MudWatt Generates Power from Mud and Garbage

The MudWatt kit from KeegoTech is an educational DIY kit that can teach kids about soil chemistry, microbiology and electricity. By combining ordinary dirt from your yard, along with scraps from your refrigerator, kids can create a fuel cell that will light up an LED. The MudWatt set is priced at $44.95 and can be [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2011/11/27/mudwatt-generates-power-from-mud-and-garbage/

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Google Voice Search learns Latin American Spanish, Indonesian, and Malaysian

google voice search
Google Voice Search has just introduced localizations for Latin America, Indonesia and Malaysia, enabling native language search for hundreds of millions of users.

Google's official blog post offers some interesting insights into the process of collecting and analyzing the speech data needed to expand support. Thousands of hours were spent gathering voice samples and choosing key regional accents to analyze, and International Program Manager Linne Ha is clearly very appreciative of the Google users who helped the company complete the expansion. Without an enthusiastic base of users to lend a hand, Google Voice Search's polyglot powers would have been nearly impossible to deliver.

Google Voice Search learns Latin American Spanish, Indonesian, and Malaysian originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 31 Mar 2011 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/31/google-voice-search-learns-latin-american-spanish-indonesian-a/

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Protect Your Testicles From Technology, Your Future Children Will Thank You [Science]

If you dream of spawning a mini me or three one of these days, you might consider keeping that laptop off your lap and curbing your cell phone use just a touch. More »


Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/L7eGd2jSWOc/protect-your-testicles-from-technology-your-future-children-will-thank-you

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Editorial: Carrier IQ -- the 'evil' we agree to and hate that we did it

HTC Legal

Seems like every time you turn around you'll see corporations using sneaky tricks to gain a competitive advantage over a different, yet equally sneaky corporation.  That's usually how money is made by the people who are best at making lots of it -- at the expense of others.  The cell phone industry is no different, even though we wish it were.  Yes, I'm talking about Carrier IQ, and it's my turn to bitch.

Carrier IQ sells a stock client for BlackBerry, Symbian, and Android.  There's strong evidence that  they also make client software for other smartphone platforms, and even semi-smartphone OS's like Bada or BREW.  But they're only making it easy to get the same type of data your carrier has been collecting about you since the minute you turned your cell phone on.  If they're collecting it in an insecure manner, which has happened, that's bad on them, and they need to fix it -- pronto. But they're not doing it on their own. They're doing it at the behest of the manufacturer and the carrier, who uses the data to determine how to make changes that get you to spend more money when they offer you the latest shiny.  If 72 percent of the people use a certain feature, you can bet your last dollar that more work goes into making that feature "better" so it's a stronger selling point.  Carrier IQ, as a company, could care less what you do with your smartphone, when you do it, or why.  All they do is make it easier for the people you give your money to each month to see why you like your phone.  I don't work for HTC or AT&T, but I'm sure easy data collection and aggregation makes for a compelling sales pitch.

CIQ isn't doing anything it's not supposed to be doing, unless there's a software bug in play.  The software was purposefully placed there in order to track what you're doing in real time.  Apparently, it works pretty well.  Some may argue that it's a rootkit, or a flaw of some sort, but to the people using the product -- again, the carrier and manufacturer -- it's a feature, one that they pay money to include.  Remember, you are not HTC's (or Samsung, or LG, or RIM, etc.) customer -- companies like Verizon and Sprint are, and all parties find the data that's collected pretty damn useful, so they aren't likely to stop collecting it.

It could be argued that you don't have a choice in the matter. You bought the phone. And while there might be (and usually is -- see the picture above from a CIQ enabled HTC phone) some vague reference to the phone collecting data about how you use it, you likely skipped over that section, and it's not all that up-front about what's being collected or how it's being done. But on the other hand, that's probably true about 90 percent of what your phone's doing at any given time.  It works exactly how it's supposed to work.  Getting mad about it after the fact isn't very productive, and isn't going to solve the problem any time soon.

Vote with your wallet.  You have the option to say no to this sort of data collection software, and that's done by not buying phones that use it.  Every major carrier in the world now carries one of those.

Yes, I think Carrier IQ is a bad thing, done by unscrupulous people so they have more pennies to count.  But all the hate towards the company that writes and sells the software is misguided.  They are only filling a need, and if they stop someone else will step up to replace them.  Enough words have been written about it, yet the solution for Android fans only needs three:

Buy a Nexus.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/dR8VqV7pzKY/story01.htm

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MudWatt Generates Power from Mud and Garbage

The MudWatt kit from KeegoTech is an educational DIY kit that can teach kids about soil chemistry, microbiology and electricity. By combining ordinary dirt from your yard, along with scraps from your refrigerator, kids can create a fuel cell that will light up an LED. The MudWatt set is priced at $44.95 and can be [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2011/11/27/mudwatt-generates-power-from-mud-and-garbage/

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Pixel-Perfect Portrait Depicted in Colored Sprinkles

221,184 pixels doesn’t sound like much, but if you’re laying them down by hand, one at a time, then they soon add up. Which is why it took artist Joel Brochu eight months to reconstruct a photograph using multicolored cake sprinkles. The image of a dog — based on an original photograph by Shingo Uchiyama — [...]

Source: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/11/pixel-perfect-portrait-depicted-in-colored-sprinkles/

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Engadget HD Podcast 276 - 11.29.2011

Even with the holiday break, it's been a busy week and we've got plenty to discuss including some long-awaited events, like a new HD guide from Comcast, the DirecTiVo, and SlingPlayer for Boxee Box. That's not all however, since we're just a week away from Microsoft's latest assault on the living room with the new Xbox 360 dashboard, and with CES just over a month away rumors are heating up including news about Samsung and Google TV. We've also got our holiday shopping guide for 2011 to talk about, so check out that list and what we're watching over the next week and add in your suggestions in the comments below.

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Hosts: Ben Drawbaugh (@bjdraw), Richard Lawler (@rjcc)

Producer: Trent Wolbe

05:23 - Revamped Xbox 360 dashboard to launch on December 6th, Microsoft confirms
16:50 - Microsoft acquires VideoSurf, promises to bring better video search and discovery to Xbox Live
20:02 - Comcast shows off its new 'Barcelona' HD guide upgrade
25:07 - TiVo Q4 results bring first sub growth in years, DirecTiVo is imminent
30:32 - Samsung in 'last-stage talks' to use Google TV, will show off hardware after CES
32:46 - Blu-ray video encryption cracked using $260 kit
38:33 - SlingPlayer for Connected Devices is here, arrives first on Boxee Box
41:15 - Sky Sports dedicated F1 HD channel coming next season
44:10 - Engadget's holiday gift guide 2011: HDTV and home theater
54:00 - Must See HDTV (November 28th - December 4th)

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Engadget HD Podcast 276 - 11.29.2011 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 Nov 2011 18:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/29/engadget-hd-podcast-276-11-29-2011/

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Levenger India Cloud Book Pillow Review

How would you like to give a gift this holiday season that’s actually multiple gifts in one?  You can, with the India Cloud Book Pillow from Levenger.  The recipient will get a great book pillow that works with paper books, eBook readers, and tablets.  Other people will receive the gift of a living wage and [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2011/11/28/levenger-india-cloud-book-pillow-review/

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Sensu Artist Brush for Capacitive Screens

I’m sure there’s more e-doodlers out there than me , and Artist Hardware’s Sensu Artist Brush looks pretty cool for doodling and painting on the go on your capacitive screen device. Now fully funded on  Kickstarter  ( funding requested $7,500, funding recieved $68,823 !!! ) , the Sensu is a capacitive brush device that gives [...]

Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2011/11/28/sensu-artist-brush-for-capacitive-screens/

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VMware adds Mozy to its cloud and virtualization empire

mozy vmware
Mozy is one of the most popular cloud backup services around, with more than one million users storing around 70 petabytes of data. Its popularity apparently put it on the acquisition radar of VMware -- which has now made Mozy part of its virtualization empire.

VMware's official blog post makes it clear that the company wasn't so much interested in Mozy as a consumer offering. Rather, it's the inner workings of Mozy which piqued VMware's curiosity. CTO Steve Herrod says, "Over the past 5 years, Mozy has built one of the best examples of a globally distributed, large-scale cloud offering." He adds that the move will allow VMware to "further ramp our own cloud-related learning and accelerate new IP, scale, and capabilities" of its existing offerings.

Existing Mozy customers don't need to worry, of course. VMware has pledged to continue running Mozy's service without interruption.

VMware adds Mozy to its cloud and virtualization empire originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/04/05/vmware-takes-over-operation-of-mozy/

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