Jul 27 2007 The Strangest Sights in Google Earth
PC World has compiled their list of the strangest sights in Google Earth.
With its detailed satellite photos, Google's interactive map lets everyone be a virtual globetrotter. And some of the things we've found in our travels are downright bizarre.
Oddly left off the list were my giant biceps. Oh right, it's 'strangest' sights, not 'most awe inspiring.'
The Strangest Sights in Google Earth [PC World]
Jul 27 2007 Crowd Farm turns walking into electricity
Two graduate students at MIT's School of Architecture and Planning are developing what they call the "Crowd Farm", which is a smart floor that would harness the energy of people walking over it and turn it into electricity.
A responsive sub-flooring system made up of blocks that depress slightly under the force of human steps would be installed beneath the station's main lobby. The slippage of the blocks against one another as people walked would generate power through the principle of the dynamo, a device that converts the energy of motion into that of an electric current.
The obvious places to put this in use would be areas with heavy foot traffic, like malls and transit stations. Or my bedroom. It's like a never ending line of ladies in there.
Jul 27 2007 Hello Kitty in Swarovski crystals
Contrary to popular belief, a Hello Kitty doll made from 62,000 Swarovski crystals is 100% absolutely necessary. This monstrosity was displayed at the opening of a “Hello Kitty Selection” event at Mitsukoshi Department Store in Tokyo and costs 8 million yen ($66,115). And just look at how it delights the children. I haven't seen a child this happy since, well, the last time I was at the dentist.
Hello Swarovski [Japundit]
Jul 27 2007 Levitating Desktop Globes
Who knew there was such a big market for levitating globes? This one isn't nearly as cool though since it needs a top and bottom magnet.
A magnetic field sensor continually measures the height at which the globes are suspended. This sensor feeds that data into a micro computer in the base of the unit. This computer then calibrates the electronic magnets at the top of the frame based on the distance between the globes and the top magnet to keep the globes correctly positioned.
There's a 4" and 8" version which sell for $39.99 and $74.99 respectively. Or a 443,520" version which I'm selling for $1 million. It floats in space and circles the sun and doesn't even need a stupid magnet.
Product Page [Think Geek]
Jul 27 2007 Bee Miniature Paper Sculpture
This is a miniature paper sculpture of a bee which stands at 6 cm tall and was designed and crafted by artist Elsita.
For the making of this bee I arranged 25 little pieces of paper that I carefully cut with a sharp knife and scissors. I gave volume to the pieces by pressing them from the backside with a wooden tool. Then the parts were glued together with professional acid free glue. The paper used is white 260 g/m smooth Bristol.
Each is hand made and will look slightly different. The artist is selling them for $49.50 each, which seems a little steep for something I could probably make myself. And by 'probably make myself' I mean crumple up some paper and glue it together and then start crying because it looks absolutely nothing like this.
Product Page [Etsy]
Jul 26 2007 Machine Gun Violin
This is a violin designed by artist Wei Lieh Lee to look like a machine gun. Yeah, a Stradivarius is pretty nice, but last I checked a Stradivarius never gave Arnold Schwarzenegger a boner.
Violin [SVA]
Jul 26 2007 The Blow Table Lamp
The Blow Table Lamp is lamp designed by Studio Italia Design that features a low-voltage lamp encased in an outer, clear-crystal globe.
Lamp direction is controlled by a matching decorative magnet located on the outside of the clear globe. Place it almost anywhere on the globe and the inside lamp will follow. The Blow Table Lamp is a studio quality work of art that is fun to maneuver.
This thing looks so good but also seems so impractical. How are you supposed to change the bulb? I'm assuming the case comes off but that sort of defeats the whole purpose. You could just stick a glass case around a regular lamp. And at $1,200 the whole point of this thing is to not be a regular lamp. Well, that and to bankrupt you.
Product Page [Lumens via SCI FI Tech]
Jul 26 2007 Transformers Bumblebee Speakers
Brando is selling these dancing Transformers Bumblebee speakers for $58.90. The Bumblebee speakers will actually dance to your music and even play it back with Transformers sound effects.
In a twist of customized cool, Bumblebee takes your tunes and plays them back to you with TRANSFORMERS sound effects! Touch Bumblebee to mix beats with your music, or sit back and watch it dance!
The dancing sounds neat, but why would anybody want Transformers sound effects in their music? It'd be like buying a speaker to take a crap in your ear.
Product Page [Brando via Gizmodo]
Jul 26 2007 Homer Simpson on Jay Leno
In case you missed it, this is Homer Simpson doing the monologue on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno Tuesday night. I'm not saying it's bad, but I'm also not saying it's good. In fact, I'm not saying anything at all. I'm actually asleep right now.
Homer Does Monologue, Schneider Does Lohan [I Watch Stuff]
Jul 26 2007 First Person Pinball Machine
This is a few years old, but the Furminator is a first person pinball machine that puts you inside the perspective of the actual machine:
The ////furminator is a pinball machine that puts the player in a first person perspective similar to modern "EGO Shooter" video games. Like being inside a huge VR-helmet, the player's head is stuck into the ////furminator capsule. His nose is situated right behind the flipper fingers, only centimeters away from the ball. Sealed off from reality and with his head arrested inside a force-feedback-helmet, the sound- and lighteffects, the mechanical noises of the pinball and the absorbing perspective create a highly immersive mechatronic environment.
I've always wanted to play pinball in the first person. I've also wanted to play it while on fire and juggling chainsaws. Some might consider me an"unusual" person, but my mom says I'm special.
Product Page [Fursr]
Jul 26 2007 Levitation desk
The Levitation desk is a desk with one leg.
The challenge was to use an unique leg which could be placed anywhere under the desk. We find a solution, I would conceal it...
I'm not sure how it works but I'm guessing it's a really really heavy leg they've got on there. Like really heavy. Really really really heavy. Otherwise anything you put on the desk would just tip it over. Did I mention it was heavy? Because it's definitely heavy.
Product Page [Coroflot]
Jul 25 2007 Lightspeaker Lamp
The Lightspeaker Lamp was designed by LYX Furniture and Light to look like a floor speaker.
The "bass & treble reflectors" in the polished white acrylic box are really light reflectors with mirror topped bulbs. And the volume control is really a dimmer.
It's a neat concept, but the exposed bulb would be blinding. Like my smile. Some people whiten their teeth using bleach, I use radioactive paint.
Jul 25 2007 Tank Limousine
So what do you do if you've got a few spare tanks lying around and plenty of time? Turn one of them into a limo of course.
So at Christmas we pulled out the best armored personnel carrier from 30 we had laying around. A bit of a special not only fitted with a turret for when it was on the Berlin wall, and one of only 13 ever made but she also had some strange mine laying or clearing gismo on its rear which we binned. We decided on Gloss white as you would. Chopped a few windows in the side fitted smoked glass Fridge; twin DVD's reversing cameras completely re trimmed the interior. We found the army had left the massive diesel powered crew heater in one of the 432,s so we threw that in as well.
The Tank Limo will set you back between $3200 to $8000 per hire, but can you imagine pulling up anywhere in this thing? It's a limousine, but it's also a tank. And, God willing, one day it'll also be my home.
Jul 25 2007 Pac-Man Plush Head
Looking for the greatest hat ever? Look no further. club NAMCO is selling a Pac-Man Plush Head for $29.99. If wearing this on dates doesn't get you laid, nothing will. Well, except for maybe taping a picture of my face over yours.
Jul 25 2007 Garnet Hertz' Experiments in Galvanism
Experiments in Galvanism is an art project by Garnet Hertz to implant a miniature webserver into the body of a frog.
Garnet Hertz has implanted a miniature webserver in the body of a frog specimen, which is suspended in a clear glass container of mineral oil, an inert liquid that does not conduct electricity. The frog is viewable on the Internet, and on the computer monitor across the room, through a webcam placed on the wall of the gallery. Through an Ethernet cable connected to the embedded webserver, remote viewers can trigger movement in either the right or left leg of the frog, thereby updating Luigi Galvani's original 1786 experiment causing the legs of a dead frog to twitch simply by touching muscles and nerves with metal.
Yes, that's right. He stuck a webserver into a frog and is allowing remote viewers to move its legs around. Some might call this useless or pointless, but I call it the greatest human achievement since the moon landing.
A disgusting pic of the insides after the jump.
Jul 25 2007 Making Damien Hirst's "For The Love Of God"
Remember this $99 million diamond skull created by Damien Hirst? Well here's a brief walk through on how he did it. And yes, just as you suspected, he takes a human skull and basically glues a bunch of expensive stuff to it.
Jul 24 2007 NES Gamepad Mouse
This ridiculously awesome human being took out the insides of an optical mouse and stuck them in an NES controller, creating the NES Gamepad Mouse. I wonder what else you could stuff in an NES Gamepad. An MP3 player? A camera? An entire cheese pizza?
Jul 24 2007 Fully functional Warthog
From Bungie:
Um. The dudes at WETA made a Warthog. I don’t mean that they made a big plastic thing that looks like a Warthog. I mean they built a fully-functioning, four-wheel steering, powerful, off-road vehicle with a machine gun on the back. At the correct scale. If you live near Wellington, New Zealand, you might even see some crazy machine-shop dude from WETA fishtailing around your base, ahem, I mean neighborhood.What’s it for? Well, a couple of things – one of which will be one of the shorts coming from director Neill Blomkamp. We sort of blindsided you guys with the first short (Arms Race) – it had little to no context or explanation, but when you see it as it was originally intended – as part of an overall narrative, you might just pee your pants.
If getting an erection from a car is wrong then I don't want to be right.
Jul 24 2007 Office Chair Bike
Instructables has a nice tutorial on how this guy put together an Office Chair Bike after finding a 35 pound leather executive chair, a Princess bike, and a variety of other parts in a dumpster. And I'm not saying it's the greatest bike ever built, but, well, it is. God himself could put together a bike and it wouldn't be this glorious.
Jul 24 2007 Chinook is unbeatable at checkers
Canadian researchers claim they've "solved" checkers and that their checkers-playing program, Chinook, is mathematically unbeatable.
"The program can achieve at least a draw against any opponent, playing either the black or white pieces," the researchers say in this week's online edition of the journal Science.
There are 39 trillion possible positions for the endgame and Chinook can calculate every single one of them. I'm just glad we've got researchers working on such a noble cause. Cancer? AIDS? No, my friends, checkers.
Jul 24 2007 V/a.g.r.a. animated lamp
The V/a.g.r.a. is an "animated lamp" designed by Romolo Stanco that uses shape-memory alloy to change its shape whenever it's turned on and off. Although I can't figure out why it's called V/a.g.r.a. It sounds like something I'd find in my spam folder.
Jul 24 2007 Statetris
Statetris is Tetris with US states. Try it on hard and then weep at your own inadequacies.
Jul 23 2007 Horrible bed design
Looks like somebody finally invented the world's most comfortable bed. Because why roll around when you can lie there perfectly still.
Jul 23 2007 Optimus Prime Cake
These guys put together a cake based on the original Optimus Prime Transformers toy. Unfortunately they built it in truck form, so it looks more like a truck than a Transformer. But hey, I mean, a truck cake. That's still pretty cool.
Jul 23 2007 The Light Drop
The Light Drop is a light designed to look like it's dripping out of a faucet.
The Light Drop is supposed to make people think about how we are dealing with our natural resources , in this particular case, the water, which is the main source of energy for every living organism in this fantastic world. Water is energy indeed.
It's not currently in production and I don't completely understand the designer's explanation, but at least it looks neat.
Jul 23 2007 Oryx bike
The Oryx is a time trial bike designed by Harald Cramer with a one-sided fork and chain-stay.
Due to its Y-frame shape, it’s comfortably shock-proof without loosing ground contact. Each bike is custom-made which guaranties the perfect fit for every rider and simplifies manufacturing; handle bars, stem and fork are made from one piece. The frame and handle bars are connected via a frame-pivot, guiding cables through the frame as one turns. One of the innovations on the bike is the crank which is designed like a ring and mounted in the inside of the frame by two ball bearings. The whole bike itself is made of carbon composite, which is baked into the frame during the molding process.
It looks great and all, but if you ride it around wouldn't you get sick of people asking you what the year 2054 is like?
