Three Out-of-the-Living-Room TVs June 30, 2006
For times when you can”t afford to tear yourself away from your plasma screen, here are some products that will allow you to realize the extent of your inner “big brother” tendencies, bringing hi-def throughout your home or office.
The Trak-Kit (right), officially launched at this year”s ICFF, eliminates the need for multiple screens by allowing a single TV to follow you wherever you roam. With a range of 12-30 feet and 359-degree rotation, a single screen can function as a TV monitor, computer screen, gaming terminal, or a stock watcher in a multitude of viewing positions. Trak-Kit is compatible with all major flat screen manufacturers, can be custom designed for various aesthetic environments, and a pre-designed cabinet allows for completely hidden storage. Starting at $5,000, it”s available by contacting Trak-Kit.
Enabling TV addicts to indulge with discretion, the Séura Television Mirror (left) turns into a functional mirror when not in use. Also capable of looking like a virtual painting or TV monitor, you can place it anywhere in your house or office and order a custom frame to match the design of the room. The Séura TV can fully integrate with cable, satellite, antenna, external sound systems, and DVD players and has standard A/V inputs and outputs. Visit Séura to find a list of dealers.
The Aquavision Waterproof LCD TV (right) brings screens right into the shower, garden, steam room, or pool. Units come with 10.4″, 15″, 17″, or 23″ heated screens (to prevent misting in humid conditions or freezing in cold conditions). Like the Suera, the Acqua Vision is available in Mirrorvision finish which turns the monitor into a mirror when not in use. A towel warmer series incorporates a Mirrorvision waterproof TV with a heated rail. Contact Aquavision to locate the nearest showroom.
TAGS: Design, Home Furnishings, Luxury, Television,
Original Article syndicated via RSS from Cool Hunting
What did Brazil look like in 1822?
Mark Frauenfelder: 
Brazil in 1822: people walked around with monkeys on their shoulders (why is the monkey holding a stick in his mouth like that?) and kids ran around squirting some kind of liquid on well-dressed women carrying overloaded fruit baskets on their head (what kind of fluid and why did they squirt it?). See more engravings from the same series at the always-wonderful BibliOdyssey. Link
The game theory of penalty kicks
Mark Frauenfelder: David Goldenberg says: I heard from In Front Sports & Media how interested you are in the World Cup, so I thought I”d share a recent interview Gelf did with an economist at Brown who studies risk and reward on the soccer field.
There are several cool things about his research–most recently on how game theory applies to penalty kicks–but I thout this weird nugget on info he shared might be most interesting to BB readers.Gelf Magazine: Sports Jones suggested in a 1998 article on this topic that the reason more players don”t shoot to the center on PKs is because it would be embarrassing to get such a kick blocked. Do you agree?
Ignacio Palacios-Huerta: No, I do not. One can readily make exactly the opposite argument, namely that it is a great honor to score shooting to the middle, and not a big deal to have it stopped (rather than an embarrassment to have it stopped and not a big deal to score).
In fact, I think that in some sense it is a great honor. The most famous penalty shot (and I think the first one) to the middle was taken by Panenka in 1976 (YouTube). It is so famous that it has a name: when a penalty is shot softly to middle, say, 1 meter or 1.5 meters above the ground (like the second Ukrainian kicker did on Monday in the penalty shoot-out against Switzerland), it is said that the penalty was shot a la Panenka. [Editor”s note: You can see the PK here on YouTube (it starts at the one-minute mark; the Supersport announcer describes the kick as “cheeky”).]) Well, Panenka shot it like this in the last and decisive kick of the European final Germany-Czechoslovakia in 1976, and got totally famous for it. It is very risky but the fame payoffs is [great].
Voicemails from guy wants $50 for dinner date
Mark Frauenfelder: Gonzo Rangers has opened the doors to a mob shamefest on some guy who left voicemail for a woman he met through a dating service, demanding that she pay him $50 for dinner and drinks after she told him she didn”t want a second date. The entry includes emails and voicemail recordings. This kind of thing — publicly shaming a person for rude behavior by posting voice recordings, video, and photos on the Web — is becoming very common — sidekick thief, subway flasher, camera thief, subway puppy poo girl. Who needs law enforcement when you have a globally distributed mob ready to pounce on people who are accused of behaving badly? Link
Reader comment: Adam says:
You forgot the “The Broken Laptop I sold on eBay Blog“
Giant aluminum rectifier purchased for $1
Mark Frauenfelder: John bid $1 on a “large rectifier” on eBay. He won, and when he went to pick it up, it was four times bigger than he expected it to be (see soda can in lower right of image). It contains about 100 lbs of aluminum. Now, he wonders what he can do with it.
So, the question is: I have no earthly use for the thing, and while turning a $1 ebay lot into $58 at the aluminium scrap yard is an attractive option, I”d hate to see the thing melted down when there may be someone out there that could use it.
LAPD to test Dick Tracy-esque GPS dart to trace vehicles
Mark Frauenfelder: The Los Angeles Police Department is going to test a new GPS dart to track the movements of vehicles.
The StarChase system … consists of a laser-guided launcher and a miniaturized GPS tag complete with a radio transmitter and a blob of gummy adhesive. Once stuck to its target, the tag begins transmitting coordinates to a server through an encrypted cellular network. Computers superimpose the GPS data over a map that allows dispatchers to track the vehicle’s every move.
In South Bronx: “Free Technical School in basement”
Mark Frauenfelder: John Young says:
My company in NYC was doing a community service day in the South Bronx. On the way there, I got waylaid on the street by a short older man who said in a thick Jackie Mason accent: “Young man! Do you want to learn electrical engineering?”
I was so intrigued that I followed him a few blocks away, past a whole bunch of disquieting, Wile E. Coyote-style “Free Technical School in basement: GO RIGHT IN! RIGHT THIS WAY!” signs, and found, basically, an underground maker”s lair consisting of a big unimproved basement filled with chairs, boilers, and homemade electrical diagnostic devices. Plus LCD monitors mounted on the wall, CAT6 cable, and dry-erase boards filled with math. All the ingredients of a supervillain”s lair. Except used in the service of creating more geeks.
I was terrified the whole time (South Bronx! Three stories underground! Genial elderly man who”s spouting theories about biodiesel to passers-by!), but it turns out that he”s teaching a highly employable skill, for free, to anyone with a clean police record in a depressed neighborhood.
There are some pictures here, if you want to see the “Free elec. school in basement go right in” signs for yourself.
Scott Beale reviews Kyocera KR1 Mobile EV-DO Router
Mark Frauenfelder: Scott Beale of Laughing Squid loves his Kyocera KR1 EV-DO router, which uses a high speed wireless EV-DO connection for sharable Internet WiFi.
Now my portable broadband network is ready to go. I just show up with it, plug it in and in a minute or so the wireless network is live. That’s all there is to it. All I need is power and Verizon EV-DO coverage. Have an old laptop without a wi-fi card? No problem, just plug it into one of the 4 ethernet ports.
I’m going to bring the EV-DO router up to Gnomedex this week and see if I can get it to work at the conference and maybe do some testing with distance and number of users.
Reader comment: Vinny says:
I have to say the Kyocera EVDO Router is one of the best things ever. In our company, we were paying almost $500 a month in one of our stores in NYC that couldn”t get anything beyond a 144k down ADSL. Even at 1XRTT speed, we get 160 down in that location, and in another location in Ohio, we get almost 400k down, which is cool because we couldn”t get anything at all there. Laptops weren”t an option but this allowed us to hook the EVDO card up, leave it out where it could get a good signal, and even let the managers of those locations use their laptops with the included WiFi.Awesome device and HIGHLY recommended.
Update: Scott Beale says:
I”m using it at Gnomdex right now and it works great. In fact I”m posting photos live from the event using my personal EV-DO network (including photos of guest speaker Senator John Edwards)
Video: Fantastic Planet with electronica soundtrack
David Pescovitz: 
The musical trainspotters at everyone.doesntexist.com mixed a new soundtrack for La Planète Sauvage (Fantastic Planet), the 1973 surrealist SF animation by René Laloux and Roland Topor. It”s a strange film made even more psychedelic with the sounds of Aphex Twin, Matmos, Venetian Snares, and other composers.
Link (via Aeiou blog: excuse my French!)
Whale meat sold by the can in Japan
Mark Frauenfelder: According to Tokyo Times blog, there”s a glut in the whale meat market.
With the prospect of Japan getting the go-ahead to resume commercial whaling in the not so necessarily distant future, the people in power are desperately trying to get rid of the nation’s growing stock of scientific research by-products – or whale meat as it’s more commonly known. School children in certain prefectures are being served it for lunch, one restaurant chain is offering whale burgers, and, in a rather desperate measure, dogs are allegedly being fed the stuff, whether they like it or not.