In a little over a week, Trafalgar Square will be home to a unique installation that will let Internet users send messages to friends and loved ones using nothing but light.
Using eight of the same kinds of industrial robots that automobile production lines employ, “Outrace” receives messages via the Internet or mobile device. The eight robots have bright lights at the tips of their arms, which then spell out the words in light. A nearby camera will take long-exposure photos of the lights, capturing the messages you send, which you can then share on Facebook or Twitter or whatever.
Outrace is a collaboration between car-maker Audi and European design firm Kram/Weisshaar, and is being displayed as part of the upcoming London Design Festival. To send a message of your own, login to outrace.org between September 17th and September 23rd.
In case you haven’t heard, there’s this little indie game coming out next week called Halo: Reach.
A full, extended version of the “Deliver Hope” live action short film that Microsoft commissioned for Halo: Reach has found its way online, and man is it a doozy. Full of killer battle scenes on a planet burning from invasion and war, there’s no other word to describe it but epic. It makes me yearn all the more for District 9 director Neil Blomkamp’s Halo movie-that-almost-was (even though Blomkamp had nothing to do with making this ad).
Kudos to Machinima.com for the exclusive on this. In related news, today it was announced that there are thousands of midnight events taking place all over the country to celebrate the release of the game, which you can read about here.
Doctor Who is officially coming to the Nintendo Wii and what better way would there be to play the game than with a sonic screwdriver, the very same device carried by the Doctor in the BBC t.v. series.
I for one have a problem with many Wiicessories that are made of crappy plastics or in some cases styrofoam that my cat for some reason likes to eat.
This Wii-Mote accessory however is actually sculpted around it’s very own WiiMote, making it give off the appearance of a sleeker device, while at the same time providing a more realistic authenticity that’s sturdy to use and even features a top side light to give off the true sonic screwdriver effect.
This remote is definitely better than just some protruding add-on for a motion controller.
The sonic screwdriver is set to released in December over in the UK, two months after the Doctor Who Wii game arrives, unfortunately there are no plans to release the controller in the United States.
Can everyone say Amazon.co.uk, that’s where I buy all my hard to find gaming merchandise and most of it even manages to pass through customs.
With the shipment being a day late this week thanks to Labor Day, I thought I would focus on an intriguing series from the House Of Ideas. As much as I have criticised them in the past (not that it stops me reading every month, but could I call myself a true comics fan without the griping?), this seems to be something fresh. New. Certainly a departure from the standard fare, and hopefully one of those little gems that year after year, I will pick up and read again.
The premise is that one guy, as a result of standing up to a pair of thugs and being forced to swallow hospital waste, is unexpectedly diagnosed with cancer. Previously dormant, the biowaste has caused it to turn immediately agressive (hence the title), and this is stated from the lips of Mister Reed Richards himself, so there is very little doubting it.
However, this is comics, and there is another interesting side-effect that our central character Dennis has to deal with, while contemplating what to do with the rest of his life, short as it is. A life seemingly blighted by tragedy already, with the loss of his sister and her husband, but blessed (if you could call it that) with his stroppy, resentful and obviously grieving teenage neice. Hardly the easiest ride, but very very real. Even with appearances by the Thing, Mr Fantastic and Spider Man (in a lovely little homage there), this comic does not scream spandex.
The writer Rick Remender is not one whose name I normally remember (no pun intended) but looking at his biography and noticing that The End League (Dark Horse) is amidst his works, I feel satisfied in having high expectations here. The sense of tragedy is not forced, you can see it on the page itself laid out before you and I find I am already missing
How many moves does it take you to solve a Rubik’s Cube? Whatever your answer is, I am sure it is better than mine – which is none. As in no number of moves. I just give up before I am even halfway there.
Rubik’s Cube enthusiasts will know, however, that there is such a thing as God’s Algorithm. The whole idea is to discuss the ways one can solve the Rubik’s Cube, and to come up with the minimum number of moves needed. The use of God is an allusion to the notion that the Supreme Deity will have the information necessary to come up with least number of moves.
This brings us to God’s Number, which has finally been determined.So, the magic number is 20. God’s Number is 20.
On to the who and how…
The team behind the effort: Tomas Rokicki, a programmer from Palo Alto, California, Herbert Kociemba, a math teacher from Darmstadt, Germany, Morley Davidson, a mathematician from Kent State University, and John Dethridge, an engineer at Google in Mountain View.
With the help of idle computer time – 35 CPU years worth, no less – given by Google, the team was able to practically solve every possible position of the Rubik’s Cube. Exactly how they did it? You can check out the whole process in the team’s web site.
After reading this post, I wouldn’t be surprised if more than a handful of you guys start scrambling around to find a Rubik’s Cube and try putting God’s Number into practical application.
Optimus Prime may be a 21st century Transformer, but the team at Encline Designs wanted to see what he would have turned into during the 1800′s and the most obvious answer was formed, a steam engine!
The pictures shown below showcase Optimus Prime in all of his transformation stages as a steam engine.
There were some jaws that had to be picked up off the floor this morning when Apple held its latest media event. Emceed as ever by Steve Jobs, the event was primarily about Apple updating its entire line of iPods, but it was a handful of other announcements that stole the show.
Here’s a quick rundown of everything you need to know.
1) Ping. Perhaps the biggest news of the entire press conference: Apple has entered the Social Media War with its very own social network. But instead of making it a network about anything and everything, Apple has shrewdly zeroed in on one aspect of its business that it would be most beneficial to add social features to: music on iTunes.
Ping works much like Facebook, but it’s all about music, allowing fans, musicians, and friends to be easily linked together, so you can see what your friends are buying, thinking, what concerts they’re going to, and more. It’s pretty nifty, but it should be interesting to see if users who are used to doing their social networking on the web will be willing to give that up; Ping works only inside iTunes, or your iPhone or iPod. Ping comes with iTunes 10.0, a brand new version of iTunes, which should
At today’s Apple keynote event, Epic Games showed up to tease a new game they’re working on called Project Sword. Showing off some of the 3D gameplay the game will make possible, using Epic’s Unreal Engine (the same game engine used for Gears of War, Mass Effect, and more), they’ve made a free app available to download from iTunes. It’s called “Epic Citadel,” and it’s basically a FPS-style 3D castle/village environment for you to wander around in and take a look at what the Unreal engine can do on iPod, iPhone, or iPad.
I just downloaded the iPad version and have to say, I’m impressed. The controls are simple and intuitive, and the eye candy is definitely something to behold. Check out the handful of screenshots I just took (below), and then go to iTunes to download the app for yourself. Epic is making its Apple development tools available to other game makers, which opens the door to a whole new era of gaming on Apple’s portable devices.
Sure Darth Vader and his Stormtroopers may have the dark side to aid them in their battles, but there’s nothing like staying nice and limber as well, that’s where a daily routine of Tai Chi comes into play.
Notice the lazy Stormtroopers in the background who are doing little more than standing around.
Watch as Darth Vader does his Lift Knee Thrust Upward pose and his Turn Body, Thrust Downward Pose among 40 other moves in the style of Star Wars.
Here’s the video:
It’s all a bit silly, but check out the definition for Tai and it’s use of “the force” as told from the directors point of view:
With the shipment being a day late this week thanks to Labor Day, I thought I would focus on an intriguing series from the House Of Ideas. As much as I have criticised them in the past (not that it stops me reading every month, but could I call myself a true comics fan without the griping?), this seems to be something fresh. New. Certainly a departure from the standard fare, and hopefully one of those little gems that year after year, I will pick up and read again.
1) Ping. Perhaps the biggest news of the entire press conference: Apple has entered the Social Media War with its very own 
