THIS is why I LOVE Nicole Lee.
MarioKart for the Wii by Nicole Lee from Flickr
A blurry picture of Mario Kart for the Wii tells me what I should have already known. Mario Kart was released THREE days ago. How I missed the news, I don’t know, but I’m heading to the video store right now to go pick it up.
Here’s a video to whet your appetite:
So much of what we see at CES is just vaporware. It doesn’t exist and it may never exist. In fact, after a healthy dose of CES, everything that IS available starts to look incredibly lame in comparison. The Optimus Maximus keyboard is a good example. Imagine a computer keyboard in which the keys can be WHATEVER you want. Instead of stickers on your keyboard (that would be MY solution), the Optimus Maximus keyboard has a tiny LED screen on each and every screen. You can change the keys based on your language or whatever other scheme you prefer.
When we saw Optimus Maximus at CES this year, we thought it looked cool, but both Mike and I assumed that it would never see the light of day. We had seen this keyboard before and nothing had come of it. We logged it as cool and didn’t report it back then because it just wasn’t available for purchase.
Well, now it is:
Here is a video produced by ThinkGeek showing the abilities of the Optimus Maximus keyboard:
If you’re willing to plunk down over $1.5K, you can have a Optimus Maximus keyboard. Of course, the concept of “available” is a fuzzy one when even ThinkGeek doesn’t have them in stock.
Considering that sticker sheets are sold in packs of 25 for ten bucks, I think I’ll go for the sticker idea.
Via: Optimus keyboard now shipping, bring on the hacks – Boing Boing Gadgets
The one killer app I’ve wanted for a long time is the one where I can sync all my computers AND my mobile. There are plenty of services out there that let you sync multiple PC’s; and some even give you a web interface to access those files on a computer you haven’t synced.
But the one feature that is always missing is the ability to sync from your mobile phone to your other machines. SugarSync gives you all that and more.
The companies latest offering is a 45 day 10GB trial account. Once the trial is over the cost to keep your 10GB of storage is about $25 a year. Compare that to Apple’s 10GB .Mac service at $100, with single machine sync and no mobile access, it seems a good price.
How SugarSync Works SugarSync monitors files in specified folders on your computer and keeps an up-to-date copy of them on a secure, remote central server. It then automatically synchronizes these files to all the devices you specify. The downloadable SugarSync Manager software is required on each device that you want to sync
While having to install the client software on all the machines and devices I want to sync can be a hassle, it’s a small price to pay for the ability to connect everything.
Several months ago I was talking with a senior executive of an online storage company, and I told him one thing I would love to have is the ability to get to media files I store online so I don’t have to cary them with me. His comment to me was the amount of bandwidth needed to download the files was not cost effective. While I agree trying to download large music or video files doesn’t seem an effective use of bandwidth, my unlimited use account with T-Mobile allows me to download as much as I want.
I really like SugarSync. I think it has a lot of potential. I have accounts with Amazon S3, Mozy, Apple’s .Mac and several web hosts. But none of these services have the immediate sync capabilities nor the mobile access.
I’m going to sepnd the next several weeks using the sevice and I’ll write a follow up post. But for now, I recommend you try SugarSync.
Thom Allen is also the writer of Digital Thom.
Today I ran across this really cool jacket from a company called Zegna. The Solor JKT has collar mounted solar panels capable of charging and providing power to many small electronic devices.
I’ve seen clothing like this in the past, most notably is the ScottEVest which came out sometime in early 2001, and has morphed into several different styles. The difference between the two is the Solar JKT uses the sun to power and charge your devices. The Scott Vest doesn’t provide any charging capabilities.
The jacket isn’t really designed to be worn year round. If you live in a warm climate the thought of wearing a jacket all the time is just not feasible. Not too mention the collar is bulky and looks uncomfortable.
However, a really cool feature of the jacket is the ability to remove the solar panel from the collar and use it separately to power devices. The ability to use the solar panels without the jacket makes this “gadget” something to look at.
Some of the features:
There are plenty of alternatives to an electric article of clothing. The price is high enough to exclude the average Joe. The wow factor is high because it support a large number of devices.
I’m pretty sure the Zenga won’t bank it’s future on the sales of the Solar JKT.
Thom Allen is also the writer of Digital Thom.
This comic from Sheldon is EXACTLY why I’m not excited about the Amazon Kindle:
It reads:
Book-Lovers! Are you tired of printed books? Tired of using a battery-free data storage-and-retrieval system that works perfectly every time you pick it up?
No.
Wouldn’t you prefer to read books on a device that looks and feels like your first graphing calculator?
No.
And what if that same device could also surf the web? Wouldn’t that be awesome?
Wouldn’t I just use a laptop and surf faster and easier?
The “Amazon Kindle” …the answer to the question you weren’t asking!
And of course, there was a response strip from Jeff Bezos:
Matt Strebe reviewed the Amazon Kindle and the Sony eReader here:
The ONLY advantage I can see for these gadgets is for university or high school students. Being able to carry ALL of your text books in one, slim gadget is really appealing when you’re your books for each one class weigh eight pounds apiece. Other than that, paper is really a better option.
The Sony Rolly was surrounded with so many people that it was impossible for us to get close enough to it. We could see on the LCD screen above it that it was some sort of rolling, dancing thing with lights. We heard from the people nearby that it as an MP3 player. We brushed it off as silly and moved on to other things.
Jen Cody was able to get past the crowds and interview a Sony employee about the Rolly. Here is her interview:
It was released in Japan last September, but hasn’t come here yet. Here are the features:
I really don’t think Sony knows what they are doing in the portable music player world. Look at their ad for the Sony Rolly.
It just makes me tilt my head and squint my eyes. Do they really think this is cool?
This is another video showing the features of the Rolly:
The fact that Sony’s booth is ALWAYS super crowded with people didn’t indicate that the Rolly was anything that might appeal to people. Most of the people around the booth were too confused to even tell us what it was.
In the end, Sony loses another round in the battle of the MP3s.
Photos of this sail wagon were posted on the Library of Congress’ Flickr feed a couple of weeks ago.
Sail Wagon, Brooklyn (Library of Congress) by Bain News Service, publisher from Flickr
This entry from the Kansas State Historical Society has some information about them:
A novel device of the Kansas territorial period was the wind wagon, sometimes called a sailing wagon. Several were built and in 1860 the press gave them considerable attention. They were similar to an ordinary light wagon; weighed about 350 pounds; had a bed about three feet wide, eight feet long, and six inches deep; and were propelled by a sail or sails raised over the center of the front axle. When the breezes blew in the right direction the wagons were reported to skim over the prairies at about 15 miles per hour, with speeds at up to 40 miles per hour.
At least one wagon was reported to have traveled from Kansas City to Denver in a little more than 20 days. Upon the arrival of a wind wagon from Westport, Missouri, a Council Grove newspaper asked of its readers: “Who says now that the Santa Fe Trail is not a navigable stream.” The few wind wagons that were built undoubtedly traveled further in the press than they did on the prairie and horses and oxen remained the basic mode of power for a good many years.
My first thought was that they would be useless because narrow roads wouldn’t allow a wind wagon to tack like a sail boat can on the open water. I forgot that our plains were an open swath of land back then.
They were also using sail wagons in California. Here is a first hand description from 1902:
Riding on the Desert Queen was thrilling, according to Von Blon. “You go dodging, at the start, between dots of greasewood and cacti as the ‘ship’ leaves camp with the rising wind; here and there grotesque yucca trees stand like sentinels, with limbs, like long arms, outstretched to reach you; homed toads scurry away over the hot sands, and lizards dart,” Von Blon wrote. “These things you notice at first, but the wind increases and the pace grows madder. You tie a string to your hat and anchor it to your suspender; your handkerchief is whipping from your neck and goes sailing and writhing up and away out of sight almost before you realize that it is gone. This is indeed a different wind from any that ever blew in any other part of the world.â€
Sail wagons were somewhat of a fad in the early twentieth century, but as a current transportation method, sadly, they would be hampered by our narrow roads. It makes me wonder what our landscape would look like now if the sail wagon had beat out the oxen wagon and eventually the car.
Sail Wagon, Brooklyn (Library of Congress) by Bain News Service, publisher from Flickr
This video shows some of the video games from 1972 to 2007.
Which games did you play? Which were your favorite? I LOVE that they included Adventure on the list. It was my favorite game on the Atari and I can still navigate those mazes, even the blind ones, by touch only.
I am surprised that they didn’t include some of the handheld games that were popular in the early years like this football game from Mattel. I played this thing so much that the letters and arrows wore off. I remember handing it to my friend to play and she had never played it before and couldn’t figure it out because all the arrows were gone. This guy and Merlin were my video games that I could take with me. I loved them and to this day I don’t know why the industry doesn’t take them as seriously as the original games from Atari and Intellivision.
Via:
There has been a flurry of activity in the running gadgets world. You can catch up on all of it at Starling Fitness.
Firstly, six patents were registered by Apple detailing a “Lifestyle Companion” that they are working on:
Then Nike announced the Nike+ Sportsband that bypasses the iPod altogether:
Then, a tour of Nike’s secret labs by Sports Stuff revealed that the Nike+ system will work with the iPhone and the iPod Touch soon:
Finally, Sports Stuff pit Nike+ against Samsung’s and Adidas’ mi Coach in a death match. See who emerged the winner here:
This is a very exciting time to be a runner, so if you like your exercise with a few gadgets, then you should head on over to Starling Fitness and start reading up!
Here is a video from the Internet Archive about Comdex 1996. It was made by Computer Chronicles:
It runs about a half hour and talks about the following:
Also, here is a transcript of the keynote speech from Comdex 1996 by Bill Gates:
That concludes our trip down memory lane. Comdex 1996 was fun and I enjoyed it fully. All of it makes me excited to go to CES next year.
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