It's Friday, and it's just about Halloween, which means you're probably sitting in your cubicle eating candy for lunch and looking at photos of dogs dressed up as Darth Vader. Just me? Well, Gearlog has a few
spooky sites for you to check out.
1. If you didn't get around to carving your own jack-o-lanterns this Halloween, then you can do so online. Check out this virtual pumpkin carver from vidugiris.com.
2. It's too late to mail a Halloween card, but it's not too late to send an e-card! Take a look at these Halloween e-cards from MyPunchBowl.com before it's too late.
3. Although this has nothing to do with tech, it's still extremely disgusting, and a great cake for this spooky holiday. Check out Instructables' Brain Cake.
4. Thanks to Popular Mechanics, you can spy on those hooligans coming to toilet-paper your house, or steal your Halloween decorations with this DIY pumpkin surveillance camera.
5. Spruce up your computer with a flashy Halloween desktop. (Via LifeHacker)
6. It might be a little too late for this year, but you can always get an early start for next Halloween: Check out the Pumpkin Pal Stake (pictured above) which lights up your jack-o-lantern by sticking the stake directly in the pumpkin.
Do Microsoft's new storefronts look eerily family to you? The company's new mall-based retail locations seem to have taken more than a few aesthetic and spiritual cues from Apple's successful stores.
The company opened up its first location in Scottsdale, Arizona this week, and PCMag sent a photographer with a last name rather similar to our own consumer electronics managing editor. You can check out a slideshow of the company's new Windows 7-centric location at PCMag, Surface computer included.
Microsoft opened up a second location in Mission Viejo, California, to what was apparently a rather enthusiastic reception. According to the OC Register, over 1,000 people crowded into the Orange County Mall, in an attempt to check out the new store.
Maybe it had something to do with the gift bags that Microsoft was handing out, which included a $25 Zune Pass gift card and lip balm, among other MS swag. Times are tough and lips are chapped all over, I guess.
Finding it difficult to be happy with the current state of the world? Boy have we got the hat for you. The Happiness Hat takes a Pavlovian-style approach toward smiling, driving a metal spike into its wearer's head should he or she make the mistake of frowning.
The hat's designer Lauren McCarthy describes the function of the Orwellian device thusly,
An enclosed bend sensor attaches to the cheek and measures smile size, a servo motor moves a metal spike into the head inversely proportional to the degree of smile. Through repeated use of this conditioning device you can train your brain to smile all the time. The device runs on Arduino.
The knitted cap seems to be little more than an art project at present, but heck, it made us smile.
In general, insider trading affects the investors who buy a particular company's stock, not the consumers who buy its products - one reason that we've largely avoided covering the insider trading scandal that has netted a number of high-tech executives, including executives from IBM and Intel.
The Wall Street Journal's latest report, however, names ex-AMD chief executive Hector Ruiz as one of the tipsters in the Galleon case. He is not a defendant, the paper reported. Ruiz, now chairman of GlobalFoundries (the spinoff of AMD's manufacturing arm) served as AMD's chief executive during the period of time covered by the investigation. According to the Journal and Bloomberg, Ruiz leaked the AMD manufacturing spinoff before the deal took place, but did not profit from the leak.
Livescribe has announced new Pulse smartpens, which digitally capture and sync handwriting and audio and make me wish I was still in college taking notes. Options now include 4GB and 2GB versions in a new titanium color. The $199.95 4GB model holds 400 hours of recorded audio, and will be compatible with Livescribe's upcoming Application Store when it launches later this year; the 2GB model rings in at $169.95.
The company also unveiled the Pro-Pack bundle, aimed at business professionals. It includes the 4GB Pulse smartpen in an exclusive black color, an A5 starter notebook, a leather carrying case, handwriting-to-text conversion software, and the company's Pro Charging Cradle, which looks like an ink well and charges the Pulse from a USB port or power outlet. The Pro-Pack bundle costs $249.95.
For fans of high design who don't want to put their laptops on any old piece of plastic, there's the Intelligent Forms Log Pillow. Perfect for Web loafing in bed or on the couch, the Log Pillow consists of six fabric tubes criss-crossed log-cabin style and attached with snaps. The "logs" are made from a mix of hemp canvas, cotton, and Lycra and filled with buckwheat hulls. The design is meant to cause better ventilation and keep heat from building up at the bottom of your laptop. The log pillow also fold flat for transporting.
Intelligent Forms also has laptop pillows with buttons and a "Terrapin" design. Though you might get some strange looks at the airport, these laptop pillows are well-suited to "working" from home with a big hot cocoa at your side. All three pillows are available for $69 each at the iF Web site.
Considering the big fight to get augmented reality apps onto the iPhone, the concept of "Terminator-style" AR contact lenses seems little more than a pipedream, but that's exactly the technology laid out by Babak A. Parviz, a bionanotechnology expert at the University of Washington, in Seattle--references to killer robots from the future and all.
"These lenses don't give us the vision of an eagle or the benefit of running subtitles on our surroundings yet," writes Parviz. "But we have built a lens with one LED, which we've powered wirelessly with RF. What we've done so far barely hints at what will soon be possible with this technology."
Parviz goes on to detail the possibilities of such a technology, which, he points out, even in a simple state could be rather useful,
Even a lens with a single pixel could aid people with impaired hearing or be incorporated as an indicator into computer games. With more colors and resolution, the repertoire could be expanded to include displaying text, translating speech into captions in real time, or offering visual cues from a navigation system. With basic image processing and Internet access, a contact-lens display could unlock whole new worlds of visual information, unfettered by the constraints of a physical display.
I wish I knew how to quit you, Brando Workshop (to use a timely reference). I've been trying not to blog about every one of your unusual gadget releases. I didn't post about your amazing Solar Fan Cap last week, startling as it was. But now you've gone and given me a hat I can't ignore.
Brando Workshop has just released the WiFi Detection Cap, a baseball cap that lets you know if you're in range of an 802.11 b/g/n signal: One LED alerts you to a signal, while other LEDs show its strength. The hat comes in two styles, one that looks like the old XM Satellite Radio logo and one that looks like a laptop screen, and three colors (red, white, and black). It runs off two CR2032 batteries, which are included.
What makes the WiFi Detection Cap classic Brando is that it doesn't tell you if the WiFi signals are open or not. Most of the time it will detect protected networks. And, of course, if you're wearing the hat, you can't see when it detects a signal.
The cap goes for a low $14. Oh those Brando Workshop inventions: Just when I thought I was out...they pull me back in (to use a timely reference).
Maybe I'll start a new feature on Gearlog, "Fish-in-a-barrel Fridays," where I'll take easy potshots and poorly thought-out new tech products. Many thanks to editor-in-chief Lance for passing along the press release for the Waist Band MP3 Player with Remote Control, brought to us by USBfever.com.
This attractive wearable is like a small boom box you can strap to your midsection. The product description says it's great for hikers who would like to listen to their favorite music. Finally, a way to listen to music outside the home.
The Waist Band MP3 Player apparently has no onboard storage, and users need to supply their own SD card or flash drive. The flash drive will stick up into your midsection if you're wearing the player. The product page cautions that you can't have both a card and flash drive inserted at the same time or the player won't work.
No portly people, please, because the included waist strap is 40-inches long. If you have trouble reaching the player strapped around your waist, it comes with a helpful remote.
Perhaps the greatest terrible thing about the Waist Band MP3 Player is that while it seems to have a radio, the radio doesn't actually work. "Radio is a dummy," the description cautions twice. It's not alone.
So how much would you pay for small, poor, wearable speakers, no storage, and a non-working radio? USBfever is hoping $32.99 sounds right.
The exterior of the Overland Cambridge bag says it all: "I'm ready for anything." Despite appearances, the Cambridge bag is not exactly for the woman about town. It's a tote, a briefcase, and a backpack all in one, but can this everything bag pull it off? Or is it too much to bear?
The inside provides ample room for a 13-inch laptop, small pockets to store your change or snacks, and tons of space to tote a plethora of books. Ballistic nylon protects the outside of the bag, making certain you'll be ready to protect yourself from that Starbucks coffee spill to the unexpected downpour on your way to class. This bag is nothing if not durable. Where most school bags fail is in the bottom of the bag, but the Cambridge Overland bag does not. You see, over time the books and pencils start to poke through the bottom of your average bag, wearing it away and eventually making the bag unusable. The Cambridge bag, on the other hand, is well reinforced at the bottom.
As a southpaw myself, the arrival of Left-Handers Day on August 13 every year is a cause for celebration. At least in the tiny office where I spend my days. Here, however, I am free from the tyranny of right-handed designers (and nightmarish, righty-designed college desks).
Take Google, for example. I love my Google Android phone (the MyTouch 3G) but it has one fatal flaw: in landscape mode, the display refuses to flip. I'm stuck navigating with my inferior right hand. (Curse you, right hand, and your inferior dexterity!) Do no evil, eh, Google? Lies!
Apple, however, is a bastion of creativity and intelligence, long the domain of the 8 to 10 percent of us blessed with a dominant left hand. Unsurprisingly, my wife's iPod nano easily flips back and forth, depending on the orientation, and allows me to click through with impunity. This, clearly, is why Apple controls the market for MP3 players.
Playing too much World of Warcraft? Haven't showered in a few days? Sweeten the stench of your computer space with AromaUSB.
This fragrance dispenser connects like any other flash drive, directly into your computer's USB port. There is no memory on the AromaUSB flash drives, only the finest scents. Choose from a number of smells to occupy your workspace, such as lavender, lemongrass, and orange.
The AromaUSB is also completely customizable from color to shape. If you're looking for a luxury scented drives go to Scent-Drive.com to choose from a number of USB drives with memory.
In case you hadn't noticed, the Internet has become quite the thing. Considering the ease of e-mail and text-messaging, those paper love letters and corny cards have come to seem obsolete. The Postal Service has been in a bad way for a while; so much so that now the government has considered closing 677 offices.
"The writing is on the wall, and the postal service obviously has to make some tough decisions if it wants to weather this storm," Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) said during a hearing.
Some Postal and Congressional sources say that only 200 out of the possible 677 offices will be likely to close after a close review, but either way, this will mean massive layoffs.
Let's be honest for a moment. The Comic Con showroom floor doesn't smell all that wonderful by late Sunday afternoon. Anyone doing their part to tackle the stench deserves a metal--or at the very least, a Gearlog post. In a giant convention center full of strange Star Trek tie-ins, perhaps the strangest came from Genki Wear.
The company makes a line of Star Trek-themed colognes and perfumes, with names like Tiberius, Red Shirt, Pon Farr--and, exclusive to Comic Con 2009, KHAAANN!, which is limited to 500 (read: you've missed it).
The colognes are officially licensed and smelled by the folks at Paramount, because in space, everyone knows when you stink.
Enjoy table-top gaming or snuggling up with the latest Captain America comic book? Well today, unlike any other day, would be the time to let your geek flag fly.
"Why," you may ask? Not only because you can, but also because July 13th is Embrace Your Geekness Day.
The origins of this holiday is from Wellcat Holidays, a Web site dedicated to celebrating life and its quirky moments. So put on those swanky Ghostbuster briefs and celebrate your inner and outer geek!
It's Friday, and it's just about Halloween, which means you're probably sitting in your cubicle eating candy for lunch and looking at photos of 
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