While not everyone might have a fascination for dictionaries, I suppose that we can all see the value in having one handy, especially for students. And for those who do not care much for the traditional “paper” dictionaries, the Oxford University Press is making an effort to reach out and share their expertise.

The Oxford UP has gotten together with WhiteParkBay.com to create versions of some of their most popular dictionaries for the iPod Touch and the iPhone. Some of these dictionaries are:

-Oxford Dictionary of Politics
-Oxford Dictionary of Law
-Oxford Dictionary of Computing
-Oxford Dictionary of Music
-Oxford Dictionary of Business and Management.

You can see the complete list of specialized dictionaries at www.dictionaryapps.com.

The interface of the dictionaries is pretty cool, making full use of the features of the iPhone. For instance, turning the device horizontally or vertically allows you to have different views – either a list of entries or the main entry plus detailed information.

These dictionaries are available at the App Store for $14.99 each. Not bad! After all, you can’t put a price on learning!

Each arc is another five light years from Earth, so while most ETs have watched the first baseball game, and Alderbaran is about to witness World War II, it’s going to be a long time before Friends, Babylon 5, The Sopranos and Spongebob Squarepants make it out there.

Okay, maybe not everyone has that urge but I can think of countless other situations wherein the Bottle Cap Tripod will come in handy.

Say you and your hubby (or wife or partner) are on vacation together. Naturally, you would want pictures with both of you in them, right? Option one: have the waiter take pictures of you. Option two: have one of you (whoever has longer arms) take the picture. Option three: lug a tripod along (assuming you have one). Option four: Bottle Cap Tripod.

Other possibilities: group picture at the office, group picture during a night out drinking, etc.

So what makes the Bottle Cap Tripod advantageous over “real” tripods?

First, it’s just ₤6.95.

Second, it’s so small you won’t even feel that it’s in your bag.

Three, you don’t need specialized equipment to use it. Just pop it on top of any standard screw-top bottle and you’re ready to go. More than serving as a handy holder for your camera, the tripod also stabilizes the camera for clearer shots. More so, it pivots round 360 degrees, making sure that you can take picture from any angle, wherever the bottle may be.

Now imagine yourself on a field of grass having a picnic…I am sure you can find a bottle somewhere to hold your camera.

But Square Enix’s attempt at creating mystery might be all for naught. Japanese magazine Weekly Shonen Jump may have actually jumped the gun on the company. Scans of the magazine showed Square Enix’s new game Four Warriors of Light: Final Fantasy Gaiden for the DS. The game will be a turn based RPG that will arrive this fall in Japan. The game will revolve around a 14 year old boy who has been tasked by a king to rescue a princess from a witch.

The gameplay will involve controlling a four-man squad of various roleplay types. The magazine also revealed that as characters gain and equip various weapons and armor, their appearance will also change.

There are no reports yet of whether the game will be released outside Japan.

One of the reasons for the fans’ continued support for Starcraft, aside from the deep, strategic gameplay is the fact that you can play it with your friends and mount frenetic multiplayer battles during LAN parties. Nothing beats having a heated game in a room with all the trash talking going on between two competitors.

But if Blizzard’s plan for Starcraft II does push through we won’t see those cool Starcraft LAN parties anymore. Blizzard confirmed what many are speculating about Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty. The game will be launched for the PC at about the same time the newly revamped Battle.net online network service, which is at the last part of 2009. Unfortunately, the game will be releaed without any LAN multiplayer option.

Blizzard said that the decision to remove this popular option is a type piracy prevention mechanism and also a way to maintain quality assurance. Blizzard wants to direct players to Battle.net as the best, and now the only, option for multiplayer gaming for Starcraft II.

I’m not too sold on the whole anti-piracy thing idea. Why would long-time fans of the game suffer for what pirates are doing? By removing the LAN multiplayer option, Blizzard is effectively alienating a large majority of Starcraft fans who plan on playing the game through their local networks. LAN multiplayer will obviously not need an internet connection — why would Blizzard expect players to connect to the internet to play with people who are all in the same room? And what about the lag, which is obviously not going to be a problem with LAN multiplayer? I think Blizzard is making a big mistake with this move.

The title gives a clue: this is a 32×32 pixel editor with a pretty intuitive interface that lets you map out thoughts in grayscale pretty quickly.

The idea is that you sketch out ideas on the move, then sync up and use more advanced software on your laptop or PC to do stuff such as color, animation and so on.

The beauty of good iPhone apps is that they do something simple and niche and they do it well. Instead of adding lots of bulky features that would only slow the app down and probably waste battery life, Caffeine Monster Software has stuck with the important functions.

Take a look at CreativeApplications’ demo video:

Find out more

Anyhow, it got me reading up on more Walkman stories, and one of the most interesting that I ran across is Scott Campbell’s little experiment. Scott is a 13-year-old kid who has used an mp3 player most of his life. When challenged to swap his iPod for a Walkman for one week, he didn’t realize just how much of an adventure he was in for.

The BBC featured his review and comparison of the two portable music players. It was quite amusing to read his thoughts:

My dad had told me it was the iPod of its day.

He had told me it was big, but I hadn’t realised he meant THAT big. It was the size of a small book.

When I saw it for the first time, its colour also struck me. Nowadays gadgets come in a rainbow of colours but this was only one shade – a bland grey.

His dad’s Walkman must have been way older than mine – mine is black and not THAT big (at least I think so!). Anyway, you can read the rest of his story here.

Maybe you have your own nostalgic moments about the Walkman? Any interesting stories of your own?

So what about mice? If you are the kind who tends to spill water (or, God forbid, coffee) on your gadgets, you might want to take a look at some of the waterproof mice in the market. One of the newest washable mice is the Cherry MW-2800. It is optical and tracks at 1,200dpi. You can submerge this baby in water and use it like new after. It’s a bit pricey at $45, though.

Another washable mouse is the one from Belkin, the F5L007. This is cheaper at $29.99 and also has optical tracking at 1,200dpi. However, Belkin recommends washing this mouse under running water and not submerging it. That means that you cannot accidentally drop your mouse into your cup of joe (yes, I have done this).

USB Geek also offers a washable USB mouse for $17. It is heavier than the two other mice and only tracks at 800dpi. Last time I checked though, this was out of stock.

So, do you really need a washable mouse? Probably not but it would be fun to have one and not worry about splashing liquids all over the place. Now for a waterproof laptop…

So, by way of small celebration here are ten images inspired by your greatness.

1. Hard-wired SonyEricsson Walkman phone. Neatness doesn’t come as standard

2. Great, let’s stick a huge replica of a Walkman phone on top of a metal stand because… well, because we can, OK?

3. Yeah, Stone Age Walkman usage FTW!

4. OK, what is it with BIG Walkmans? I know they were big anyway, but this Sports Walkman ain’t going jogging with you any time soon.

5. Wow, mashup. Fully functioning paper based Walkman, but using Sanyo tape player. Don’t get this wet.

6. C90 exposed! OK, not really a Walkman shot but evokes memories of fighting with cassettes when the machine decided to chew up the tape.

7. Sony in the 1980s. Gotta love it. “Once again Sony turns the world of headphones upside down”. What, by putting DRM on them?

8. Walkman pr0n! Definitely a lot of exposed components here – almost an orgy. WM-DD30 meets WM-DD33.

9. “I’m your father”. So true.

10. You’re looking at the phones, right? It’s what I go to trade fairs for…

To whet your appetite here’s a picture of Gilgamesh in all his awesome glory.

Sony’s decision to remove this feature may have been borne out of the desire to save a few more dollars on production costs but I always felt that the company actually lost more because backwards compatibility is a major come-on for established PS2 gamers with an extensive games library to jump on the PS3 bandwagon. But based on a recent patent that Sony Computer Entertainment filed in the US patent Office, Sony may have a way to put backwards compatibility on PS3s once again.

Sony has apparently found a way to translate the instructions from the Emotion Engine into data that can be referenced by the PS3. The figures above are schematics on how the technology will actually work.

So the question is, will we see this new technology in play as a firmware upgrade in the near future?

Here we have origami-styled logos for Firefox, Twitter, Apple, Digg, Basecamp, Flickr, GMail, IE (broken, love it), iTunes, Mint, RSS, Opera and Skype, designed by Paddy Donnelly.

They can be downloaded in a variety of formats. Jump on to see them all:

So lets say you were a die-hard Lucky Star fan and you went to Saitama to see the sights. You visit the shrine where Tsukasa and Kagami work in the anime and buy some merchandise, but you feel that something is missing. What is it you ask? The Lucky Star girls of course. This problem may soon be solved as the prefecture may change their school uniforms to match those in the anime. No doubt this would bring in another influx of anime fans and boost tourism in the area once again. One has to wonder if the girls that actually have to wear the uniforms will have any objections to crazed otaku around every corner asking them for a picture. This just goes to show that you never know what the Japanese will make their schoolgirls do for some easy money. Who knows, maybe one day we’ll see an entire school perform the Lucky Star dance.

Besides the obvious Lucky Star spots, the “Anime Land” Engrish website also lists other attractions in the area that may be of interest to anime fans (especially those of Crayon Shin-chan and My Neighbour Totoro).

Source: ANN

The idea of doing fan art parodying some of my favorite characters and stars in such a fun and simple style got me hooked immediately. Some of these guys and gals have appeared on the Simpsons and I could just work from that, but most I had to do from scratch.

The results often are amazing and last week’s Ghostbusters week was very cool.

Image credits: All images © Springfield Punx.

The Gathering Hall will be constructed at he former site of the prestigious Lazarides gallery in central London.

There’ll be three floors dedicated to the PSP game which launched in Britain last week, with comfy seating, free soft drinks, graffiti art, and space for the hundreds of gamers expected to turn up over the next two months.

To get in, you have to bring your PSP loaded up with Monster Hunter. The venue is open from 10am-8pm every day (10pm on Thursdays).

In London and want to be prepared? Here’s the venue map: 121 Charing Cross Road, London, WC2 0EW.

Dubbed The Human Printer, Louise creates photographic “prints” by hand, and you can even send in your own photos for Louise to work on.

The results are definitely unique.

Apparently this is the fourth version of the map though I hadn’t seen it before – wish I had.

As you’d expect, all the big boys are on there — Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Skype, StumbleUpon, WordPress, Reddit, IMDb…

There’s a lot of media there too including News Corp, BBC, The Guardian and so on.

It’s well worth spending time scrolling around looking at how sites are linked up together and who the key players are.

The taller the building, the more successful it’s deemed, while its width denotes how stable it is.

See the full sized map here.

There’s not much to say about the game other than that it allows you to show off your bacon baking skills on your iPhone. And it’ll rip you off for $1.19. Dept. of Uselessness as far as I am concerned, not because we don’t like bacon here at FG. we love bacon, if used interestingly but this is just another stupid money costing app.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted something about this struggle on my Facebook status and within seconds, I got tips from friends. One in particular got my attention: Nanda’s line of alarm clocks.

These are no ordinary alarm clocks, mind you. Nanda’s Clocky is patented and JUMPS 3 feet from wherever you place it. It actually gives you one chance to snooze – I usually do this at least 3 times and then go right back to sleep. After you use that chance, Clocky will jump, roll around, and hide from you. Of course, it will be beeping all the while, giving you no other choice but to get up, look for it, and silence it.

Measurements: 5.25″ x 3.5″ x 3.5″

Price: $50

Where to get it: NANDA’s web site or check out your local distributors.

The Nanda Clocky might just be what I need to actually get up on time and get some work done! Then again, there is no saying what I might accidentally do to it when it beeps and rolls around the house when I am in a bad mood…

Speaking about Transformers, check these cufflinks out from an Etsy shop: Silver Plated Transformer AUTOBOTS and DECEPTICON Cufflinks with Gift Box.

Whether you have a soft heart and like Optimus Prime and his band of Autobots or you lean towards the darker side and prefer Megatron, this cufflinks set will certainly bring out the movie/cartoon geek in you. One cufflink has the engraved image of the Autobots while the other is of the Decepticons. They are both silver plated and are placed inside a black PVV cufflink box (nothing like PVC to keep the Transformers safe, huh?).

Dimensions are as follows:

Measurements (cufflinks): 0.80 inches (Height) x 0.75 inches (Width), which is equivalent to 2cm x 2cm.

Cufflink box measures: 1.0 inch x 1.60 inches x 3.25 inches (2.5cm x 4cm x 8.1cm)

Finkstudio, the seller of the cufflinks also offers other Transformers cufflinks and features other super heroes as well. For you yuppies who actually use cufflinks and can’t let go of your cartoon fixation, you might want to browse this Etsy store for some great finds. Oh, this particular set of cufflinks go for $20, by the way.

We all know that T3 is one of the most popular gadget and technology sites today; and while you may not be a T3 fan (to be honest, I am not that much of a fan), it would be cool to participate in their awards. The chance to win prizes is even cooler!

Anyhow, some of the categories for the awards are:

-Camera of the Year
-Commuter Gadget
-Computer of the Year
-Drop Dead Gorgeous Gadget
-Gadget of the Year
-Gadget You Can’t Live Without
-Game of the Year
-Green Gadget of the Year
-Home Gadget of the Year

There are several more categories. Browsing the categories, I couldn’t help but think that I would have a hard time choosing one gadget for each. They do present the contenders for each category, though, so you have an idea of what to vote for in case you are overwhelmed by the number of gadgets that you have or want.

Well, what are you waiting for? Head on over to the T3 Gadget Awards 2009 page and cast your votes!

Via Geek Pad Show.

Designed by Rhea Jeong and inspired by water droplets and musical notation, it has a tumbler toy built in to the base meaning that it will always self right itself.

In addition, spinning or pushing the speaker in different directions can be used to operate the iPod. Left and right (with the Shuffle facing you) would skip back and forward a track, front to back would pause and resume the music, while spinning it one way or the other would adjust the volume.

How about one for the iPod touch?

Example:

The campaign below relies heavily on social media and thus the prominent listing of grandma’s Twitter and social profiles:

On the other hand we have the Samsung Jet site below.

OMG! Animation heavy site! And you have Flickr and Twitter located in a not so happy position down bottom. And you;ll come to realize too that the Flickr page is the press area for hi resolution photo downloads. Isn’t that important? And .. it’s going to be really hard to StumbleUpon something that’s located at the very bottom of your page.

Flickr via Technabob.

Ahh, I’ve never grown tired of the notion that everyone who lives in Australia stands on their head because it’s on the other side of the world from Britain (not exactly, of course).

It’s all in celebration of The Ashes series which starts next month. Cricket is a sport that both Brits and Aussies understand but the former seldom does particularly well at.

Anyway, back to the remote control unit itself. You’ll notice that Sky hasn’t gone to the effort of rotating the entire design through 180 degrees, or even flipping every button, because some items like the central “play/pause” button have obviously not been fully rotated because of their odd shape.

I’m sure Sky could’ve gone much further with this – maybe sending a new version of the EPG to the set-top box without the user’s permission so that all the programme listings are upside-down as well. Or transmitting the programmes upside-down or played backwards. Yep, I think that’d be really good for business.

There’s no mention of how you can get your hands on one of these funky new RCUs. I bet with a Stanley knife and some glue you could easily make your own version (albeit one that doesn’t work when you reassemble it).

I wonder if the Australian Broadcasting Corporation will consider doing the same.

For those that haven’t quite worked it out, below is what the original Sky+HD remote looks like.

What’s Geek The Library all about?

It’s a movement that was made possible by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The idea is very simple and yet brilliant at the same time: focus on what individuals are passionate about AND then highlight how libraries can support these passions.

We all know how people tend to look down on libraries. They’re boring places. They’re not cool. But if you think about it, libraries are the physical manifestations of cool things such as the Internet!

In spite of my natural tendencies to “not like” Bill Gates, I cannot help but admire him for pushing this initiative. With this kind of movement, people just might pay more attention to libraries and see their significance. Oh, and I love how they turn “geek” into a verb: Geek the library! What do you geek?

Yeah, tell me, what do you geek? I geek the library!

Martin Wilson is a long-standing artist using traditional film photography as his medium.

His web site showcases 16 big art pieces that are stitched together from individual, ordered 35mm film.

Once Martin has developed the film, he scans it in and then place the final image together, including the shot numbers under each frame. He swears that he doesn’t cheat at all using Photoshop, and if he makes a mistake or shoots a frame out of place he starts the whole project again from scratch.

In a digital age when so much is manipulated via Photoshop, surely this has to count as master geekery? Take a look at some of the amazing artwork on his site. You can buy it all, too, and not for stupid prices either.

(Via)

Reaver’s Etsy listing.
]]> http://www.forevergeek.com/2009/06/hommage_cylon_inspired_jet_robot/feed/ 0 http://www.forevergeek.com/2009/06/wooden_ipod_mini/ http://www.forevergeek.com/2009/06/wooden_ipod_mini/#comments Tue, 23 Jun 2009 10:00:14 +0000 Franky http://www.forevergeek.com/?p=13138 Awesome mod of an iPod Mini. I must say this is probably the nicest iPod Mini mod I’ve seen so far, almost as beautiful as Joel Scilly’s wooden turntables.

My finished wood ipod mini. This has been such a fun project for me. It’s handmade (with special thanks to my 8yr old dremel) from Australian red cedar, Camphor Laurel for the clickwheel, brass plates, brass screws and the guts from the first ipod i ever had.
I was given a new ipod mini for christmas and I just couldn’t leave my trusty old mini to sit unused somewhere. So I decided to finally try a wooden shell mod on him that I had wanted to do for a long time.

More photos at the Wooden iPod Mini set on Flickr.