Gadgets and New Technologies

TMSUK, a robot developer introduced a brand new remote-control robot which offers a new way to shop - from the comfort of your home, that is. This telerobotic shopper is a modified TMSUK-4 humanoid robot that boasts different cell phone communications technology, enabling you to move it around from your handset without having to step out from the home. Of course, the whole idea is pretty novel, but it does detract from the experience of picking up and choosing your own fresh produce. In addition, won’t it be much easier to just go through an online shopping cart instead? I suppose the novelty will wear thin after a while, and you might actually spend less time driving to the mall, picking up the groceries, checking out, and heading back home compared to just trying to manouevre the robot around. (Read the full post about ‘Telerobotic Shopper Makes Life Easy’…)

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One thing that we are never short of as far as gadgets go are novelty alarm clocks.  Having just a normal alarm clock is clearly not an option with some.  This Bomb Alarm Clock even comes complete with a fake fuse to give it a more realistic look.  Then just in case it was unclear it’s a time bomb, it says on the front in bold letters TIME BOMB.  As if we were going to somehow miss that part. The alarm sits as you see in the picture, then when it’s time to wake up it flashes red.  If you want a few more minutes of rest in that warm bed, just pull on the fuse to activate the snooze button.  Being an LED clock it projects the time brightly all night long.  So when tossing and turning in the night you can quickly glance over to see how precious few hours you have left.  The clock uses three AAA batteries and will cost you about $40 or £19.99 from DrinkStuff. (Read the full post about ‘Time Bomb Alarm Clock is sure to drag you out of bed’…)

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Those intrepid hackers at the iPhone Dev Team have already broken the v2.0 Firmware of the new iPhone. While it obviously hasn’t been tested on the actual new hardware, the team haver successfully Jailbroken a first-gen iPhone running the new operating system. And they did it before the official release from Apple, presumably using the leaked version we covered yesterday.

The Team will be releasing the hack into the wild any time now, in the form of their Pwnage tool. Given that the major attraction was that the jailbroken iphone was the ability to run third-party applications, the real 2.0 firmware somewhat takes the wind out of the hack’s sails with the new App Store.

(Read the full post about ‘IPhone 3G Software Already Unlocked’…)

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It’s Friday, you probably can’t stand to do any more work, so how about you close the GemCraft tab that has been open all week and check out some more Far Cry footage?

This is the second video interview that we have seen from Far Cry 2’s developers, but if you are anything like us you can’t get enough of the game.

(Read the full post about ‘More Far Cry 2 Gameplay Footage’…)

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by Joshua Fruhlinger, posted Jul 11th 2008 at 7:12AM We love dirigibles and we’re not about to apologize for it, so that’s why Boeing’s new Skyhook JHL-40 airship has us ooh’ing and aah’ing in wonder. The eight-engine blimp is being developed for 40-ton 200-mile hauls in adverse environments such as wildernesses and what Boeing calls places “no other kind of transport can go.” It is also slated to have a minimal impact on the environment with a carbon-minimal footprint as it won’t require new roadways in remote areas. Of the eight engines, four provide lift while the other four control direction. Two production prototypes are under development at its Rotorcraft Systems facility in Ridley Park, PA. (Read the full post about ‘Boeing’s Skyhook JHL-40 blimp gives us hope for yesterday’s future’…)

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Microsoft’s latest move in introducing a price cut for its Xbox 360 console has not fazed Sony, as the Japanese electronics giant won’t budge from their current price structure, at least for the forseeable future. After all, with Metal Gear Solid 4 having been released recently, people who want to play that game and do not yet have that console will no doubt make a beeline to counters and fork out that extra bit of dough. (Read the full post about ‘Sony PS3 Sees No Price Cut’…)

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Nets2go has released a set of 9 custom-made wooden blinds, but these are no ordinary ones as they feature Web 2.0 logos. The most prominent one among them is Google, but you also get luminaries such as YouTube, Digg, Stumbleupon and Facebook. There is a story associated with these blinds, but unfortunately it ends on a sour note. Net2go apparently manufactured the whole set for a client who regretabbly separated from his wife a couple of weeks after installing them, as she did not understand the geek in him and decided to walk out the door. Surely she doesn’t read Ubergizmo… (Read the full post about ‘Google Blinds from Nets2go’…)

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As the clock struck 8 on the East Coast geeks who had been sustaining themselves with Doritos, cigarettes and Red Bull (yes, in many respects, it is a day like any other) finally got what they had been waiting for: their hands on an iPhone 3G.

It may not have the revolutionary cachet of last year’s model, and the upgrades and fixes and mods may not have set the review-o-sphere on its ear this time around, but there definitely was plenty of pent up demand for the second coming of the Jesus Phone, the AP reports.

At the New York Apple store many in line already had owned an "old" one, like Alex Cavutto, who sold the device the other day and had been using some Brad X replacement he deemed "uncomfortable."

In Atlanta, where hundreds waited for the appointed hour, grad student Nick Epperson stayed up all night (dude, sleep deprivation wasn’t required for activation) and spoke for many prospective buyers by declaring his love for the device was because "Chicks dig the iphone."

Read the full AP account here.

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While there are several options available in the world of classic gaming digital distribution, GOG.com is looking to break onto this scene with some great outlooks on the possibilities of such a service. GOG stands for “Good Old Games” and is touting cheap, DRM-free downloads coming this September, with a beta planned to launch August 1. Price points for the games are listed between $5.99 and $9.99, and with promises of no DRM, infinite downloads once a game is paid for and games modernized to work on Vista and XP, the only question left is how expansive and deep is the library going to be? (Read the full post about ‘GOG.com to offer classic PC game download service’…)

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Flickr has teamed up with the well-known image company Getty Images to offer users a way to earn some money from the pictures they have taken and uploaded to the site.

Getty provide a huge range of stock photography as well as a lot of the images you see adorning newspapers and magazines around the world. With this deal editors at Getty will search Flickr for the photos they want to use. Those pictures will then be earmarked for inclusion as part of a Flickr Collection Getty and Flickr are working on together.

The actual release of the Flickr Collection is not set in stone and just marked as “soon”.

(Read the full post about ‘Getty to sell Flickr photos’…)

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