Infographic by Martin Missfeldt shows exactly how #GoogleGlass will work on my eye (Kinda Invasively IMO)

Infographic source

I've always felt a little weirded out with the idea of tech projecting something directly on my retina. It seems like it would be a little too easy to make me see something that isn't there. Like if someone hacked my Glass. I'm sure I'm just paranoid, but still, if it's possible to hack anything, it's possible. It'll be just short of being able to insert something directly in your mind. If you close your eyes, the image vanishes. But the fear instinct doesn't always let you look away.

Otherwise, I think this is a pretty cool device. I can't wait to get my hands on mine. That's right, I was selected as one of Google's Glass Explorers:

https://twitter.com/projectglass/status/318137531814248448

I just hope they hold their events in NY, LA and San Francisco soon since I'm taking a long weekend out of town later in April and going away for much longer in mid-May. It would suck if I had to skip getting my glass because I was going to be out of town. Neither trip can be postponed--one is a party celebrating my late step-dad's life and the other involves a cruise ship that goes to Europe, so, yeah, unpostponable. I know, first-world problems, but problems nonetheless.

Fingers crossed!

I TOTALLY want to do this: How to Install Android on an iPhone in Six Easy Steps

Link: I TOTALLY want to do this: How to Install Android on an iPhone in Six Easy Steps

And I just might!

Seeing how smoothly it works on an iPhone 2G makes me reeeeally want to see how well it works on a 3G—MY 3G.  Especially since I’ve been so SICK of iOS and iTunes giving me endless shit about what I can and can’t do.

What’s really great is that, apparently, you can dual boot—so it leaves your iOS install untouched.  Pretty cool.

If I do it, I’ll be sure to take pics and/or video…

I want a pair of these soooo bad: a Head-Mounted Display in the form of glasses from Lumus

Link: I want a pair of these soooo bad: a Head-Mounted Display in the form of glasses from Lumus







OK, so they could use some slimming down (like maybe a belt-clipable handheld-sized device?) and I’d probably take a sharpie to that gross stripe (I may be from Jersey, but I’ve got SOME class), but still—this is the future and I can’t wait!

No more worrying about a scratched display or a cracked screen—just keep these babies on or in a hardcase and you’re in great shape.

Hell, I’d settle for one of these.

You’ve heard of “blood diamonds,” now learn about “blood minerals”

You’ve heard of “blood diamonds,” now learn what “blood minerals” are :(



Found via newsweek.tumblr.com

The sad truth :(

Still, it’s not the consumer’s fault that Apple and friends get use “blood minerals” in the gadgets we lust for.  Big electronics companies could try finding alternative sources or alternatives, charge a little more and make a big deal about why the price is higher.  Guilt the public into being OK with spending more money.

OR, electronics companies could make less money and still do the right thing… ;)

Nah, I doubt they’ll do that.

AMAZON'S KINDLE: ThePete's Take: Not Even for Kindling

Yeah, I really think Jeff Bezos is not the person to listen to when it comes to considering the future of technology. This is the guy who agreed with the guy who made the Segway who also said that cities would redesign themselves for said Segway. Oh yeah, Bezos is also the guy who built his own spaceship. Now what is he spouting on about? It's that thing to the right--it's called the Amazon Kindle and he's convinced it's the future of books. But check out the features:

6 inch diagonal B&W (grayscale) screen

Uses Sprint's EV-DO network (connects to 'net via cell phone network) to hook you to the Amazon Kindle Store (think iTunes Music Store for digital books)

QWERTY keyboard for entering in book titles (and such) to said AKS, you can also annotate and bookmark

Compatible with Audible.com tracks as well as standard mp3s

Has an SD (low capacity) slot for "expansion"

Supports something called "Kindle format" for text docs, along with PDF, Mobi, HTML, plaintext, and image files like JPEG, GIF, and PNG (source) but I have yet to read conclusively that it surfs the web

Comes with a built-in dictionary and allows you to wirelessly connect to Wikipedia.org

All that for just $400.

I haven't even told you how expensive books and newspapers are.

Books: $9.99 (for most titles)
Newspapers: $9.99 to $14.99/mo
Magazines (the only reasonably priced thing here): $1.99/mo

Will it flop? Well, I haven't heard of Bezos making any flights into orbit and I only see Segways zooming down the street when there's a blue moon out, so, based on those two facts and the cost of the Kindle, I'm going to go out on a limb and say:

Baring an extreme price drop, the Amazon Kindle will bomb.

I mean, think about it: you're saying the future of a passtime that hardly anyone does is in an electronic device that costs $400???

For that price you can get a laptop--hell, the eee PC is the same price and it runs XP! I just dropped $400 on an XO laptop and it has basic PC features (like web surfing) and it has an e-Book mode. So, why should I be expected to drop another $400 on the Kindle? Just because it has free Sprint EV-DO service?? Well, it only has free EV-DO to the Kindle store and to Wikipedia--that's hardly a robust Internet experience. I can do more on my Sidekick 3--which also cost me $400. But my SK3 is a phone and I can surf and check my email and IM and, a short stack of other things.

So, remind me again why I should drop $400 on the Kindle?

I'd say this thing is worth $100 for what it does. Ditch the free EV-DO service and just let us load our own stuff in it and I'm good. Oh and the books that cost nothing to copy over and over and over? Those should be about $3--not $10. Who the hell do you think you're kidding, Bezos? $9.99 for a digital book? Where do the costs go? Not to cover design or printing--just to marketing and download service support (I'm assuming that most of the mark-up on the Kindle, itself, goes to pay for the EV-DO).

Frakkin' greedy bastards. All these guys think about is how much they can charge instead of how little. Do they want their device in everyone's hands? Newsflash, guys! The cheaper your tech is, the more people will buy it! This is especially true if your device is as useless as the Kindle.

sources: Amazon Kindle product page Engadget: here, here, and here.

Wi-Fire WiFi Signal Extender from hField Technologies, Inc.

hField Technologies, Inc.

That little black box there is called the Wi-Fire and it extends your laptop's wifi range to 1,000 feet.  It's both Windows and Mac compatible and will run you under $80.  Not bad... 

Will the High Cost of Oil and Low Value of the Dollar Effect Gadgets?

If you've been paying attention to the news at all, you've probably heard about how expensive the cost of a barrel of oil has gotten--topping $94 as I type this. Another thing you may have learned about on the news (though it is less likely) is that the US dollar is at it's weakest in a very, very long time. In fact, a quick check of the exchange rates (again, as I type this) at XE.com shows that the USD is still trailing the Canadian dollar by about five cents. Not a lot, but we're still weaker than the Canadian dollar!

So, what does this mean for gadgets? It could mean nothing, but then again, gadgets do contain a lot of plastic, which is a petroleum product and gadgets do cost money to buy. What this may mean eventually for us is more expensive gadgets. In fact, it's a little surprising that we haven't seen at least small price jumps in the years since oil began it's astronomical rise and the dollar's long fall. However, there are certain physical laws when it comes to money and they can't be ignored forever.

Here's how price jumps will work when they come (and they will):

I'M RUNNING OUT OF GADGETS!

Ever since I saw my first James Bond movie, I've been in love with gadgets. Within a month of the Sony's Walkman hitting stores I had one - well, it was a competitor's model, but it still was a tape player you could carry with you. I was fourteen years-old. Two years later when Sony put out their portable, personal CD player, I got one. A couple of years after that, Sony put out their mini-Discman that played the smaller (and now defunct) three inch compact discs, again, I made sure to get one. Of course, this was all back when I was a kid. When asking for something for my birthday meant that I would usually get it. It was the Eighties, the economy was doing pretty well and I wasn't in college yet. The summer after my senior year I managed to afford my own camcorder, which I proceeded to cover with comic book stickers. I quickly dubbed the device, the Batcam!

Then, 1989, I went off to school and the gadgets pretty much ended. My folks had enough financial worries just keeping me in school, I wasn't about to turn around and ask them for any more high priced gadgets - especially since I was more interested in having enough money to finish my student films. Another thing happened in 1989, I saw my first Windows Laptop machine. It was glorious for it's day - it was portable, it had a backlit monitor screen, point-and-click and everything! Of course, the most my Mom could afford was a DOS laptop which, while being bell-and-whistle-free, did manage to get the job done. But I never considered it a "gadget" because it there was no cool factor. It simply functioned and that was that. That was ten years ago.

Ten years later, in 1999, I finally got my finances under control as an adult and could actually say in all honesty that I was making more money than I spent. It was great - and not so great. I finally was able to buy that Windows based laptop that I had wanted since 1989. Better late than never, I guess! On top of that, I bought a CD burner which I LOVE. This year for the holidays everyone got my obligatory comics-drawn-by-me calendar on CD-ROM - which allowed me to spend a LOT less money on everyone. For Christmas my Dad got me a RAM card for my digital camera (did I mention that I got a digital camera?) that was too big for it, so I had to take it back to Best Buy. But there, I managed to exchange it for a brand new (but open boxed and therefore discounted) Palm Pilot IIIe!! That's where I am now - what gadgets are left to me? I am infinitely happy in my new found gadgetness, but where do I go from here?

I know - if only we all had these problems. I realize it's pretty lame of me to whine about this sort of thing, BUT IT'S MY DAMN WEB SITE!! If you don't like it, TELL ME ON THE VENTILATION PAGE.