Physorg - 'Smart Concrete' Could Improve Levees

Physorg - 'Smart Concrete' Could Improve Levees:
"The failure of levees in the wake of Hurricane Katrina points out the need for new technologies to strengthen levees and monitor their reliability, according to Deborah D. L. Chung, Ph.D., a University at Buffalo materials scientist and inventor of 'smart concrete.'"
Via Future Feeder

I4U News - Sub-$100 Laptop Design Revealed by MIT's Negroponte

I4U News - Sub-$100 Laptop Design Revealed by MIT's Negroponte:
"Nicholas Negroponte, chairman and founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Labs showed designs for a sub-$100 laptop for kids in 3rd world countries."

I4U News - Sony Announces New Memory Stick Micro M2

I4U News - Sony Announces New Memory Stick Micro M2:
"The new Memory Stick M2 measures 15 x 12.5 x 1.2 mm and could theoretically have 32GB in the future."

Gear Live - PocketDish: Carry Around Your Dish Network Programming

Gear Live - PocketDish: Carry Around Your Dish Network Programming:
"EchoStar Communications, parent company of Dish Network, is attempting to be the latest to break in to the PVP market with the PocketDish. Basically, it’s a portable video player that can store TV programs along with music, games and photos."
Via: I4U News

Publish - Next-Generation Blogging Platform Previews

Publish - Next-Generation Blogging Platform Previews:
"While no one fears a Weblogging shortage any time soon, a new platform will tempt even more uninitiated civilians to enter the blogosphere when Six Apart releases its public beta of Project Comet in early 2006."

TWICE - Sirius Eyes Web Radio, Claims Gains At Retail

TWICE - Sirius Eyes Web Radio, Claims Gains At Retail:
"Sirius Satellite Radio’s CEO Mel Karmazin told analysts last week that the company continues to examine new platforms to leverage its content, including Internet radio."
RELATED: TWICE - Cellular Competing For Ear Time With Music Radio

Scotsman News - 'Bionic eye' has potential to cure blindness

Scotsman News - 'Bionic eye' has potential to cure blindness:
"SCOTTISH scientists are developing an electronic implant that will be capable of curing two of the most common forms of blindness."
Via KurzweilAI.net

BBC News - James Bond writer 'reinvents' spy

BBC News - James Bond writer 'reinvents' spy:
"James Bond is to be given a new image as a younger character with no gadgets, a writer on the next film has told trade paper the Hollywood Reporter."
Via LIVEdigitally Newsletter

Wired News - New Shades Battle Boiling Brains

Wired News - New Shades Battle Boiling Brains:
"Your next pair of sunglasses could do much more than shield your eyes from ultraviolet rays. They could tell you how hot your brain is and even prevent heatstroke."
Via 21f Group

textually - It's Bluetooth for the ears: a hearing aid takes calls

textually - It's Bluetooth for the ears: a hearing aid takes calls:
"TV delivered into living rooms over broadband connections will completely change TV as well as the internet as we know it, concludes a major report."
Via PSFK Newsletter

PSFK - Generation Forever Young

PSFK - Generation Forever Young:
"This time last week we mentioned the 60 Minutes show about the Echo Boomers who think they're perfect; this week we noticed a great article in the UK Times about 'Generation Forever Young' - a generation who believes they're still youthful until they're 48 years old (at least)."

BBC News - Broadband to rule the TV waves

BBC News - Broadband to rule the TV waves:
"TV delivered into living rooms over broadband connections will completely change TV as well as the internet as we know it, concludes a major report."
Via PSFK

PSFK - Ikea Launches Prefab Homes In Scotland

PSFK - Ikea Launches Prefab Homes In Scotland:
"Ikea is to create a series of prefabricated homes, for sale or rent, in Scotland's Glasgow. The company will build up to 100 easy-to-assemble homes in Drumchapel as part of the area's £100m, reports the Herald:

Prices have yet to be decided, but following the Scandinavian ideal of providing affordable good design for everyone, the schemes will be targeted at people with incomes of between £12,500 and £30,000 who want to get on the property ladder."

PSFK - The Future Of The Ebook Isn't PDF

PSFK - The Future Of The Ebook Isn't PDF:
"We're in an age of links, trackbacks, dynamic updatable content - and the PDF is quite frankly a dinosaur. There's no point making a book an ebook if you don't make the content accessible. Many traditional books are in a poor format for our modern lifestyle - I have several business books at home half read, getting dusty. However, two books that I read in a flash recently was Tom Peter's Trends and Robyn Waters' Trendmaster books. Why? They were booklets - short, concise, could fit in my pocket so I could read anywhere, anytime on my ever-changing schedule (and I could take my eyes away from the screen for once)."

PSFK - Silent Flight

PSFK - Silent Flight:
"With the rising number of air passengers there has been an ongoing expansion of airports and air travel, noise polution has become more and more prevalient."

News @ Nature - Space cycle makes artificial gravity

News @ Nature - Space cycle makes artificial gravity:
"Astronauts may soon have another weapon in the fight against the muscle-wasting effects of living in space. And it's a surprisingly low-tech one: a cycle-powered centrifuge that creates its own 'gravity'."

News @ Nature - Shocked metals are stronger

News @ Nature - Shocked metals are stronger:
"Sudden shocks make you harder. At least, they can do if you're a metal. A team of researchers in the United States and Switzerland hope that this discovery could point the way to ultra-hard metals for engineering in extreme environments, such as nuclear fusion reactors."

contract Magazine - Focus: Quality, not Quantity

contract Magazine - Focus: Quality, not Quantity:
"When it comes to the numerous components that shape the atmosphere of a space, ambient lighting may be one of the most underrated. But although funky may trump functional in garnering attention, an appropriate ambient lighting scheme is a key variable in any design equation."

BizReport - Blockbuster Weighs Online Video-On-Demand

BizReport - Blockbuster Weighs Online Video-On-Demand:
"Movie-rental giant Blockbuster Inc. continues to take small steps toward a rollout of online video-on-demand in the United Kingdom while rival Netflix Inc. plans a small-scale test in the United States this year."

BizReport - Microsoft in talks on AOL link

BizReport - Microsoft in talks on AOL link:
"Time Warner Inc. and Microsoft Corp. are discussing cooperation between their Internet search and advertising networks, a source familiar with the matter said on Thursday."

BizReport - New Google Search Engine Boosts Blogging

BizReport - New Google Search Engine Boosts Blogging:
"A new Google Inc. specialty search engine sifts through the Internet's millions of frequently updated personal journals, a long-anticipated development expected to help propel blogging into the cultural mainstream."

BizReport - Yahoo blends Web e-mail with speed of desktop

BizReport - Yahoo blends Web e-mail with speed of desktop:
"Yahoo Inc. said it is upgrading Yahoo Mail, the most popular Web e-mail program, to make it run more efficiently than other Web-based systems and nearly as fast as desktop e-mail."

USA Today - Concrete's future looks lighter, greener

USA Today - Concrete's future looks lighter, greener:
"Now, thanks to environmental pressures and entrepreneurial innovation, a new generation of concretes is emerging. This high-tech, Willy Wonka-esque assortment of concrete confections promises to be stronger, lighter, and more environmentally friendly than ever before."

USA Today - Videogame tourneys draw big-time sponsors

USA Today - Videogame tourneys draw big-time sponsors:
"'Kids in the early 1900s were playing baseball in dirt fields. Kids today are playing computer games' says Jason Lake, an Atlanta real-estate lawyer who owns two teams of pro gamers, totaling fourteen players, some of whom did battle last week."
Via Ypulse

reveries magazine - Cafe Freud

reveries magazine - Cafe Freud:
"'At Cafe Freud, guests can feast … in one of three halls — Id, Ego and Superego — then wend their way to their respective toilets through three lipstick-red stained glass doors depicting male and female figures and suggestive plants and fruits in an abstract, Joan Miro style,' reports Sophia Kishokovsky in The New York Times. Cafe Freud is in Moscow, Russia, and according to psychoanalyst Yelena Bazhenova, its design is true to its name: 'In accordance with psychoscxual development, our country is now in the an@l stage … Restaurants have gone through the oral stage. All cuisines are now represented. Now it’s the an@l stage. They’ve started to design their toilets.'"

Scotsman.com - 'Bionic eye' has potential to cure blindness

Scotsman.com - 'Bionic eye' has potential to cure blindness:
"SCOTTISH scientists are developing an electronic implant that will be capable of curing two of the most common forms of blindness."
Via Reveries

ZDNet Australia - Tasmania powers up 12Mbps broadband

ZDNet Australia - Tasmania powers up 12Mbps broadband:
"Internet service provider Datafast, in partnership with Aurora Energy and hardware vendor Mitsubishi Electric, today kicked off a 12Mbps broadband over power line service in Hobart, which the company claims is the world's first large-scale commercial trial."
Via Slashdot

Yahoo! News - Tech Notebook: We hear VoIP gets excellent mileage

Yahoo! News - Tech Notebook: We hear VoIP gets excellent mileage:
"All the major tech companies -- including Microsoft, Yahoo, and Google -- have been investing millions of dollars in VoIP, an acronym for Voice over Internet Protocol, which is a fancy term for making phone calls over the Internet."
Via ZDNet

geekBlue.net - EBay to buy Skype for $4.1 Billion

geekBlue.net - EBay to buy Skype for $4.1 Billion:
"EBay, the world's largest internet auction company, has purchased two year old VoIP firm Skype for $4.1 billion - $1.3 billion of the deal will be in cash, $1.3 billion in stocks, and the remainder will be payed by 2009 if the finacial goals have been met. About 40 per cent of investors sold up for a mix of cash and eBay stock, but the remainder have chosen an option that includes future payouts based on performance."
Via LIVEdigitally Newsletter

Yahoo! News - Samsung Readies 32GB Memory Cards

Yahoo! News - Samsung Readies 32GB Memory Cards:
"Samsung Electronics has announced a new flash memory chip that should pave the way for removable memory cards that can hold up to 32GB of data."
Via LIVEdigitally Newsletter

Engadget - First Toshiba SED TVs coming in March 2006

Engadget - First Toshiba SED TVs coming in March 2006:
"Toshiba dropped a few more deets and a prototype SED (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display) television at the IFA in Berlin. As we already told you, the first units developed in cooperation with Canon will flaunt a 50-inch diagonal and hopefully sport an incredible 100,000:1 contrast ratio. We now know these super bright and oh so thin boobs-o-tube will ship in March 2006 (Japan first most likely) with “full” HDTV resolution (1,920 x 1,080 pixels) and a response time of less than a millisecond. Damned impressive… with a price tag certain to match."
Via LIVEdigitally Newsletter

TV Squad - Adult Swim goes web on Fridays

TV Squad - Adult Swim goes web on Fridays:
"Starting September 16, Adult Swim, which doesn't air Friday nights, will be available for free download on www.AdultSwim.com. They're calling it Friday Night Fix. There will also be sneak preview episodes that aren't scheduled to premier until the following Sunday available."
Via Ypulse

eMarketer Daily - Telecoms in TV Face-Off with Cable Operators

eMarketer Daily - Telecoms in TV Face-Off with Cable Operators:
"Verizon and SBC are close to launching TV service via broadband, adding a new dimension to the competition between cable, satellite and telecom providers. "

Treehugger - Subaru Joins Electric Car Race with R1e

Treehugger - Subaru Joins Electric Car Race with R1e:
"Fuji Heavy Industries (20% owned by GM), the company behind the Subaru brand, announced on 19 August plans to bring a fully electric version of the mini R1 car to the market. Dubbed the R1e when introduced as a concept car in 2003, the all-electric vehicle could be available to consumers in Japan as early as 2009."Via Electrifying Times

St. Louis Post-Dispatch - Midtier hotels challenge the big boys

St. Louis Post-Dispatch - Midtier hotels challenge the big boys:
"Flat-screen television sets and high-speed Internet connections for guests' rooms are among the millions of dollars in renovations under way at several area midtier hotels."

Wired News - Computer, Heal Thyself!

Wired News - Computer, Heal Thyself! :
"Microchips are like potato chips: More of them come out of the oven broken than whole. And of the chips - micro, not potato - that make it to market, many have built-in weaknesses that eventually cause them to fail. Most people don't care. The useful lifespan of an electronic device is only about three years, and it's hard to consume just one. By the time your cell phone's processor melts down, you've already bought a newer model."
Via Reveries

San Mateo Daily Journal - Farmers to offer new eco-label

San Mateo Daily Journal - Farmers to offer new eco-label:
"'These new eco-label and verification schemes tend to really just muddy the waters with questions,' said Jake Lewin, a director of marketing at California Certified Organic Farmers, an organic certification and trade group. 'It’s not clear to consumers, 'What is this product and why should you want it?''"
Via Reveries

VisualStore - Not Your Parents’ Vending Machine

VisualStore - Not Your Parents’ Vending Machine:
"Zoom Systems (San Francisco) is deploying the company's new automated retail stores in airports, hotels, malls and even grocery stores. The company network of 40-square-foot robotic stores are placed in heavily trafficked locations and are open 24 hours a day, allowing brands to place products, like digital music players, headphones, computer accessories and even cosmetics, directly in the path of consumers, creating a new experience and generating revenue opportunities where none existed before."

BizReport - Web Buying Spree for Big Media

BizReport - Web Buying Spree for Big Media:
"Traditional media companies have snapped up many Web properties this year as they scramble to cash in on the second big Internet advertising boom. While Internet ads claim a small slice of the overall ad pie -- generating not quite $10 billion in the United States last year, less than 5 percent of all ad revenue -- the online dollars grew more than 30 percent, much faster than off-line. In response, traditional media companies have been making some startling moves."

BizReport - NerdTV Available by Free Internet Download

BizReport - NerdTV Available by Free Internet Download:
"NerdTV identifies its target audience with its very name and with its format: It's not available over the air but rather via a free Internet download."

BBC News - Eco-aware shower recycles water

BBC News - Eco-aware shower recycles water:
"A shower which recycles water promises to save householders money and energy."
Via Engadget <- LIVEdigitally

Mass High Tech - Tiax tagged to help build better space structures for NASA

Mass High Tech - Tiax tagged to help build better space structures for NASA:
"Cambridge-based Tiax LLC, a product and technology development firm, is collaborating with ILC Dover and Johnson Space Center to identify, develop and test new materials for building inflatable structures in space."

Reuters - Nanotech advance may hasten molecular machines

Reuters - Nanotech advance may hasten molecular machines:
"DUBLIN (Reuters) - Scientists have made a breakthrough in nanotechnology which could hasten the development of molecular machines that could act as artificial muscles or drug delivery systems in the body."

Apple - iPod nano

Apple - iPod nano:
"Take everything you love about iPod and shrink it. Now shrink it again. With 2GB (500 songs) and 4GB (1,000 songs) models starting at $199, the pencil-thin iPod nano packs the entire iPod experience into an impossibly small design. So small, it will take your music places you never dreamed of."

BizReport - Ex-Microsoft Exec Alleges Incompetence

BizReport - Ex-Microsoft Exec Alleges Incompetence:
"Former Microsoft Corp. executive Kai-Fu Lee accused the software titan of incompetence in its plans to gain a business footing in China, and testified Tuesday that being yelled at by Chairman Bill Gates was a low point of his career before he defected to rival Google Inc."

TerraTec - The world's most mobile TV card!

TerraTec - The world's most mobile TV card!:
"The Cinergy Hybrid T USB XS receives digital and analogue TV signals, yet is no larger than a USB memory stick! Just connect the ultra-compact TV tuner to a notebook or PC via a USB 2.0 port – and in a flash you're able to view both all analogue TV programs available in the transmission area and the digital programs transmitted via DVB-T. The Cinergy Hybrid T USB XS supports both standards in one device, and is therefore flexible and has a guaranteed future."

news @ nature - First chimp fossil unearthed

news @ nature - First chimp fossil unearthed.:
"Palaeontologists digging in the dusty wastelands of East Africa have discovered the first known chimpanzee fossil. The modest haul of just three teeth is the first hard evidence of the evolutionary path that led to today's chimpanzees."

3Dlabs - Wildcat Realizm 800

3Dlabs - Wildcat Realizm 800:
"Welcome to a new kind of Realizm ... where precision, speed and your creativity combine in ways you've only dreamed of. 3Dlabs puts the power of the industry's most advanced visual processing right at your fingertips with Wildcat Realizm 800 - the flagship in a fully programmable lineup of graphics accelerators developed exclusively for professional designers. 3Dlabs' 16x PCI Express-based graphics feature dual Visual Processing Units (VPU's). Twice the processing power. Twice the performance."

Memory

• 640MB GDDR3 total memory.
• 512MB GDDR3 unified memory with 512-bit-wide interface bus
• 128 MB GDDR3 DirectBurst memory with 128-bit-wide interface bus
• 64 KB of flashable EEPROM memory for VGA bios and product configuration storage.
• Virtual memory support allowing:
• Onboard memory to be used as an effcient L2 cache
• Seamless handling of huge datasets
• Automatic paging out of unused buffers
• Very large individual texture sizes (for example, 4K x 4K)

A Weekly Dose of Architecture - Ironworkers Local 580 Training Facility

A Weekly Dose of Architecture - Ironworkers Local 580 Training Facility:
"Containing mock-up and work areas, welding booths, buring tables, a teacher's lounge, director's office, material storage and bathrooms, the training facility obviously fulfills its purpose. But moreso, as a part-time home for the apprentices in the three-year training to become ornamental ironworkers, the building around them acts as a three-dimensional example of what they can attain with contemporary means. This sythesis of the client's goals and design no doubt helped it earn 2004 AIA New York Architecture Design Award for Daniel Goldner Architects."

INTERACTIVE TV TODAY [itvt] - Internet Streaming Media Alliance Forms IPTV Workgroup

INTERACTIVE TV TODAY [itvt] - Internet Streaming Media Alliance Forms IPTV Workgroup:
"The Internet Streaming Media Alliance (ISMA)--an organization that bills itself as 'a global alliance of industry leaders dedicated to the adoption and deployment of open standards for streaming rich media such as video, audio, and associated data over Internet protocols'--has formed an IPTV workgroup."

Metropolis Magazine - A Green Blueprint

Metropolis Magazine - A Green Blueprint:
"Intended to attract private developers, the Lloyd Crossing catalyst project incorporates many of the shared infrastructure technologies planned for the district, including solar power and a thermal loop. The project is expected to exceed LEED platinum standards."

ACD - Reality Movie Making

I admit this will sound terribly cruel to those who are experiencing the hellish aftermath of hurricane Katrina. However, it strikes me as the next step for reality television. For example, we all knew hurricane Katrina would likely have an incredible result on New Orleans. In some cases people knew exactly what was going to happen. Anyway, all I'm getting at is what if a movie was created while the whole thing was going on. Like how about "Escape from New Orleans" for the movie title. Then after the movie is released, a portion of the profits would be given to victims.

For people with ADD, here's the summary.
1) Film movie during disaster
2) Return portion of income to victims

LA Downtown News - CRA Approves Convention Center Hotel

LA Downtown News - CRA Approves Convention Center Hotel:
"The $412 million hotel is expected to rise on the west side of the Staples Center parking lot as part of the $1 billion LA Live entertainment district being developed by Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG). The hotel has long been cited as key to reviving the city's flagging convention industry, which has plummeted from more than 30 major bookings annually to 14 this year."

Times Online - 'Miracle mouse' can grow back lost limbs

Times Online - 'Miracle mouse' can grow back lost limbs:
"SCIENTISTS have created a “miracle mouse” that can regenerate amputated limbs or badly damaged organs, making it able to recover from injuries that would kill or permanently disable normal animals."
Via Future Feeder

PSFK - DTV - Open Source Web TV

PSFK - DTV - Open Source Web TV:
"Last Tuesday online TV took a step forward as the beta version of DTV was released for Mac OSX. DTV is an application that allows users to collect and distribute video online. Created by the Participatory Culture Foundation, DTV could be the platform to take video blogs into the mainstream in much the same way as iTunes has done for the podcast."

PSFK - Home-Delivery Grocers

PSFK - Home-Delivery Grocers:
"Genuardi's.com launched their home-delivery service today in some of regions of Philadelphia. Customers get to specify how ripe they want their fruits and how thick they want their steaks. Customers get free delivery on their first order."

PSFK - Powdered Alcohol

PSFK - Powdered Alcohol:
"A product is called subyou, manufactured in Germany, is being marketed 'squarely at teenagers' with slogans like 'taste for not much dough' and 'gets a good buzz going', Deutsche Welle reports. Add the powder to cold water, and consumers have an alcoholic drink containing either vodka or rum."

PSFK - Green Roofs

PSFK - Green Roofs:
"A growing trend, green roofs consist of a thin layer of plants covering roofs of buildings are 'designed to reduce air pollution, control heating and cooling costs, and absorb storm runoff'."

PSFK - mc-h: The MicroCompact Home

PSFK - mc-h: The MicroCompact Home:
"Taking into considering how we spend so much time in compact spaces (cars, planes) Austrian designers have used this inspiration to create the micro compact home. Living in their 2.6m cube means 'less is more.'"

ExtremeTech - Hacking Firefox: Speed Up Your Browser

ExtremeTech - Hacking Firefox: Speed Up Your Browser:
"Hack it, tweak it, and make it scream down the information highway. This chapter covers several of the much-touted hacks that you will find on the Internet, as well as some other less popular but very useful hacks. You will get the skinny on the what, how, and why of them. More important, you'll see how to customize them to fit your current setup and situation. The primary method of hacking for this section is adjusting key hidden preferences."

AutoWeek - Experts say electric cars should be part of research plans for automakers

AutoWeek - Experts say electric cars should be part of research plans for automakers:
"That's the advice of a panel of technical experts representing the National Academy of Sciences. They say government and industry researchers should examine battery electric vehicles as an alternative to cars and trucks powered by hydrogen fuel cells."
Via Electrifying Times Newsletter

gizmag - 1 terabyte storage from Sony home server TV/PC

gizmag - 1 terabyte storage from Sony home server TV/PC:
"The Vaio Type X home server debuted recently at the CEATEC 2004 convention in Japan. For around US $5000 it offers an entire rolling digital media library at your fingertips. Equipped with the 1-terabyte hard disk, the Sony VAIO Type X performs as an 'audiovisual recording server.'"

OhGizmo! - OhGizmo Exclusive: Interview With The Heliodisplay Inventor

OhGizmo! - OhGizmo Exclusive: Interview With The Heliodisplay Inventor:
"A few days ago, we broke the story that the Heliodisplay was finally being produced and sold. The news took the geek world by storm. For those of you who haven’t heard, the Heliodisplay is an interactive tactile 3D display that projects a floating image in the air, a little in the same way as R2D2’s projector."
Via Gear Live <- I4U Newsletter

The Economist - A big merger in the satellite industry is rich with irony

The Economist - A big merger in the satellite industry is rich with irony:
"'TRUTH and technology will triumph over bullshit and bureaucracy.' That was the motto of Rene Anselmo, the maverick founder of PanAmSat, who set out in 1984 to overthrow the monopoly over the satellite business then held by Intelsat, an international consortium backed by over 100 governments and incumbent telecoms operators. Anselmo took on the slow-moving, bureaucratic industry with the aid of Spot, a cartoon dog who was depicted urinating on the leg of anyone who stood in his way. Both motto and mascot can still be seen on PanAmSat's website, but probably not for much longer. On August 29th Intelsat, now a private firm and the industry's second-largest operator, announced that it had agreed to buy PanAmSat for $3.2 billion. Combining its 28 satellites with PanAmSat's 25 will put Intelsat back on top of the industry. Anselmo, who died in 1995, 'will be spinning in his grave,' says Simon Bull of Comsys, a satellite consultancy."

Nanotechweb - Diamond nanorods harden up

Nanotechweb - Diamond nanorods harden up:
"Physicists in Germany have created a material that is harder than diamond. Natalia Dubrovinskaia and colleagues at the University of Bayreuth made the new material by subjecting carbon-60 molecules to immense pressures. The new form of carbon, which is known as aggregated diamond nanorods, is expected to have many industrial applications (App. Phys. Lett. 87 083106)."
Via Future Feeder

AZoNano - World's First Rechargeable Long-Life Solar Cell

AZoNano - World's First Rechargeable Long-Life Solar Cell:
"Solaris Nanosciences has demonstrated a completely rechargeable dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC or Graetzel Cell) creating the lowest manufacturing cost, long-life photovoltaic system in the world. DSSCs which are based on low cost materials and simple construction, have to date suffered from limited operating lifetimes due to the degradation of the sensitizer dyes."
Via Foresight Nanotech Institute Newsletter