SUCK IT!
Bendy straws are soooo last century. This constructable straw set allows you to make straws of all shapes and dimensions - even straws that allow you to drink from multiple glasses at the same time.
Designed by Frank Frisari and John McCoy, the set includes a variety of rubber connector pieces to hook your straws […]
A Visual Definition
Oh, the convenience of online dictionaries - gone are the days when I have to expend time and energy walking over to the bookshelf, dragging a heavy tome back to the desk and sifting through the pages. Now I can even explore related words and their meanings in a completely different, visual and […]
Shake It Up
A multimillionaire entrepreneur who styles himself Dr Earth claims to have found the answer to the planet’s environmental problems - to dance.
Andrew Charalambous, a 35-year-old property developer, said Club Surya, which opened its doors in King’s Cross, London, this week, was the “world’s first ecological nightclub.” The technology that will save the world […]
Thow Away, Throw Away, Throw Away, FLEE!
This looks like it could be a lot of fun. The Flee Digital Camera is designed specifically to take photos after you’ve launched it into the air. The casing for the camera actually looks like it was inspired by some of the fancier balls made for playing fetch with […]
A Wild Combination
We love people who take common everyday items you might find at a garage sale, and then turn them into something with real artistic appeal. Canadian artist Graeme Patterson has done just that with his whimsical Hockey Organ, combining an old table hockey game, a 1980s era Casio electronic keyboard, and other assorted […]
Stare With A Copy Of Your Own Pair
Paris design studio 5.5 Designers recently unveiled their series of household items based on your own unique body parts. My personal favorite among these oddities are the eyeball lamps, which are modeled after your very own peepers.
Extreme Sand Art
Most visitors to a beach are happy just writing their name in the sand.
But a coastal walk 12 years ago led Jim Denevan to a career in sand art that has seen him sculpt spectacular images on beaches and desert floors.
Among his creations is a 5km (three-mile) long spiral design in the Black […]
An Eco Umbrella
If you’ve ever been caught in a sudden and unexpected downpour (you probably weren’t wearing your weather forecasting Suunto Lumi) you’ll know that a newspaper can make for a half-decent substitute umbrella. But holding it over your head while trying to keep yourself and whatever else you’re carrying dry can be difficult.
Water, water, everywhere! Even in the air.
There’s gallons of water hanging in the air, and the Klimatec Base 1 AirWater Machine extracts it for your drinking pleasure. It’s not just a few drops here and there, either - this beast can give you an astonishing five gallons of fresh H2O every 24 hours. It cleans […]
A Dying Breed?
As the birthrate in European countries drops well below the “replacement rate” of 2.1 children born to every woman, to somewhere between 1.1 and 1.4 children — the declining population will first be felt in the playgrounds.
They might be listening
The first thing alien race is likely to hear from Earth is chirps and whistles, a bit like R2-D2, the robot from Star Wars. In reality, they are the sounds that accompany the aurora. Now ESA’s Cluster mission is showing scientists how to understand this emission and, in the future, search for alien […]
Piece of cake. No serious engineering needed here
The idea is as wondrous as it is audacious: Get on a train at New York City’s Penn Station and hit Paris, London or Brussels just an hour later. “From an engineering point of view there are no serious stumbling blocks,” says Ernst Frankel, retired professor of ocean […]
Fact: Every hour of every day, 330 Americans turn 60.
Fact: By 2030, one in five Americans will be older than 65.
Fact: The number of people over 100 doubles every decade.
Fact: As they age, people lose muscle mass and strength, flexibility and bone.
Fact: The resulting frailty leads to a loss of mobility and independence.
The last two […]
You might already have a mountain of remotes sitting on your coffee table, but are any of them modeled after a classic 1950’s science fiction ray gun? I didn’t think so. While the Channel Changer Ray Gun can only be used to advance one channel at a time everytime you pull the trigger, it apparently […]
Outta Site
If you drive down the average city street, you’ll see scads of ugly satellite dishes protruding from the side walls, balconies and roofs of homes like some sort of convex grey metal virus. So it was only a matter of time before someone would come up with a way to do away with all […]
Totally Tonal Trip
As technology merges ever more seamlessly with our everyday life, the intersection between art and technology has become increasingly more common. Bleeding-edge Japanese artist Mutoh Tsutomu takes this art approach into new realms with his Optical Tone installation that uses LED light spectrums in concert with sensors that interact with visitors to create […]
After all these years, artificial brains are still hard to come by
James Gaskin: “If you define artificial intelligence as self-aware, self-learning, mobile systems, then artificial intelligence has been a huge disappointment. On the other hand, every time you search the Web, get a movie recommendation from NetFlix, or speak to a telephone voice recognition system, […]
stop overfishing and the fish increase - no kidding?
A controversial decision to halt commercial and recreational fishing across vast areas of the Great Barrier Reef has proven remarkably effective for reviving coral trout numbers.
“Everyone is a little surprised,” admits Garry Russ, a marine biologist at James Cook University in Townsville.
Next generation car batteries could power a car for days without recharging
John McCain hopes to solve the country’s energy crisis with cold hard cash.The presumed Republican nominee is proposing a $300 million government prize to whoever can develop an automobile battery that far surpasses existing technology. The bounty would equate to $1 for every man, […]
Pipe Lighting at its Best?
The Lightpipe is a supercool light that looks like an industrial pipe.
Losing weight ends up being a bizarre state of mind where the rules of physics don’t apply
Want to shed those extra pounds? Well, all you need to do is start eating a big breakfast, according to a new study.
The study, conducted by Dr Daniela Jakubowicz from Virginia Commonwealth University, found that women who eat half […]
Next Generation Gaming is Not for the Faint of Heart
Thomas Frey: Life is a game. Every day we find ourselves in the middle of the game, involving the work we do, the people we hang out with, and the social structures that surround us.
But who exactly created this game? Each day we live our […]
If you are curious about Earth’s periodic mass extinction events such as the sudden demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, you might consider crashing asteroids and sky-darkening super volcanoes as culprits.But a new study, published June 15, 2008, in the journal Nature, suggests that it is the ocean, and in particular the epic […]
Wanderlust. Restlessness. Shpilkes. In our sedentary society, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) means disrupted classrooms and lost worker productivity. But for nomads, it might be the key to success.
Bella Luna!
The “solstice moon” will be visible tomorrow night. It just might be the biggest thing you’ve seen in quite some time!
There’s no better time to see it. The full Moon of June 18th is a “solstice moon”, coming only two days before the beginning of northern summer. This is significant because the sun and […]