NEW YORK – "Pokemon" has been around almost as long as Justin Bieber has been alive. Among a certain demographic, the fierce little "pocket monsters" generate the type of obsessive fandom reserved for the biggest entertainment icons, be they the hottest new toys or dreamiest teen crooners.
The vast "Pokemon" empire is about to get even bigger with Sunday's launch of two new video games for the handheld Nintendo DS. Simply called "Pokemon Black Version" and "Pokemon White Version," they sell for $35 each.
The "Pokemon" video games center on catching, battling and trading the hundreds of colorful characters that go by the same name. As usual, the two new games are slightly different so that players can buy one and trade Pokemon characters with others to strive toward collecting them all.
The new games add more than 150 creatures to bring the total to more than 640, ranging from the purple cat creature Purrloin to dinosaur-inspired Haxorus. The latest games let players battle not just people they know, as with previous versions, but strangers through random matches using the DS's Wi-Fi connection.
"Black Version" and "White Version" are the latest for the kid-centric empire that has managed to outlive video game icons such as "Guitar Hero" and outsell big shots such as "Call of Duty." The games are rated "E" for everyone and have a broad appeal that goes well beyond grade school kids.
"I like the community feel," said Tiffany Stanley, 17, who competes in "Pokemon" tournaments along with her brother, Trey, 11. "The people who play 'Pokemon' are the nicest and most intelligent people I have ever met."
Playing the game, she added, requires creativity and originality, as well as math and strategy skills to do well.
The "Pokemon" franchise is the second-biggest video game property for Nintendo Co. and in the world, not far behind the iconic "Mario Bros." games. Worldwide, the game has sold about 215 million copies, compared with Mario's 250 million, Nintendo says.
But "Pokemon" did so in 15 years. Mario took a decade longer.
It helps that the primary system to play "Pokemon" games is the handheld Nintendo DS, the world's best-selling video game machine. Through the end of December 2010, Nintendo sold nearly 145 million DS systems in various iterations, compared with 85 million units of the Wii console.
Over the years, related "Pokemon" products have popped up, including cartoons, trading cards, comics and toys. The company that licenses the brand, Pokemon Co. International, is privately held and won't disclose revenue figures, except that, in years when there's a new game, it's in the billions of dollars.
"It's like crack to kids," said Darrin Duber-Smith, professor of marketing at the Metropolitan State College of Denver.
The popularity of "Pokemon," he added, has spread by word of mouth more than through traditional marketing. That is part of its genius.
"We have a very strong community of 'Pokemon' fans," said J.C. Smith, consumer marketing director at Pokemon Co. International. These fans can be counted on to spread the word about "Pokemon" on offline playgrounds and on online social networks such as Twitter and Facebook.
"Pokemon" got its start in 1996 from a company called Game Freak — a group of guys who wrote fan magazines for video games and decided to make their own, Smith said. The first game was for the original Nintendo Game Boy, and it let players interact with each other by using a cable that plugged into their friend's Game Boy. The cartoon series came the following year in Japan, and the games launched in 1998 in the U.S. and Europe.
Part of the game's staying power has been that it was built from the start as social. In this age of nonstop interactivity, the games that have been the most popular have been those that let players interact, whether that's on Facebook playing "FarmVille" or at home scheming against a common enemy on "Call of Duty."
"It's a really addictive game that's approachable by all ages," said Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter. "It's E-rated fun that's challenging. It's a well-constructed game. Hardcore gamers love it and parents don't mind it."
South Korean Sexy Model Girl, Ryu Ji Hye 류지혜
South Korean Hot Model Girl, Ryu Ji Hye 류지혜Last Name : 류 (Ryu)
First Name : 지혜 (Ji Hye)
Measurement , 174cm / 49 Kg, 90/60/90
Birthday : 28 October 1989
Title : Racing Girls (RG)
수상 : 월드 슈퍼카 코리아 투어 신인상 강남글로웰상(2008)
See More Photos of Korean Sexy Model, Ryu Ji Hye 류지혜
Advanced robotic arm control using Kinect
[Ryan Lloyd], [Sandeep Dhull], and [Ruben D'Sa] wrote in to share a robotics project they have been keeping busy with lately. The three University of Minnesota students are using a Kinect sensor to remotely control a robotic arm, but it’s not as simple as it sounds.
Using OpenNI alongside PrimeSense, the team started out by doing some simple skeleton tracking before working with their robotic arm. The arm has five degrees of freedom, making the task of controlling it a bit tricky. The robot has quite a few joints to play with, so the trio not only tracks shoulder, elbow, and wrist movements, but they also monitor the status of the user’s hand to actuate the robot’s gripper.
When everything was said and done, the results were pretty impressive as you can see in the video below, but the team definitely sees room for improvement. Using inverse kinematics, they plan on filtering out some of the joint tracking inaccuracies that occur when the shoulders are moved in a certain way. They also plan on using a robotic arm with even more degrees of freedom to see just how well their software can perform.
Be sure to check out their site to see more details and videos.
Miniature PC packs a big punch
We are always looking out for smaller yet capable computers for our projects, and this newest offering by [David Braben] is looking mighty nice. [David] is the head of a UK-based games studio, but has recently been focusing on bringing small, affordable PCs to classrooms around the world.
The computer, called Raspberry Pi, is about the size of your standard USB thumb drive and contains a 700 MHz ARM 11 processor as well as 128 MB of memory. It has an HDMI port which can display 1080p video on any compatible screen, along with a USB port for input peripherals. Mass storage is provided courtesy of an on-board SD card slot, and it looks like the ability to utilize add-on modules will be available as well.
There is sure to be no shortage of willing buyers if [David] is able to bring these computers to market within a reasonable timeframe. With a projected cost of about $25, this will certainly give the OLPC and others a run for their money.
Thanks to everyone who sent this story in… all of you. You can stop now… please. (don’t stop sending us tips, we’re just joking around)
Digital picture frame reverse engineering
A few months ago [Jason] got his hands on a free Coby DP700WD digital picture frame and thought it would be fun to hack. After realizing that the frame did not run any sort of Linux-based OS he figured his options were pretty limited, but he gave it a shot anyways.
The frame came with a set of built in images, and his goal was to swap them out for pictures of his own. He started by trying to read data from the frame’s serial flash chip, but found that the processor was preventing him from doing so. He de-soldered the chip from the frame, mounted it on a makeshift breakout board, and started reading up on SPI.
He was eventually able to read the device’s flash chip and swapped out the built-in images with his own. After a bit of trial and error, he was able to replace the frame’s boot screen with his own custom image as well.
If you are looking to do something similar, be sure to swing by his site – all of the tools and code he used to hack his frame are available for the taking.
Continue reading to see his modified picture frame in action.
Rebecca Black running accessory also promotes running for everyone within earshot
Last Friday, Friday we caught wind of [gvillenave]‘s running accessory inspired by Rebecca Black, and we we we so excited, we so excited to bring this to you on Saturday, which comes after Friday.
[gvillenave] came up with the idea of using a song on the annoyance level of “Friday” to encourage a runner into keeping up a good pace. The concept is simple: if the wearer is running fast, the song will speed up. If the wearer is slowing down, the song will slow down and extend the agony.
The build uses an Arduino and [ladyada]‘s wave shield coupled to an accelerometer. [gvillenave] included the code, and also wired up some LEDs to a pair of sunglasses that blink more often as the runner’s speed increases. The wave shield has a 3.5mm jack for headphones, but [gvillenave] graciously wired a speaker in, “so that you can annoy people around you, and not just yourself.” All this is packaged in a very nice 3D printed enclosure making for a great looking project.
There’s no word on the effectiveness of the negative reinforcement aspect of [gvillenave]‘s build, but we suspect it will help her get down to the bus stop a little faster every morning.
Photon Banner
The Revision 2011 demo party that brought us” table for two” a little while ago along with some super demos for PC’s, retro, and state of the art, has also brought us the Photon Banner(google translate). The Photon Banner is a 96X24 led matrix that was made with (of course) 2304 5mm leds, and a atmega 644 clocked at 20MHz.
The end result is a 192cm X 48cm display area that uses the single micro controller, that has been beefed up with 2 megs of SPI flash memory, 6 driver boards, and took about a month just to construct. The software to drive the show took another 15 days, and it is pretty darn impressive.
The website above contains a bunch of photos, parts lists, and schematics. Before you go running off you should join us after the break for a couple of quick videos.
Generating music with credit cards
[Steve] was browsing around at a local electronics surplus store when he spotted an old Tranz 330 point-of-sale terminal that seemed pretty interesting. He took it home and after disassembling it, found that it contained a Z-80 based computer. Because the 330 shares the same processor as other hobbyist-friendly devices such as the TRS-80, he figured it would be quite fun to hack.
While the Z-80 processor is pretty common, [Steve] still had to figure out how it was interfaced in this particular device. After spending some time reverse engineering the terminal, he had free reign to run any program he desired. After thinking for a bit, he decided it would be cool to use the terminal to generate music based on whatever card was swiped through the reader – he calls his creation “Mozart’s Credit Card”.
He found that just playing sounds based on the raw contents of the mag strips didn’t produce anything coherent, so he wrote a small application for the terminal based on the Melisma Stochastic Melody Generator. Music is generated somewhat randomly using various card characteristics, as you can see in the video below.
We think it’s pretty cool, but [Steve] says he’s always open to suggestions, so let us know what you think in the comments.
Learning electronics concepts step by step
We realize that not everyone out there holds a degree in electrical engineering or has the ability to tell NPN transistors apart from PNP transistors by taste alone, so we occasionally like to mention things that appeal to the beginners in the crowd. While there is a clear division between Arduino supporters and detractors, it is hard to deny that the devices have their place, and can be quite useful when exploring certain electronics concepts.
For the supporters out there, [Pok] has put together a site jam-packed with Arduino tutorials covering a wide array of concepts and techniques. We have covered his work before in relation to specific topics, but we felt that his site deserved mention as a whole. His tutorials cover some of the most basic concepts such as lighting LEDs with the Arduino, and work their way to more advanced subjects, lesson by lesson.
He is not satisfied with simply introducing a concept and handing out a sketch that does the work. He takes the time to expand on the concepts, giving the reader enough detail to use their new-found knowledge in later projects. If you were to follow his tutorials from beginning to end, you would be exposed to LCD screen control, shift registers, real-time clocks, I2C bus communications, and more. These skills and concepts can be carried on to future projects as well as other micro controllers, making his tutorials a very valuable learning tool worth checking out.
Synkie: the modular synth for video
The folks at [anyma] have been working on an analog video processor called Synkie for a while now, and we’re amazed a project this awesome has passed us by for so long.
Like a Moog or Doepfer synth, the Synkie was developed with modularity in mind. So far, [anyma] has built modules to split and combine the sync and video signals, and modules to invert, add, subtract, mix, filter and amplify those signals. The end result of all this video processing produces an output that can look like a glitched Atari, art installation, and scrambled cable station all at the same time.
The Synkie’s output reminds us of the original Doctor Who title sequence, and actually this idea isn’t far off the mark – both use video feedback that will produce anything from a phantasmagoric ‘flying through space’ aesthetic to a fractal Droste effect visualization. We’re impressed with Synkie’s capabilities, but we’re astounded by the [anyma] crew’s ability to control a video signal in real time to get what they want.
Check out a video of the Synkie after the jump. There’s also more footage of the Synkie in action on the Synkie Vimeo channel.
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21 airlines fined for fixing passenger, cargo fees
Monday, March 7, 2011
AP – FILE - In this April 14, 2010, file photo a man walks by corporate signs of the Korean Air Lines Co. … What they came up with, according to federal prosecutors, was a massive price-fixing scheme among airlines that artificially inflated passenger and cargo fuel surcharges between 2000 and 2006 to make up for lost profits.
The airlines' crimes cost U.S. consumers and businesses — mostly international passengers and cargo shippers — hundreds of millions of dollars, prosecutors say.
But the airlines caught by the Justice Department have paid a hefty price in the five years since the government's widespread investigation became public.
To date, 19 executives have been charged with wrongdoing — four have gone to prison — and 21 airlines have coughed up more than $1.7 billion in fines in one of the largest criminal antitrust investigations in U.S. history.
The court cases reveal a complex web of schemes between mostly international carriers willing to fix fees in lockstep with competitors for flights to and from the United States.
Convicted airlines include British Airways, Korean Air, and Air France-KLM. No major U.S. carriers have been charged.
The price-fixing unraveled largely because two airlines decided to come clean and turn in their co-conspirators.
In late 2005, officials with German-based Lufthansa notified the Justice Department that the airline had been conspiring to set cargo surcharges. By Valentine's Day 2006, FBI agents and their counterparts in Europe made the investigation public by raiding airline offices. After those raids, British-based Virgin Atlantic came forward about its role in a similar scheme to set fuel surcharges for passengers.
Investigators eventually found a detailed paper trail laying out agreements, stretching back to 2000, to set passenger and cargo fuel surcharges The probe expanded to airlines doing business between the U.S. and Europe, Asia, South America, and Australia.
The Lufthansa and Virgin Atlantic mea culpas allowed them to take advantage of a Justice Department leniency program because they helped crack the conspiracies.
Former Associate Attorney General Kevin J. O'Connor, who oversaw Justice's antitrust division in the late 2000s, said he doesn't know why they confessed, but the result "demonstrates the effectiveness of that amnesty program."
Now in private practice, O'Connor said companies that confess for amnesty may be wisely trying to limit liabilities from illegal conduct.
"Generally speaking, if they have an inkling they might get caught, they come in," O'Connor said. "The theory might be that eventually these things will be exposed and why risk continuing."
Federal prosecutors and investigators declined to discuss details of the cases because they are still investigating.
"Lufthansa Cargo fully cooperated with the investigation launched by DOJ," Martin Riecken, Lufthansa's director of corporate communications for the Americas said. Virgin Atlantic referred all questions to the Justice Department.
Airlines and executives who didn't come forward were charged with violating the Sherman Antitrust Act.
Two former airline executives were sentenced to six months in prison; two others were ordered to prison for eight months. Charges are pending against 15 executives, nine of whom are considered fugitives.
Bruce McCaffrey, one-time vice president of freight for the Americas at the Australian carrier Qantas, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to restrain trade. He was sentenced to six months in prison in 2008. He admitted working with other airlines to fix cargo fuel surcharges between 2000 and 2006.
Keith H. Packer, a former senior manager of sales and marketing for British Airways, pleaded to conspiracy to restrain trade and was sentenced to eight months in prison in 2008. He admitted joining the cargo conspiracy in 2002 and participating until February 2006.
British Airways and Korean Air pleaded guilty to violating the Sherman act; each was fined $300 million in August 2007.
British Airways admitted fixing cargo surcharges from 2002 to 2006 and passenger fuel surcharges from 2004 to 2006. Korean Air admitted fixing cargo and passenger surcharges from 2000 to 2006.
Announcing four guilty pleas in June 2008, O'Connor said the case "conservatively, has affected billions of dollars of shipments. Estimates suggest that the harm to American consumers and businesses from this conspiracy is in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
"As an example of the impact of the conspiracy, fuel surcharges imposed by some of the conspirators rose by as much as 1,000 percent during the conspiracy, far outpacing any percentage increases in fuel costs that existed during the same time period," O'Connor said.
In one of several lawsuits by passengers and cargo shippers now being heard in a California federal court, San Francisco-based lawyer Christopher Lebsock and others allege airline officials routinely gathered at industry meetings to discuss fuel costs and how to make up losses.
Lebsock said they agreed to add or increase the fuel surcharges that are tacked onto passenger fares and cargo fees.
"We have seen in public documents that they were concerned and wanted to raise revenue to offset the increasing price in fuel," Lebsock said.
According to published notes of an October 2005 meeting of airline representatives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a host of executives openly spoke about surcharges already in place. One official, identified in meeting minutes only by the initials" GF," suggested the group create "a subcommittee to study this subject and come up with a joint proposal."
According to published notes of another meeting of airline representatives in Saudi Arabia in September 2004, "the participants agreed to make uniform policy for such (insurance and fuel) surcharges to be applied."
Not all airline officials at these meetings agreed to join the conspiracies.
During a 2004 industry meeting in Thailand, executives from U.S. based-United Airlines and Northwest Airlines left the meeting when others started discussing setting fares and fuel surcharges, according to a court filing by lawyers in one class action suit.
Warren Gerig, an international manager for United when he walked out of that meeting, declined to discuss the case. The Northwest executive was identified only as Sarathool M. and could not be reached.
While meeting notes make it appear the discussions were open to anyone who accidently walked into the wrong ballroom, Lebsock and Justice officials believe executives were more careful to hide their activities.
"My sense is they weren't really open to the public," Lebsock said. "They weren't that stupid."
Lebsock said documents obtained in pretrial discovery make clear that many surcharge discussions carried over from large group meetings around the world to more private office settings and e-mail discussions
According to one passenger lawsuit, several Asian airlines — including Cathay Pacific Airways, Japan Airlines, and All Nippon Airways — confined many discussions to phone calls and e-mails. Lebsock said evidence shows some airline executives tried to hide or destroy incriminating documents and e-mails.
Lebsock believes the conspiracies were so well hidden that it's possible they would have continued undetected had Lufthansa not come forward.
"In the absence of someone coming forward, and ratting it out, it is very, very difficult to establish that there was a (conspiracy)," Lebsock said. Read more...
Acquisitions lift stocks as oil hike eyed
Reuters – A specialist works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange March 3, 2011. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson 
The Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) gained 33.07 points, or 0.27 percent, to 12,202.95. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) rose 4.60 points, or 0.35 percent, to 1,325.75. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) added 9.33 points, or 0.34 percent, to 2,794.00. Read more...
Wooden quadcopter body
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
[Greasetattoo] shares the process of building his wooden quadcopter body that won 2nd place in the Minnesota state fair. His plans were purchased as a kit back in 1999, but he never got around to actually building them. The original plans called for a foam board body, but he felt that a wooden piece of art would be much nicer. This build isn’t focusing on the electronics, they’re just a kit from Mikrokopter. Instead, it is a log of the entire process of making the beautiful wooden body. He really put some nice detail in there from the layered and nicely finished dome to the little oak sleeves for his motors. Great job [Greasetattoo].
Mercedes-Benz unveils SLS AMG E-Cell Electric Sports Car at the Detroit Auto Show
Thursday, February 3, 2011
There's been plenty of chatter over the last few months about Mercedes-Benz's next EV release, but all the speculation was put to rest today at the 2011 Detroit Auto Show where the famed company made the public unveil of their SLS AMG E-Cell prototype! The new supercar features four electric motors, and has a killer kick of 526 hp and 649 lb-ft of torque and is capable of reaching zero to 62 mph in just four seconds flat, all features that no one was really paying attention to because we were too busy ogling the jaw-dropping paint job on this sweet ride - a retina-searing electric yellow!
Artist Cal Lane Transforms Industrial Objects into Intricate Lace Sculptures
Using her trusty blowtorch, artist and welder Cal Lane burns delicate lace-like patterns into reclaimed steel objects. She says she thinks of the original materials - such as shovels, manhole covers, dumpsters, wheelbarrows and i-beams - as “male” because of their industrial nature. Lane enjoys pushing the dichotomy of feminine and masculine by combining patterns of domesticity with these cold, harsh symbols of masculine blue collar labor.
Keepon finally gets a cheaper version
Keepon, the adorable bot meant to help autistic kids with its jovial dance moves, seems to finally be getting a cheaper version. The original cost $30,000 and did a lot more than dance. Actually, we got to play with it a little bit at CES a couple years ago. The commercial version most likely won’t have facial recognition or any of the other fancy features of the first one, but we hope it can dance well. We’ve actually seen a couple home made versions and we’re hoping that the new one has some major hacking potential. The temptation to have one of these cute little bots around is made even stronger when you see that some of the money is going back into autism research.
Green Overdrive Video: The RAV4 EV (Via Tesla, Toyota)!
In one of the most interesting electric vehicle partnerships of 2010, Tesla and Toyota announced last year that they would jointly build an electric RAV4, combining Toyota’s SUV with Tesla’s battery and EV tech. For this week’s episode of GigaOM TV’s Green Overdrive Show, we grab some time with the RAV4 EV’s chief engineer, learn about the partner’s future plans and check out the inaugural car!
Disco Death Ray
Wielding the power to melt glass or instantly ignite most day to day materials can be intoxicating pretty fun. With a little math, a lot of patience, and 5,800 1cm pieces of mirror, this build requires welding glasses just to look at the 1-2cm focal point. With an idea rumored to date back to Archimedes, this more portable parabolic project is perfect for your home burning needs. Unfortunately, this setup seems to have burnt itself to death at some point, though that makes room for version two, which will reportedly bump the mirror count to 32,000 or so.
There are plenty of other ways to make a death ray out there as well, including using lasers or lenses. Think you have a better tool of destruction? Be sure to tell us about it
Nook Color gets honeycomb
[Deeper-blue] has released all the files necessary to get Android honeycomb working on your nook color. We had a chance to play with the nook color for a bit, but ours was only on Android version 2.1. It seems like they’ve come a long way with the capabilities of this simple e-reader since then. While he’s built out the majority of the features, it is still lacking some fundamentals, like sound. As you can see in the video after the break, the scrolling is a tiny bit choppy but the applications themselves see to be fairly snappy. We can’t wait to see how this works after a little improvement.
Japanese Pals Recycle Old Truck into Transforming Two-Story Mobile Home
Everything about this crazy mobile home screams "made in Japan"; it's compact, it's a vehicle and it's extremely unique. In fact, we're wagering that it's the only hydraulic, double-decker, transforming, fully-equipped camper in the the world - well, at least the only one that features a Japanese-style zen loft space with rice paper windows and tatami mats on the second floor. Of course, the other thing that makes this vehicle so special is that it wasn't made by Honda or Nissan, but rather a group of pals who decided to convert an old truck into something way cooler, and have some fun doing it. Read on for more pics of the interior (it's amazing what they were able to fit in there).
Fermentation temperature control
[Eric Friedrich] needed to keep the wort warm enough for yeast to ferment it into beer. To solve the problem he built his own fermentation temperature controler using a microprocessor to turn some heating tape on and off. You can see the heating element embracing that diminutive fermentation bucket in the picture above. This was originally meant for keeping reptile cages warm. It costs less than similar products meant just for brewing and works well for [Eric]. A DS1820 temperature sensor gives feedback to an ATmega168 which then uses a relay to switch the heat on and off. The target temperature can be changed using a potentiometer on the board, with the setting displayed on a character LCD screen on the project enclosure.
Rotary dial authenticates sudo commands
[W1ndman] won’t win any security awards for this build, but it’s an interesting idea. On many Linux-based systems commands can be run with administrator privileges by prefacing them with the keyword ‘sudo’. Normally you’d be asked for a password but [W1ndman] used the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) to authenticate via his own shell script. That script checks a code from this rotary dial for authentication. An Arduino takes care of listening for each digit that is entered and then sends the code via USB for comparison with a stored file. We’re not sure if that stored code is in a plain file or is otherwise protected, but at the very least this prevents you from using ‘sudo’ willy-nilly.
Company Turns LED Ceiling Lights into Wireless Internet Source
You could soon be getting your internet at the speed of light! Well, not literally, but one company is divising a system that uses LED ceiling lights to transmit data (namely the internet) to computers equipped with special sensors. What this means is that light waves could potentially replace radio waves as a method of transmitting data, since lights can ‘flick’ data faster than the eye can see. The company, LVX Systems, has already implemented the technology at several city offices in St. Cloud, Minnesota. Read more...
Water-dosing coffee maker augmentation
[Arthur Benemann] has the worst part of making coffee licked. His add-on for a drip coffee maker fills the water to the proper levels for you, saving the drudgery of rinsing out the carafe, carefully filling it to the appropriate level, then pouring it into the machine without getting everything wet. This isn’t limited to a full pot, but is user selectable by the cup based on how many times in a row you hit that red button. One LED gives feedback on the selected mode, then the device uses a washing machine water valve to turn on the tap for the appropriate amount of time. We’re a little bit leery of connecting homebrew hardware to the water pipes in our house. Make sure you’ve done a good job of debugging so that an infinite loop doesn’t flood you out.
Shiny acrylic MAME box
This nice table-top MAME arcade features a two-toned acrylic case. [Fabricio] spent about 50-60 hours designing the 29 parts that make up the enclosure. Originally the sides were meant to be orange but one design flaw meant he had to have them recut and only had enough black stock for the job. But we like it this way. The screen is just over ten inches and inside you’ll find a mini-ITX motherboard with a gig of ram and a solid state drive. The seven page build log features some bending, glue, screwing, and wiring that really show off the depth of the project.
This results a very modern look but if you like your retro gaming to appear vintage we recommend this cocktail cabinet.
Sliced Stable: Open-Air Kitchen Connects With the Land
This Sliced Stable in the Netherlands is a little piece of community space set on a farm that is destined to become forested land again. Part of an art experience by Dutch design studio Overtreders W, the project is a vision for a community gathering place with an agricultural bent. Spotted over at Designboom, the simple, wistful structure is part of an exhibit called The Woods That See and Hear, and it consists of a kitchen and tables with a look-out seat rising above the din. Read more...
Building infra red light sources with regular lights
[Oneironaut] sent us another IR hack. This time it is a writeup on the best ways to create IR light sources from regular lights. Since normal flashlight bulbs emit a broad enough spectrum to include visible light and IR light, this basically comes down to filtering. [Oneironaut] explores different light sources and different materials in depth, along with great pictures to show his results. This is a great resource if you’re needing to do some night vision for cheap.
Automating automatic racing
Hackaday forum user [Nikescar] upgraded his XBox360 hard drive. During this upgrade, his Forza 3 game save was lost. He had accumulated millions of in-game dollars and really wanted to get back to where he was. We’re not familiar with the game, but he says that one easy way to make some money is to allow the AI to run races for you while you do other things. Unfortunately, this requries coming back to the system and starting a new race every hour or so. Luckily, [Nikescar] had an arduino lying around doing nothing, so he patched it into the controller and had it carry out a the correct button press sequence on a schedule. Now his virtual driver makes virtual money while his virtual-person keeps it going. His real person sleeps.
Fantastical New Salvador Dalí Museum in Florida is Also Hurricane Resistant
Salvador Dalí's surrealist artwork now has a new home in a spectacular and fantastical museum in St. Petersburg, FL. The HOK-designed museum, appropriately opened on 1-11-11 at 11:11 am, features a geodesic inspired glass atrium and walls so thick they can withstand a Category 5 hurricane. Sustainable design features abound in the new museum, which provides a "Dalí-esque" experience without being trite or cliched. The Salvador Dali Museum houses the world's largest collection of the master's artwork with over 2,000 pieces of art and highlights 100 of Dalí's most important oil paintings.
Bringing an LCD viewfinder back to life
[Foobarbob] posted a pretty simple job of bringing an LCD viewfinder back to life. He doesn’t specify what was wrong, but since he replaced the backlight, we’re guessing that was the main issue. It was pulled off of a JVC camcorder. The camcorders with LCD viewfinders are getting more and more common at garage sales, so we’re surprised we don’t see more of these used. [Foobarbob] cracked it open, traced out the power lines and replaced the backlight with an LED and a makeshift diffuser made from a bottle cap. His results look great, we could see this being perfect for an HMD, or possibly a home made VR helmet.
Digital measuring tape
You’ll never come up short with this measuring tape. That’s because there isn’t actually any tape in the device; it measures distance based on the rotation of a wheel. Roll it across the room and you’ll get an accurate measurement of the distance the little bugger traveled. Like the Etch-a-Sketch from Monday this uses the encoder wheel from a mouse as the input. The IR emitter and sensor from the ubiquitous peripheral find a new home on the PCB that hosts the PIC 16F819. It monitors the rotation, turns it into inches, then spits that number out on a 7 segment display. Handy, and cheap!
Swedish Company Harvests Body Heat to Warm Buildings
Image © Tomislav Medak via Creative Commons
Emulating ink cartridges
[Smartie_on_computer] wanted to do some experimenting with an epson printer. After getting a somewhat disassembled one, the first step was to simply get it running. Unfortunately, one of the ink cartridges was missing and these printers refuse to do pretty much anything without all the cartridges installed. Rather than go purchase a costly cartridge that they didn’t intend to actually use, [Smartie_on_computer], chose to emulate the cartridge using a microcontroller. After some searching for the protocol used on the cartridge, the info ended up being in the patent. [Smartie_on_computer] now has a functional printer that is destined to be a 3d printer in the near future. You can see a video breakdown after the break.
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TI Evalbot development under Linux
We have some beefs about how Texas Instruments does things, the biggest of which is their lack of support for development under Linux operating systems. But if they build it, someone will try to get Linux involved in one form or another. This time around, [BLuRry] put together a guide to developing for the Evalbot under Linux. He got a shove in the right direction from the code package that went along with that nunchuck-controlled Evalbot. Picking apart that example to the bare essentials he wrote up the process of setting up the cross-compiling toolchain in a virtual machine so as not to clutter your system. From there he details how to set up and use Eclipse when starting a new project. What what did he choose for a Hello World experience? Well a plain “Hello World” was first but right on its heels is the “Hello Hack-A-Day” seen above. So if you’ve got one of these on hand get out there and start coding for it.
Nokia LCD, nunchuck, and MSP430 join forces
[JB's] driving a Nokia 6100 LCD using an MSP430 with input from a Wii Nunchuck. He’s using the G2211 microprocessor that came with the Launchpad, and developing his code with MSP-GCC. As you can see in the video after the break, this works but there’s some room for improvement. That’s being said, he is bumping up against the code memory limit, with just around 500 bytes left to work with. The LCD screen is SPI and currently it’s hogging the pins that are used for the hardware i2c. Since he needs an i2c bus to talk to the nunchuck he had to go with software i2c which explains part of his program memory troubles.
We’re in no way experts on this, but it seems like he could save space (and improve the input responsiveness) by rewriting his LCD drivers in order to remap the pins. Then again, it might just be better to move up to a larger MSP430. If you’ve got some advice, make sure to share it by leaving a comment.
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Have a face for radio?
The help of fellow members of the Austrian technology collective/hackerspace [Otelo] allowed [Georg] to develop a networked audio streaming board, with less than $20 worth of components. Dubbed the OggStreamer for obvious reason, it’s designed to relay audio from a mixing board to an Icecast server (an open source implementation of SHOUTcast) in real-time. The board is based on the STM8 Discovery kit and the Xport Pro. It features stereo input, an onboard OGG Vorbis encoder, and (to top it off) is running uClinux. We think it’s very well thought out - but don’t take our word for it… the OggStreamer won second place last year in the Lantronix XPort Pro Design Contest, and [Georg] has documented it extensively (pdf).
Robo Rainbow graffiti machine
[mudlevel] built this rainbow graffiti producing robot for an art exhibit in San Diego. While there are no build details we can easily pick this apart from the pictures. Looks like the brains are an arduino, the drive is a power drill with the trigger removed, and a few other servos for firing the spray cans. The counter weighted arm for creating the rainbow was a pretty good idea too. Watching this, we had an idea for a super simple purely mechanical way to do this that would be similar to a catapult. You could use the motion of the trailer to “wind up” the counter balance with a simple ratcheting spool of string attached to the axle. Engage your spray cans and let the balance drop and you’re done. Pedal on to re-wind the counterbalance for another rainbow.
STK200 pocket change programmer
A common complaints of beginners to microcontroller programming is the availability of DIY tools that do not require a parallel port. Using not much more than a couple of 74xx series chips and some protoboard, [Rue] was able to create an AVR programmer for less than the cost of some chips it can program – giving parallel programmers a run for thier money. [Rue] used Linux treat the ubiquitous PATA/IDE port as a parallel port. By having avrdude treat the programmer as an Atmel STK200, [Rue] was able to upload a blinky program to his AVR microcontroller through ISP. If anybody can think of an even lower cost unconventional solution give us a shout.
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