will be considered and no actions will be taken unless we know without a shadow of doubt the party responsible.
Still all glib comments aside these are people’s lives we are talking about, and a chilling decision to send people into harms way as a response to a digital invasion. I’m honestly not sure how to take this announcement. Its good the situation is finally being dealt with. But the response might not be the right one.
My suggestion a SEAL team of Nerds. In all seriousness a team of counter Cyber terrorism agents. Although they probably already exist.
A while ago there was this mythical posting online i was very excited about, it was the dual screened Courier, Go ahead, look at that article. it was a magnificent response to the iPad. A dual screen wonder with guesture support, a built in form factor people were familier with and the microsoft engine behind it.
The gadget above is a tablet called the NEC LifeTouch W, an interesting name, and the gadget itself is soon to debut in Japan. A bit late on the market but i think the form factor has legs. no word on the price, however the specs are listed at two 7″ TFT LCD displays at 600 × 800 resolution, an ARM Cortex A8 processor, 384MB RAM, 1GB ROM, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1 support, a 3-megapixel camera, USB 2.0, an SDHC memory card slot, GPS and around 5 hours of battery life.
Two screens no waiting and no battery life. Could it be this is the reason Microsoft killed off their device? That is a lot of pixels to push. Hopefully we’ll get to see some fo these stateside soon.
I feel bad for Skype, well as much as I can feel bad about any business that was just purchased for a sum I will never see in my life. 8.5 billion in cash. the company has been passed around a lot. it seems the service is great but the marriage had its problems. And to be honest ebay always seemed like the wrong fit for a telephony company.
Working with and being part of Microsoft could be a fantastic transition for Skype. between skype coming to Kinect, Xbox and windows mobile platforms. It does leave the support for the software on other platforms in doubt. Not that a company with Microsoft’s footprint couldn’t do it but rather that any delay will be seen as a slight.
Being that I’m nto a heavy user of the service I won’t be using any sleep but I honestly hope for good things for Skype.
I personally think instagram is the bane of photographers everywhere. Any goofball with an app and an iphone tries to look arty with a filter. It takes some of the skill and fidelity out of capturing things with film or a high end digital camera.
But than again art isn’t about the methods, but the result and like them or not these photos do look spiffy. The Makers of Instagram have released a neat looking iphone case, which makes your phone look like the camera it is mimicking. The case is more than just a pretty face though because it also comes with a tripod adapter and a slot in the case to attach it. For $39.95 the case would have to be something special. only time will tell if it lives up to the price tag.
Printing seems easy, and it should be. But printing quality images at home to save money over the drugstore prints is very hard. The biggest problems I see people have is that after they are finished trying to print photographs out on their color inkjet printers, the finished product doesn’t always come out the way you expect it to.
New technology replaces outdated tech, it comes at the expense of older workmanship. It renders an investment in a hobby worthless. For all of the photography buffs of the world, the avid snapshot fans and the nostalgia fan. The 35 mm camera is still an older technology but it appears ready to get an infusion of new life.
RE-35 is a product line and a company that looks to mimic the form factor of 35mm film canisters and throw in a bit of new minimized technology. Replace the film with a cartridge from RE-35 and have it be an image capture device, you pull the new film out and plug a USB into it to charge.
Launching later this year RE35 looks to come in three different resolutions 4mp, 8mp, and 12mp. No word yet on pricing, or availability, but I can’t wait to see it. I know a whole subset of people reticent to leave behind their investment in lenses, camera bodies and sight optics for “new fangled” digital film.
At first the criticism was justified the image quality was nowhere near what it needed to be now the difference between professional SLR and professional film is small enough that a consumer might not be able to tell. What will this do to the market?
You know some stories write themselves. This is a giant slingshot that shoots a machete, there is no subterfuge in the name. Watch the video it IS as dangerous as it sounds. Experts only, Some Darwin awards are merely held in reserve. This is crazy. Crazy like a Zombie Eating FOX! How would you like to bring one of these puppies to bear in the event of a zombie apocalypse. The good thing is it looks like with a little modification you could use this for any bladed weapon…
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Nulla nunc urna, elementum at vulputate ut, dictum a massa. Nullam lobortis accumsan hendrerit. Nam laoreet, erat ut laoreet varius, turpis est pharetra leo, a varius purus risus at tortor. Vivamus nec augue sapien. Aliquam et nunc sit amet turpis rutrum tristique gravida non mi. Morbi nunc lectus, lacinia vel sollicitudin in, rutrum a tortor. Pellentesque enim massa, adipiscing quis laoreet eu, viverra quis sem. Nam quis dui sem. Nulla in odio nulla. Vestibulum nibh lacus, pharetra a aliquet non, tincidunt in tellus. Ut justo nisl, tempor sit amet dapibus sit amet, accumsan sit amet augue. In tempus lorem in ante egestas vel gravida justo condimentum. Nullam placerat mauris et lorem pretium semper. Curabitur ultricies mi in mauris lobortis aliquet dignissim magna luctus. Sed risus dolor, commodo ut posuere eu, viverra eget eros. Nulla orci dui, varius eget elementum a, dictum convallis odio. Suspendisse odio sem, vulputate in accumsan id, adipiscing eget dolor. Read the rest of this entry »
Sketching can be cathartic sometimes. clearing out jitters, nervous energy or just taking eyeballs from a computer screen. Other times it can really help focus you down. This one was inspired by Mitch Joel diving into the social web and picking apart why the name doesn’t fit. his Fear acronym was the catalyst for this lunchtime sketch. In a recent talk by Mitch Joel gave at TedxConcordia he let slip this wonderful acronym. Fear is nothing more than False Evidence Appearing Real. I haven’t been able to get the quote out of my head so I shake it onto a page during a lunchtime sketch.
Here is the presentation. Well worth the viewing minutes. Skip a couple of Surprised Kitten, Sneezing Panda views this lunchtime to watch Mitch trip the light social.
An idea put forth by Scott Hanselman, fizzbin is a tech support secret handshake. Basically a commonly agreed upon word that once spoken will make the person on the other end of the line stop reading the tech support script and send you to someone who knows their stuff.
I’ve worked in technical support for 7 years on the front lines. There are reasons for the script, basically most problems are able to be fixed with one set of very simple solutions. Turn it off and on again, did you reboot, is it plugged in. Sad thing is most people overlook these simple solutions because they are either untrained, uncaring or in a rush. usually some convoluted example of all three.
Service providers have taken these simple suggestions to the next level and installed a level of tech support that offers neither support nor technical knowledge. These unlucky people have to answer phone calls all day long and slog through a script, in painstaking detail, no matter what the other person says. As users remember, these people’s jobs depend on sticking to the script, and following rigid company protocol.
I’m lucky to work in an environment that allows for a bit of free form support. The tessereract of Tech support. We go from problem to solution as quickly as possible because there are tons of other people who need help too.
It is very easy to fall into the trap, “All Users Are Stupid.” It is even more easy to fall into the trap “Tech Support is Stupid” How about we just listen to the problem, and the response from now on. Secret handshakes are awesome and all but if yu hire qualified people to answer the questions and the people calling in don’t mind a bit extra explanation on what went wrong things go smoother.
For 7 years now I’ve been working under the assumption that anyone can be taught anything, as long as they are willing. With each problem I face, I really do try to inform and educate the other people on what went wrong, and how to stop it from happening again.
Yes I get frustrated when people throw the Nike ”just do it” down. I’m only human and I have brushed people off at times when I misjudged their problem as something simple. But every single time the problem has been communication. How are you at communicating your needs and problems to support / customers?
I think we can all do a bit better, until then Fizzbin it is…
Summer is almost here so now is the time to get cool savings on cool tech, for hot days ahead. I know most people love listening to tunes while they are outside, and there is no greater dichotomy in summertime fun than to try and listen to the radio in the pool. Gadgets hate getting wet. Enter the iFloat Pool speaker system, for 129.00 you get wireless pool audio in a compact format.
Addicted to twitter? Can’t wait to hear the latest and greatest out of the mouths and off of the fingers of celebrities. Watch as normal people make fools of themselves and spread information at the same time. Learn SEO, B2B, Varble your Mergivs and whatnot. No other technology can be so useful and so ridiculous at the very same time.
Twitter is a lot of different things to many different people. and in fact it turns 5 years old today! Happy Birthday Twitter. in honor of the 5 year anniversary of prepending things with a TW to be twendy you too can purchase a Real Life Twitter Bird for the low low price of 19.95. Two Cool
Just as an aside. One of my favorite hobbies on twitter is to put SEO, and Business and sale and other words into my tweets to see how many spammy followers I collect. It can be fun, just saying
Now a 3d printer is a very simple device. It produces some awesome results. but consider this. A normal 3d printer prints slices or layers of a desired object in pass after pass in one of two ways, either spraying a resin / agent into a dust bed in a particular pattern hardening the mix in a very specific way, or by laying down tiny layers of self adhesive agent.
Either way the desired construct is built the same way with minor changes. What say you to using live cells in place of cornstarch, or polymer? Well scientists at Wake Forrest are thinking the same thing and are working towards being able to actually “print” a kidney. If this development goes through as planned image a world with off the rack replacements, without the need of a human doner? You could theoretically have a copy of your own organ printed…
If you have ever wondered what it would be like to see yourself as a doll, now you have that chance. CloneFactory, based in Japan, is giving people the opportunity to create a doll resembling the customer. After a digital composite, the company is able to make the doll any way you would like, with outfits to go with it. They will even give your doll an expression. It is a little pricey to have this done for you. For a high cost of $1750, you can have a scary resemblence of yourself turned into a doll.
Entries (RSS)