Jul 19

Facebook phone concept appears with “like” home button

Posted in: Today's Chili

A set of conceptual renderings for a futuristic looking Facebook phone have appeared this week courtesy of designer Tolga Tuncer that are set to delight. This device completely enclosed in a combination of blue plastic and aluminum with the Facebook emblem right up front and center and a “like” thumbs up button down where you’d expect a home button to be. From there it only gets stranger – and perhaps more enticing.

When Tuncer designed this device and submitted it to Yanko Design, it appears that with this 17.5 cm x 5.5cm wedge of a smartphone he wanted to make his intentions clear. The form of this device makes it clear immediately that Facebook, of all companies, wont be bringing your everyday average smartphone. This phone is tall, has a display that would certainly need to have great viewing angles, and has next to no edge around the left and right of the screen.

Users will be able to hit “like” wherever they want and will have a few more buttons that bring them to different functions – or perhaps full apps – inside the device. On the upper right-hand side of the device you’ve got an Instagram button, on the upper left there’s a Spotify button next to some volume buttons, and up top you’ve got a notification light.

This notification light is also a button that brings you straight to your messaging inside your Facebook account. You’ve also got a headphone jack up top with some small speaker holes, and the designer has made it clear that there are no microphones on the front of the device. Instead, if you’d like to make a call, you’ll be holding the device with the display away from your face as both the ear speaker and the one mic hole are on the “back.”

Also on the back is another Instagram-branded element, the single-LED flash-toting camera. This device has no front-facing camera, oddly enough, and at the moment it appears to be running whatever operating system the designer deems worthy of the hardware. You can see a version of Facebook working in the main rendering, but its formatting is wholly unique.


Facebook phone concept appears with “like” home button is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


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Jul 17

Faraday Porteur concept e-bike becomes a reality, launches pre-sale on Kickstarter (video)

Posted in: Today's Chili

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Last time we saw the Faraday electric bike, it had just emerged victorious from the Oregon Manifest design competition. Designed by Ideo and built by Portland’s Rock Lobster Cycles, the retro-styled ride was destined to rot in concept hell for all eternity — that is until lead designer Adam Vollmer quit Ideo to press the bike into production under the Faraday Bicycles name. Now he’s perfected the design, the company’s launching a pre-sale on Kickstarter to, er, kickstart the first production run.

Don’t be fooled by its low-fi looks, parallel top tubes hold a series of lithium-ion batteries which power a front motor, good for between 10 and 15 miles of travel. The two front prongs are the basis of a modular racking system and contain a pair of LED headlamps that activate automatically in bad light. It charges in 45 minutes and weighs around 40 pounds. The bike will set you back $3,500, $300 less than when a second run is produced next year — significantly cheaper than the current price for the $5,400 Grace One we rode around New York. If you’ve got some baller-style cash to throw around, you can spend $10,000 on a collectors edition hand-finished by Rock Lobster’s Paul Sadoff. After the break we’ve got video and more details, but be warned — you might find yourself opening your wallet a little too rapidly.

Continue reading Faraday Porteur concept e-bike becomes a reality, launches pre-sale on Kickstarter (video)

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Faraday Porteur concept e-bike becomes a reality, launches pre-sale on Kickstarter (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Jul 2012 15:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jul 05

Lamp post + Umbrella = The Lampbrella

Posted in: Today's Chili

Ever been caught out in the rain without an umbrella? We feel your pain. A Russian designer by the name of Mikhail Belyaev has come up with a cool concept that could solve the problem by using street lamps. Belyaev’s idea would see umbrellas automatically deploying from street lamps when it begins to rain, providing shelter for those looking to avoid getting drenched.

In addition, there could be a manual control that would operate the umbrella, and the possibility of a motion sensor that would detect when users have left the safety of the umbrella and automatically close it a few minutes later. The construction otherwise looks to be fairly simple, although we can’t help but wonder how repairable the rig would be if the umbrella becomes damaged.

Still, it’s a neat concept that wouldn’t be terribly difficult to implement, and it could come in handy in urban areas. There are a few more illustrations over here, so make sure to click through and check them out.

[via Tree Hugger]


Lamp post + Umbrella = The Lampbrella is written by Ben Kersey & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


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Jul 02

Sony FutureScapes thrills for tomorrow

Posted in: Today's Chili

The folks at Sony have revealed that they’ve been running a set of workshops this yeah that all surround a better and brighter future under the title FutureScapes. This project is a collaboration between Sony and Forum for the Future and is bringing together futurologists, thinkers, authors, technologists, sustainability experts, and vloggers, not to mention the public – to imagine the future world of 2025, and they’ve created a short video presentation to make it all clear.

This video shows how this Sony FutureScapes project works with four different concepts: Wandular, The Internet of Things Academy (IOTA), Hyper Village, and The Shift. With innovation at the center of this futuristic adventure, Sony hopes that many will join in and make it as great as it can be in the now. Have a peek at the presentation video here:

Sony FutureScapes has been syphoned down to these four projects and will be pushing forward with them in mind from here on out:

Wandular – A device which fits in the palm of your hand and never goes out of date due to cloud downloads and plug-and-play hardware upgrades.

The Internet of Things Academy – A place where everyone can get educated on software, data, and complex hardware, and how these things work with the things they use and/or need on a day to day basis.

Hyper Village – A place where “high-tech” and “high-nature” blend in a rural community setting. Both high-tech methods and natural perfection are used to create one fabulous future.

The Shift – Not an invention, but a philosophy. Here you’ll be working with your relationship to technology and seeing how it’ll help better meet all of our needs, not just the ones that are met here in the present. “How might technology itself change to boost creativity, productivity, or even our relationship with nature?”

Check out the video above and stay tuned as Sony and Forum for the Future continue to innovate!


Sony FutureScapes thrills for tomorrow is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


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