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Tech NewsWe’ve Figured Out How To Make Robot Birds Fly, Up Next: Humans?
Mankind is decades away from taking to the skies in an Iron Man-like suit, but now that researchers at the University of Maryland have cracked the secret to building robot birds that can dive and swoop like the real thing, maybe those crazy human wing designs of yesteryear are worth trying again? Research on what … Continued
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Tech NewsA Chiseled Chrome Coffee Cup Sets Your Latte Apart
Why wait in the Starbucks line for one of those pitiful paper cups over and over again when you can have this handsome chiseled tumbler to refill every morning? New just in time for iced coffee season, the stainless steel carafe holds 16 ounces of your favorite caffeinated beverage and it’ll cost you $20. It … Continued
By Leslie Horn -
Tech News
Commuting Is No Sweat on These Swanky E-Bikes
With gas prices hovering around $4 a gallon and what seems an entire generation shunning automobiles, it’s no wonder that bike commuting has seen such a resurgence in recent years. But for all the physical and environmental benefits riding imparts, it nevertheless leaves you a hot, sweaty mess. That is, of course, unless you get … Continued
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Tech NewsGadgetsHow to Make Cocktails With Your Keurig
If you’ve ever worked in an office you probably know the ubiquitous K-Cup machine, made by Keurig. It quickly and painlessly dispenses single-servings of the hot beverage of your choice. Even, it turns out, if that beverage is 100-proof. We just happened to have one of these discarded machines lying around, and decided to see … Continued
By Brent Rose -
Tech NewsDesignThis Trumpet Blasts Solos Made of Glass
A glassblower’s weapon of choice has been a simple blowpipe over 2,000 years now. It’s a tried and true device. But that doesn’t mean there’s no room to jazz it up a little, and that’s exactly what “Strange Symphony” does. A collaboration between designer Philpp Weber and glassblower Christophe Genard, Strange Symphony takes the time-tested … Continued
By Eric Limer -
Tech News
Possibly the Best Music Discovery System Yet
In the digital age of “nichification” it’s often easier to find lots of things you already like, while inadvertently walling yourself off from experiencing new things that you don’t know about yet. When it comes to music, recommendation systems like Pandora’s can help you discover music you may not have heard before, but that music … Continued
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Tech NewsThis Dead Space Plasma Cutter Blinds and Burns With Lasers Instead
Apparently today’s theme is dangerous DIY props because as a follow-up to the frightening 80,000-volt Thor hammer we now have an equally terrifying replica of the Dead Space Plasma Cutter. As far as prop design and attention to detail go it’s beautiful, but the use of a pair of 1,500-milliwatt burning blue lasers has us … Continued
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Tech NewsWhat Is Freezer Burn and How Does It Destroy Your Food?
Most of us just accept that fact that food left in the freezer too long will eventually become covered in ice and almost inedible. But have you ever stopped to think about why that happens exactly? After all, it’s not like everything in your freezer is completely thawing and refreezing every day. The culprit here … Continued
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Tech News
Let’s Talk About Anything You Want for the Next Hour
Hey everybody! Happy Friday! I bet you can’t wait to get that weekend started. Too bad these last few hours of work are crawling by, right? Well here’s an idea to help your afternoon fly by—join the Gizmodo staff on this thread, and for the next hour, we’ll talk about anything you want. Come test-drive … Continued
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Tech NewsFacebook
The 14 Types of Profile Pictures
Your profile picture represents you. You want to convey that you’re fun, interesting, well-traveled, worldly, witty, or any number of likable, desirable qualities. But we’re also really predictable—our profile pictures can be boiled down into 14 specific categories. Like the cover of a book or a movie trailer, your profile picture tells people what you’re … Continued
By Leslie Horn -
Tech News
This Lego Recreation of Fallingwater Is Your Deal of the Day
When Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater was completed in 1937, it was both an artistic accomplishment and a marvel of engineering. The residence’s design—set above a waterfall—is meant to evoke harmony between house and nature, and it achieves that through cantilevered floors supported by reinforced concrete, a technology that was relatively new at the time. The … Continued
By Kif Leswing -
Tech News
8 Totally Bizarre Celebrity Apps With No Reason to Exist
Celebrities endorsing products in weird, non-sensical combinations isn’t anything new. Ozzy Osbourne, for instance, hocked I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter, and Kiss wanted you to rest for eternity in your very own Kiss Kasket. But those were the dark ages. The dawn of the smartphone gave celebs an even easier, more intimate way to … Continued
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Tech NewsGadgets
Own a Piece of Design History With Braun’s Re-Released ET66 Calc
If Braun’s ET66 calculator looks oddly familiar, like you’ve used it before, you probably have. Originally released in 1987, the ET66 shed the sliding switches of its predecessors, the ET22 released in 1976 and the ET44 released in 1978, and became an icon of product design. So much so that the iPhone’s original calculator app … Continued
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Tech NewsMotion Control Is Awesome for Surgeons (Or Anyone with Bloody Hands)
High fidelity motion control is awesome, but for most of us it’s not quite essential. For surgeons and murders(?) though, a motion-controlled interface like this one could be super useful. Making use of the awesome Leap Motion, Scopis Medical has developed the first hands-off surgical navigation system for use in the operating rooms of the … Continued
By Eric Limer -
Tech News
Urville: The Booming Metropolis Inside an Autistic Artist’s Mind
Spending a decade (or two) on a project isn’t uncommon amongst urban planners. Gilles Trehin is one of them. Except in Trehin’s case, the project is entirely fictional, and the scale is monumental. Trehin has devoted the past twenty years to designing Urville, a city of twelve million on an imaginary European island. He started … Continued
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Tech News
Color-Changing Gloves Alert Lab Workers To Invisible Toxins
The trickiest part of avoiding exposure to toxic substances is that they’re often invisible, odorless, and undetectable to our five senses. And as an alternative to expensive detectors and other electronic sensors, researchers at the Fraunhofer Research Institution for Modular Solid State Technologies EMFT in Regensburg have created a simple pair of gloves that turn … Continued
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Tech News
Super Thin Graphene Solar Panels Could Pave the Way for Powered Paint
Covering any and all things with solar panels would be an awesome way to get power, but the bulk and expense of the tech we’ve got today makes it a little less than practical. But wonder-material-at-large graphene is shaking up the scene with ultra-thin solar panels and, maybe someday, solar-powered paint. Graphene is plenty impressive … Continued
By Eric Limer -
Tech NewsNASA’s Student-Designed Explorer Launches Today
Whether you think it’s our fault or not, the simple fact of the matter is that the Earth is heating up—so much so that last summer’s heat caused surface melting along an unprecedented 97 percent of the Greenland ice sheet. Now, researchers are turning to an ever-ready solar rover to survey the damage. Dubbed the … Continued
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Tech News
Acer Aspire R7 Hands On: We’re Not Quite Ready for This Kind of Crazy
Can we start by saying that Acer’s new R7 convertible is nuts, and that that’s totally great? Because it is, it’s great that Acer’s doing this weird new thing that doesn’t exactly make sense, just to see if it works. The very first thing you notice about the R7 becomes is also the most and … Continued
By Kyle Wagner -
Tech NewsPerform Pachelbel On a Pint-Sized Playable Pop-up Paper Piano
Taking those electronic music playing greeting cards to a whole new level, Antonella Nonnis created a playable paper piano that she eventually hopes to turn into one of the awesomest pop-up books you’ve ever seen. The paper keys are all lined with a strip of copper foil that’s wired to a series of megaohm resistors … Continued