Designer Eric Klarenbeek has created new contact lenses that are guaranteed to increase the wearer's ability to frighten small children and animals. Dubbed "Eye Jewellery" [sic], these contact lenses apparently suspend tiny jewels from strands of wire. The jewelry hanging from these contacts supposedly does not affect vision, and it at least appears to make it easier to insert and remove the lenses. There's no word on testing or a release date, so until that day, you'll just have to stick to the standard jewel-encrusted eye patch.
If brewing your own bathtub rum has given you more alcohol burns than delicious hooch, you should consider taking a more civilized approach. Enter the WinePod, a product that might actually deserve to have "pod" in its name. The WinePod lets you make your own wine from the comfort of your "home or office," once again improving the outlook of casual fridays. It uses a wireless onboard computer to control the process, and the complete winery setup goes for about $1999. $1999 can buy you a lot of wine, sure, but that wine won't make you happy. Happiness only comes in a glass of wine made with M&M's and Cadbury Creme Eggs.
Appeal is a new battery charger concept that requires no energy source beyond the simple activity of swinging a rope. The concept charges batteries by tapping the centrifugal force created from swinging the charger around repeatedly in a motion similar to that of a lasso. I'm sure hikers will see this charger as a great way to keep camera batteries charged on long hikes, only to accidently swing the charger into their head, sending their batteries flying into the woods and leaving them as unconscious prey for foraging mountain lions. In the end, I guess that's the secret goal of most electronics, finally putting an end to the terrible scourge of hikers once and for all.
MobilRelay, a small midwestern technology company, has developed a technology that can transform your cell phone into a movie ticket. Using an internet-enabled cell phone, customers simply browse to the Mobile Box Office website, choose and purchase tickets for their selected movie and times, and then wait for a text message that contains a barcode relating to the purchase. The usher scans the barcode when the customer enters the theater, and the customer gracefully skips the lines and unmanageable stress usually involved with buying a ticket from an actual person. Also, when you purchase tickets on your phone, only you and the usher will know that you saw Big Momma's House 2 eight times, a secret shame you'll both carry to your death.
With the ever-increasing amount of technology that is trying to get inside your head comes the idea to retrieve passwords directly from your brain. The proposed system is based around using brain-wave signatures as "pass-thoughts," which are supposedly unique to each individual. These "pass-thoughts" could be anything from a "snatch of song, a memory of your last birthday, or even the image of your favorite painting." The benefit of this system over that of finger print or iris scanners is that people would be able to change their passwords periodically, greatly reducing the black market value of your severed eye and finger. They are still working on a machine that can comfortably isolate "pass-thoughts" from a distance, so until then, I'll continue to get my passwords tattooed on my lower lip.
Boomer is a new tennis robot that vastly improves on the current tennis ball machines. Instead of just firing balls randomly at its opponent, Boomer has the ability to serve, return, play out a point, call the lines and the score, rate the quality of shots, and even "talk trash." Using a computer and a camera setup, Boomer tracks the location of the tennis ball in the court. If the human opponent makes a shot that's in, boomer will reply with a "realistic" return. This continues until the human or robot makes a mistake, or when the human attacks the robot for its nonstop insults. Boomer's skill level can be changed from beginner to world champion, and it costs approximately $14,450. If you can't find an actual person to play tennis for $14,450, I suggest you take up a less social sport like solitaire or vandalism.