Hasta La Gadget!

Theme hotels are nothing new, of course, but thus far they’ve been way too hung up with concepts of comfort, style, or adventure. One hotel in Nantes, France is forgoing all of those silly things, in order to give the vacationing public what it really wants–the opportunity to spend a night like a hamster.

Of course, as anyone who has ever owned one of those little puffy cheeked rodents can tell you, hamsters are nocturnal, so actually “spending the night like a hamster,” would generally involve little to no sleep. Which, I suppose, is where the giant wheel comes in. If, however, you do get tuckered out from all of that squeaky-wheeled running, there are stacks of hay for you to sleep in.

The Hamster Villa will run you 99 eruos ($135) a night. The room is located in an 18th century building which its designers feel looks a bit like a hamster cage. Don’t forget to BYO salt lick.

Imagine how many accidents could be avoided if we all had perfect X-Ray vision — assuming, of course, that everyone could refrain from being distracted by all the naked pedestrians. Drivers would never be surprised by rapidly slowing traffic, cars broken down around blind curves, or autos zooming into blind spots. No matter how many ads we respond to in the back of Mad Magazine we’ll never have that, but Ford has an alternative with its Intelligent Vehicle Research: cars that simply rely on GPS and a wireless data connection to beam their location and speed to each other.

Autos alert their drivers when a car at the front of a convoy is rapidly decelerating or when there’s a broken down rig right around the next bend. Interestingly the tech is using WiFi, not cellular data, so range is somewhat limited, but still far enough to warn drivers with blinking lights or trigger an automatic-braking system. It’s all demonstrated in the video after the break and, while there are no crazy platooning stunts like Volvo recently showed off, we have to figure that’s coming in version 2.0.

Continue reading Ford’s intelligent vehicles communicate wirelessly, shoot hula hoops out of tailpipes (video)

Ford’s intelligent vehicles communicate wirelessly, shoot hula hoops out of tailpipes (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Jan 2011 11:50:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

You know that Facebook-branded HTC handset that everyone was talking about, earlier this week? Yeah, well, that’s not happening. The social network knocked down the rumor today in a less-than-subtle fashion. The site’s head of business development told Reuters, “The rumors around there being something more to this HTC device are overblown.”

Asked point blank whether the Taiwanese company would be releasing a “Facebook phone,” Rose answered, simply, “No.”

Rather, HTC may be creating a device centered around the social network without the direct blessing of Facebook. Says Rose, “This is really just another example of a manufacturer who has taken our public APIs (application programing interfaces) and integrated them into their device in an interesting way.”

Big Brother’s watching us on public streets and in our homes, and now he’s fixed his gaze on shopping malls — under the guise of helping us find our cars in a mall parking garage. Santa Monica Place has installed Park Assist’s M3 Camera Vision system with “Find Your Car” kiosks that allow wayward shoppers to punch in their license plate number to receive a picture of their auto and its whereabouts. It utilizes a network of cameras to capture each car’s location and read the plate, and has a central control system that can dole out firmware upgrades as more (nefarious?) needs arise. A similar system is used at Heathrow Airport, though the British version snaps a photo of your plates upon entry and tracks cars with infrared cameras — as opposed to Park Assist’s use of hi-res cameras to capture an image of your plate once you’ve parked. While helping people find their cars is an admirable goal, the system seems rife with opportunities for abuse because the footage is privately owned — meaning the car location information could be sold to anyone, including that crazy ex-girlfriend of yours. As for us, we’d rather not exchange a walk-on part in the war to maintain our privacy for a lead role in another video cage. We’re just fine remembering things the old-fashioned way, thanks.

SoCal mall installs ‘Find Your Car’ kiosks in parking garage to help you find your car — and others find you? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Jan 2011 11:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink LA Times  |  Park Assist  | Email this | Comments

Sony’s PSP sequel is a confirmed reality, but pricing, release date, and other details are still unknown.