The new 3G iPhone was announced Monday and I’m toying with the idea of getting one. The main reason I wasn’t interested in the original iPhone was that it cost WAYYYYYYYYYYY too much and didn’t use a 3G connection. Both of those things have been fixed. Also, my regular Verizon cellphone is about dead and since getting a new smart phone through them cost about as much as an iPhone, I’m really leaning towards getting an iPhone.

I used to always like it when Google did their holiday logos but with the past few events I feel like they’ve taken it too far. Today’s logo honors the anniversary of the hot air balloon. Is that something we REALLY need to honor?

People around the office starting to get on your nerves? Then get even with the Annoy-a-tron.

The Annoy-a-tron generates a short (but very annoying, hence the name) beep every few minutes. Your unsuspecting target will have a hard time ‘timing’ the location of the sound because the beeps will vary in intervals ranging from 2 to 8 minutes. The 2kHz sound is generically annoying enough, but if you really really want to aggravate somebody, select the 12 kHz sound. Trust us. The higher frequency and slight ‘electronic noise’ built into that soundbyte will make a full-grown Admin wonder where his packets are.

The second picture is how one group of office workers retaliated against a guy who used the Annoy-a-tron.

Was confused when I went to Google and saw the above pic. It was apparently the winner of “Doodle 4 Google…”

Doodle 4 Google is a competition where we invite K-12 students to reinvent Google’s homepage logo. This year we asked U.S. kids to doodle around the theme “What if…?”

Our winning doodle, selected from over 16,000 entries, was created by Grace Moon, a 6th grader at Canyon Middle School from Castro Valley, California. Grace’s lovely doodle, “Up in the Clouds,” will grace our homepage, Google.com, on May 22nd, 2008.

Just a few samples of some tests/things I did in Motion over the past week for work.

So my semi-boss at iTunes/American University quit to take some $100k salary job. As a result my part time 10-15 hour a week job has turned into a 40+ hour a week job just so that I can be trained in fancy stuff (like Motion, a blu ray disc recorder, a tapeless HD camera and other geeky stuff) before he leaves. Things should return to normal next week (his last day is Friday).

The green movement has branched into funerals with Ecoffins:

A popular choice for woodland or natural burials, Ecoffins will biodegrade naturally along with the body, leaving nothing behind but skeletal remains within six months to one year from the time of burial.

Earth Hour Day is happening today and the way I found out about it was because I thought google was broken. Personally I think the whole concept is silly and a lame marketing stunt that serves no purpose. The amount of electricity saved/carbon emissions reduced is really fishy and all the “real” news sources are glossing over the details. The event itself is described as:

Earth Hour is an international event that asks households and businesses to turn off their lights and non-essential electrical appliances for one hour on the evening of 29 March at 8 pm local time until 9 pm to promote electricity conservation and thus lower carbon emissions.

You know what I doing instead? I’m going to turn on all my lights, my two TVs, my two vcrs, my desktop PC, my laptop, my cell phone, and my xbox 360. Take that stupid marketing people!

Click here to listen to the world’s oldest known recording. This was apparently recorded in 1860 and is a woman singing “Au Claire de la Lune” into a barrel-shaped horn , etching the sound waves into a soot-covered piece of paper. This type of recording is called a XXXX and you can read more about it here.

Holy crap. China can literally control the weather. They plan to alter the weather during the 2008 Olympics by shooting down clouds!

Thought it was just me but it seems Netflix completely crashed yesterday and it still isn’t up and running right.

I know in a sci-fi sense this is cool, but I just feel sorry for the bugs that are literally being turned into cyborgs. I mean its gotta hurt. Plus what if they revolt and take over the world in a skynet-like way?

For years, now, Pentagon-backed researchers have been trying to create cyborg insects that could serve as living, remote-controlled spies.  The problem is, those modified bugs never survived long enough to be useful.  Now, Georgia Tech professor Robert Michelson says he’s managed to get the bug ‘borgs to live into adulthood.

Seems the internet demon ate the three posts I made last night. I think it has to do with the time change.

If you haven’t already heard, blu-ray won the war. The HD-DVD is officially dead with all manufactures stopping production. So if you see one on sale don’t think you’re getting a good deal… its places trying to sell them before the prices hit absolute rock bottom.

I’m up and running. It’s crazy that the cheapest computer I could possible buy was still an upgrade from the computer I used to have. So at least that’s a good thing. Though it was a bitch to re-install all my COUGH* legal COUGH* programs that I use on a regular basis. Windows Vista just does not like some programs.

It’s also weird to go back to using a desktop PC because I’ve been using a lab top with an external monitor and second monitor for three years. Even typing on a normal keyboard is strange and will take me some time to get use to. However my desk is wayyyy less cluttered now.

Priced the cheapest bottom line computer possible and it’s faster than my old computer which died (it was 4 1/2 years old) so I’m buying it this afternoon. I’ll probably spend all night installing programs and stuff so expect the blog to get updates again sometime tomorrow.

always something right? Edit is finally doing better but when I woke up today my computer was dead (posting this via my cell). Even though I don’t want to spend the money on a new computer, its a non-negotiable. I have to be able to write and get my work done. Dammit!

So you’ve all heard of the MacBook Air? The world’s lightest and thinnest lab top? Well someone emailed me this picture of the MacBook Earth, Fire and Water.

In a press conference at the Natural History Museum in NYC, Richard Branson shared models of the SS2 (SpaceShip Two) and WK2 (White Knight Two). The interlocking vehicles are what he plans to use to carry rich civilians into space. Even though the ships won’t be built for another four to five years and even though tickets cost $200,000 they apparently already have a years worth of rides already sold.

The way the ships work is that the White Knight Two is considered the “mothership” and will carry SpaceShip Two into a high orbit. At that point SS2 will separate and use a hybrid rocket engine to break orbit and enter outer space.

I’m totally stealing this from “Jim Smash.” It’s a Medusa gear from Oakley. Seriously, who the hell would buy this and why the hell would you buy this? Jim had this to say about it:

Check out this “Medusa” hat and goggles, by Oakley! Perfect for any aspiring urban-villain to battle Spiderman 2099! The hat is $500, the goggles $250

LOL “Spider-Man 2099″ hahaha!

This is a quirky gift you could give to an avid coffee or tea drinker. The “Radiator Mug,” which lacks the handle of a normal mug, is designed so that you can pick it up without burning your hands.

Those fins – called heat sinks if you really want to know – cover the entire base of the mug, this way you can hold it without burning your fingers. Pretty nifty if you ask us… But don’t be fooled by the temperature of your favorite beverage, whilst you may be able to hold the mug, it does not imply that it’s ready to be enjoyed.

It’s bad enough to get spam from fake African kings or people who want to enlarge your penis, but now fake “Heroes” spam has hit the web. The emails promises deleted scenes to explicit for network broadcast:

“The network judged to wipe out several parts from new Heroes episode since they were too sexually explicit. The producer refused to cut out the questionable scenes. We managed to get our hands on that episode! Download it here”

Anyone who attempts to download the “video” will instead get a nasty virus.

Worked on it all day yesterday and all last night… site is finally working again. YEAH!

This is a crazy art-project using found items. Dutch artist Theo Jansen made this from lemonade bottles and plastic tubes. The crazy part is that it WALKS. Even crazier is that its “brain” is made of bottles so that if there is a storm, the water causes it to lower its sails and dig into the ground. Videos and more pics are posted here.

This cracked me up! It’s a Star Wars flash drive and apparently they have a whole series of them. Man people make flash drives out of the craziest stuff.

Nissan is developing a new technology where you can change the color of your car with the click of a button. The paint will change when zapped with a specific electric current and is expected to hit the retail market in 2010.

What’s odd is that over a year ago “CSI: Miami” did an episode where thieves had a car that could change color. The crooks were able to evade the police because the cops weren’t smart enough to realize the car was changing, which makes me wonder, I wonder how real law enforcement agencies will deal with this.

Cree, a LED company in North Carolina, decided to re-do their office using their own product. So they removed all over their other light bubs and replaced them with LED lights. The result is a much brighter office that uses 48% less energy than regular bulbs. Also, since LED lights don’t emit heat, they also help put less strain on air conditioners.

Tired of only being able to use USB powered devices near your computer? How about getting a breathing-powered-usb-port?

Are you breathing? Do you have a gadget that can be charged via a USB port? Well if you answered yes to both, then you are in luck. This instructable shows how to make a device that will charge your USB-capable devices while you do what you do best. Breathe. Using some parts scavenged from an old CD-ROM drive, a simple electronic circuit, and a few rubber bands you will soon be huffing and puffing your way to fully-charged pseudo-useful electronic gadget nirvana.

The problem with blankets is that when you sit on the couch you have to wrap them up and move them all around just to make sure no cold air sneaks in. That’s why Slankets are the next greatest invention! The Slankets are basically the bastard child of a sleeping bag and a regular blanket. They are big pockets that allow you to just slip right into them without worrying about cold air sneaking in.

So apparently whenever I check my email on my phone it uses minutes. Also whenever I talk to Mike form Th3rd World it uses minutes (because he has cingular). So for the past two months I’ve been WAY over my regular monthly minutes. In September I was 380 minutes over my minutes and in October I was 310 minutes over. What’s annoying is that I have NEVER gone over my minutes in the 5 years I’ve had a cell phone. (Read on …)

Everything retro is being remade. “Transfomers,” “Thundercats” “G.I. Joe” etc… so it’s not surprising that a company decided to re-make the Rubik Cube. The “Fentix Cube” looks like the bastard child of a Lite Brite and Rubik Cube and is covered with multi-touch touch screens and 216 LED lights. The cubes are being sold in limited quanties at the Kinetica Museum in London.

Yahoo is seriously screwed up and I’m pretty sure I’m switching my hosting server to another company. Now I don’t know how to do this. Mike does because he builds websites for a job. Now I haven’t had a chance to tell him yet but Mike will be switching my server over and knowing how busy he is it will probably take a few days. So once I get this figured out I’ll let you guys know. Update: Sorta on the new server and waiting for the DNS settings to fall into place before everything will work.

Yahoo screwed up MySQL database that the blog runs on. I’m thinking about switching host because this is the third time its happened this year. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr…

This pool is two kilometers long. It’s the longest pool in the world and its at the San Alfonso del Mar resort in Chile. Apparently the ocean is too cold and dangerous so the hotel built the massive pool to attract visitors.

What’s interesting is that the pool is too large for them to use chlorine. Instead they have to use a pulse-based disinfection method. I have no idea what that means, but it sounds cool.

A man in Georgia is suing Apple because he claims his iPod nano caught his pants on fire:

“So I look down and I see flames coming up to my chest,” said Danny Williams.

Williams said the burn hole from the pocket of his pants marks the spot of his 15 seconds of flame. He said he had an iPod Nano and an glossy piece of paper in his pocket. He believes the paper shielded him from being burned.

Apple apparently offered to replace the iPod, but Williams wasn’t happy with that and is hoping to make a few million dollars. Apple has also refused to release just how frequent this problem is occurring.

So we’ve seen crazy bikes with too many wheels, but how about a giant unicycle? The Wheelsurf out of the Netherlands is just that. Well, on second thought, it’s more like a motorcycle without a backseat to pick up chicks.

The Wheelsurf’s Honda engine is capable of propelling it almost 20 miles per hour, and to stay upright the pilot needs to keep the center bar more or less level with the horizon. Turning is as simple (or as terrifying) as shifting your weight in either direction, and braking is accomplished through a combination of gently twisting the brake handle and leaning back at the same time. The only other daunting part of the Wheelsurf is the price, as it costs around $6,900.

An ATM in Louisiana spit out $20’s instead of $5’s resulting in customers making $7,000. What’s lame is that the police are tracking down the people who were giving the cash.

DeSoto Parish sheriff’s Lt. Toni Morris said the automated teller machine has records identifying the 26 people who received the extra cash during five days in late June and early July.

Morris said charges could be brought against the people who got more money than was debited to their bank accounts.

That just seems wrong. Its like if you are at Wal-Mart and the clerk gives you back the wrong amount of change, you don’t arrested if you keep it. It’s Wal-Mart’s fault. So if an ATM give you money when its not supposed to that’s the bank’s fault. It would be different if it was hacked or something, but I’m betting some stupid bank clerk refilled the ATM wrong and put $20’s in the $5’s slot!

Whenever Samantha drags me to an Ocean City bar we always end up playing one of those touchscreen games where you stare at the pictures of naked ladies and point out the difference between two photos (we don’t play the naked-guy ones because she says its too distracting to her when she’s drunk).

Well it seems Megatouch Gametime is now making those game machines so that you can install them in your home. They come with 100-built in games… but of course they cost $3,800 bucks!

OXO is a company loved by chefs for designing better versions of old kitchen staples like the carrot peeler. The company’s stable of inventors may have outdone themselves with their latest kitchen innovation: the ergonomic corn stripper. Get your minds out of the gutter folks; this computer-mouse shaped gadget cuts corn off of a cooked husk of corn-on-the-cob and stores it in a little measuring cup. It’s sure to go down in history with other useful gadgets like this butter slicer and banana peeler.

OXO knows just how much time and energy you put into stripping kernels off of corn everyday, and it feels your pain. For just $12, you can say goodbye to corn kernel scattering nightmares, and greet a new day full of fresh corn chowder and succotash.

Before the robot hordes rise up and kill us all, we best get them to do our bidding for a while longer. Instead of going gigantic, scientists have been working to bring automatons down to size, and the researchers at Harvard think they have something perfect for the military.

Professor Robert Wood has developed a life-sized robotic fly for use in military surveillance. The robot fly can beat its wings at 110 beats per minute without breaking off thanks to carbon fiber joints. With a wingspan of just over an inch, paint this thing black and you’d be hard pressed to tell this from the real thing. Well, except it doesn’t have those weird eyes or legs, and it keeps wanting to look at your top secret documents instead of that candy bar on your desk.