Archive for August 9th, 2008

Man inexplicably brings touchscreen to the PSP

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

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A certain jube808 has launched a quixotic quest to add a myriad of features to the PSP that he believes should’ve been there from the start, including beefed up battery life, a better control pad, and touchscreen support. Think what you will of his aims, he certainly seems to have some hardware chops, as he’s got a touchscreen up and running on the handheld. So far he’s just got a proof of concept keyboard, which works with a finger or a stylus, but the hope is to provide full touchscreen support for homebrew gaming. Let us know how that goes, jube. Videos are after the break.

[Thanks, Craig]

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Bolivia coca farmers back Morales in recall

Aug 9, 2008 World News

VILLA 14 DE SEPTIEMBRE, Bolivia (Reuters) - Coca farmers in the verdant Chapare region, where Bolivian President Evo Morales rose to prominence as a fiery union leader, are confident he will win a recall vote on Sunday.

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Lenovo shows off stable of Olympics-themed USB flash drives

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

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Lenovo already rolled out one Olympics-themed flash drive long before the Beijing Games kicked off, but now that the Opening Ceremonies have come and gone, the outfit is showing off a few more for good measure. The Mascot series contains a half dozen colorful 4GB units that’ll go for around $30 apiece, while the so-called Medallions will only be available on the second-hand market thanks to the original batch selling out. Lastly, we’ve got five slightly different 1GB titanium drives that boast swiveling plugs and arrive in a swank mahogany box. Huzzah?

[Via EverythingUSB]

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Digital Edge Gaming Table Provides Three Tiers of Peripheral Storage [Peripherals]

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

Like to game but hate unplugging and putting away the various peripherals you need? For $379 you can get Digital Edge’s Gaming Table, which fits every gaming gadget you could possibly own, plus three 21-inch LCD monitors. Granted, I haven’t fired up the PC for anything in a long while, but I don’t remember that many games requiring more than a keyboard and a mouse. If you’re more hardcore than me though, and you have a couple hundred bones to spare, the Gaming Table is available for order all over the continental United States. [Dvice]


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Bolivia coca farmers back Morales in recall

Aug 9, 2008 World News

VILLA 14 DE SEPTIEMBRE, Bolivia (Reuters) - Coca farmers in the verdant Chapare region, where Bolivian President Evo Morales rose to prominence as a fiery union leader, are confident he will win a recall vote on Sunday.

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Crapgadget: USB back massager, limbo string and more obviously terrible ideas

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

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Remember those battery-operated vibrating ladybugs that people used to pass around (multiple times) as office gifts? Yeah, that critter ain’t got nothing on this stable of patently awful gizmos. We’ve seen a remarkable amount of garbage pass under our noses in the past few weeks, and we’ve rounded up the worst of the worst for your consideration. So, is a USB shell speaker really more embarrassing than a V-Sports console for folks tired of searching for a Wii? Is the i-Knock personal IM notifier more unnecessary than the Encore Rockin’ Music Lamp? Or does the OMG-inducing Limbo String walk away with the gold here? We know, each and every item is a festering turd in one way or another, but which of the ones below just exemplify the word “crap?” Choose carefully.

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Medeco High Security M3 Locks Hacked With Easy Credit Card Trick [Hacks]

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

With all the hacks going on this weekend at DefCon, the world’s largest annual hacker convention, perhaps the most embarrassingly easy to crack was Medeco’s high-security locks. According to a group of security researchers, all you need to get into an Medeco M3 lock, used in sensitive facilities such as the White House and the Pentagon, is a low-res image of someone’s key and a credit card.

The researchers took a photograph of a Medeco key, printed the image onto a label and used the label as a cut-out guide for reshaping the plastic of the credit card. Voila; State secrets here we come! Any credit card plastic could be used to create a simulated key, they said.

The Medeco M3 key does have an extra feature that is supposed to add security – a step protrusion on one side of the key that helps moves the Medeco lock’s slider. But the same crew that created this easy hack proved last year that all you needed to do was insert the end of a bent paper clip into lock, pushing back the slider and rendering the feature toothless. Considering Medeco locks are three to four times more expensive than conventional ones, maybe the company should jump on this problem stat. [Wired]


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Happy Birthday and Best Wedding Wishes, Woz!

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

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The WozA very happy birthday to Stephen Gary “Woz” Wozniak, the co-founder of the company we all know and love. No comments about “third founder” Ron Wayne, please. Woz will be 58 on Monday, the 11th, but we wanted to give you the scoop on some other things going on in his life right now, so we’re running his birthday greetings early.

Woz’s Segway Polo team, the Silicon Valley Aftershocks, is playing in the annual Woz Cup at SegwayFesT 2008 in Indianapolis this weekend. They’re currently at 2nd place in the standings.

Woz also took the time on Friday, August 8, 2008, to get married to WozWife 4.0 at SegwayFesT 2008. You will be happy / uninterested / dismayed to know that he did not marry former gal pal Kathy Griffin - the name of the new Mrs. Wozniak is not being released at this time.

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Zimbabwe deal possible Sunday: ruling party

Aug 9, 2008 World News

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe could sign a power-sharing deal on Sunday that names opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai as prime minister, a senior ruling party official said on Saturday.

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EU, U.S. back Georgian call for truce in S.Ossetia

Aug 9, 2008 World News

TIRDZNISI, Georgia (Reuters) - Russia accused Georgia on Saturday of seeking bloody adventures by trying to retake its breakaway region of South Ossetia and defended its own military campaign to stop it.

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AlterEgo Shows Off Incredibly Realistic 3D Animated Faces [3D Animation]

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

Pendulum Studios, the guys who brought you the in-game movies in Stuntman 2 and are working on the forthcoming Silent Hill 5, have released a couple videos showing off their AlterEgo team’s proprietary facial performance software. The program brings out some of the most realistic and precise 3D animated expressions available to the market today. When you’ve finished watching the (kind of hilarious) video above, check out the company’s hi-res demo videos as well. [Technabob]


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Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish dies

Aug 9, 2008 World News

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Mahmoud Darwish, whose poetry his fellow Palestinians embraced as the voice of their suffering, died on Saturday after heart surgery in Texas.

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NZXT’s Avatar gaming mouse gets previewed, likened to a Razer

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

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You don’t even need to dig into the machine translated read link to understand that the gaming mouse you see pictured above looks a lot like a Razer, but NZXT’s Avatar is a beast in its own right. Best known for lavish (and stylish) PC cases, the outfit has evidently seen fit to dip its toes into the wide, wide world of gamer-centric input peripherals. Boasting a 2,600DPI sensitivity rating and a rather unadventurous design, the Avatar should fare fine in heated deathmatches or WoW raids, though it’s probably overkill for the Excel maven. Nevertheless, the currently unpriced unit has been previewed quite thoroughly by the folks over at TweakPC, so give the link below a look if you could ever see yourself wanting this in your arsenal.

[Via I4U News]

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New Wolfenstein game will not feature Hitler

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Games

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When we think back on our proudest achievements throughout our video gaming careers, a few notable moments come to mind — for instance, the first time we caught ‘em all. Or when we topped our friends’ high scores on Pac-Man Championship Edition. The first time we beat the wretched wind tunnel level in Battletoads. Oh, and how could we forget — that time we shuffled robo-Hitler off this mortal coil in Wolfenstein 3D. That guy was a jerk.

Unfortunately, the satisfaction one feels after putting the kibosh on a genocidist won’t be present in Id Software and Raven’s next installment in their Nazi-stomping franchise, Wolfenstein. In an interview with Eurogamer, Id lead artist Kevin Cloud confirmed that the Fuhrer will not be present in the upcoming title, claiming that the developer needs to “save something for future Wolfensteins.” Who could possibly replace him as the game’s nefarious evil boss, though? Eva Braun? Bowser, perhaps?

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Smart Contacts Will Detect Glaucoma Before It Blinds You [Contact Lenses]

Aug 9, 2008 Blogs, Technology

Researchers at UC Davis have designed contact lenses that can give you an in-eye checkup to make sure there’s nothing wrong, as well as dispense medication automatically when needed. The “smart” lenses use an organic polymer called PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane, if you’re nasty) that detects eye pressure and sends that data to a computer—important updates to get if you’re at risk for glaucoma.

Glaucoma, a disease that causes a loss of cells in the optic nerve, is the second leading cause of blindness worldwide. Unlike the first leading cause, cataracts, it’s irreversible, making the ability to keep tabs on warning signs even more crucial. UC Davis will start clinical trials of the smart contact lenses in humans soon. [UC Davis via io9]


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