Hasta La Gadget!

Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 has gotten amazing results with its one-on-one experimental program, so much so, they have decided to give 6000 to 7000 students their own fourth generation Apple iPads. The original plan had put second generation iPad’s in the hands of about 1500 students and the feedback has been very positive. “We believe the one-to-one program is changing our teachers, it’s changing our instruction, and most importantly it’s changing the way in which students interact with their world,” said Daniel Cates, associate superintendent for administrative services.

The iPads come at a cost of between $1.25 and $1.43 million for a three year lease.  The cost will be covered through the district’s technology budget. The administration is considering plans to include all students in the plan by 2014-2015, as it has brought positive change in the schools. Other schools have joined the bandwagon as well, or plan to do so.

Teachers have also had encouraging things to say, from cutting down on paper use within the classrooms, to better attendance and participation from students and to helping out students with special needs. The devices have helped students who could not afford to have computers in their homes.  They are even helping teachers keep better checks on absenteeism.  Such plans go a long way in reshaping lives. Would you be interested if your school gave you a new iPad?

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Microsoft To Officially Launch Surface Pro Tablet On February 8th At Best Buy New York, Lenovo and NAF launches pilot program to teach app programming in high schools,

We all know just how cute LEGO minifigs can be, and perhaps in an effort to increase productivity at the office, a company has decided to listen to consulting agency Acrylicize and actually put up a wall that is full of, you’ve guessed it, LEGO minifigs, which is definitely an art installation that will turn more than just heads. The company in question to have this wall at their workspace would be Qubic Tax, and it is quite a reinvention of their office space.

This was done to interpret “taxes” in an interesting manner, where all the LEGO minifigs are dressed up to show that they are in different jobs, visually representing the kind of taxes that are filed from various industries. Definitely a true work of art, it also sends a rather subtle message that Big Brother is sure to love – remember to pay up your taxes! We do wonder whether the bulk of the cash in creating this LEGO minifig wall went to consultation fees, or to collecting those minifigs themselves.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: President Obama Criticizes Patent Trolls, Nikon Lenses Major Rebate Plan For Announced,

A couple of days back we ran a story about a rumored an upcoming Nikon Lenses rebate plan rumor. Nikon was expected to slash prices of their lenses and give major discounts on a large number of lenses. Well, Nikon has done it and has announced major discounts. The price scheme is supposed to expire on March 2^nd 2013. As reported earlier, consumers do not have to buy a DSLR body in order to qualify for the discounts. They will only need to purchase the lens.

Discounted prices can be checked on Nikon’s website . Lenses that have been discounted are: Nikkor 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6D, Nikkor 18-300mm f/3.5-5.6G VR, Nikkor 24-120mm f/4G ED VR, Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G VRII, Nikkor 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G VRII,  Nikkor 24mm f/1.4G, Nikkor 35mm f/1.4G,Nikkor 85mm f/1.4G, Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G, Nikkor 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G VR, Nikkor 28mm f/1.8G, Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G, Nikkor 85mm f/1.8G, Nikkor Micro 60mm f/2.8G, Nikkor 16-85mm f/3.5-5.6G, Nikkor 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5G VR, Nikkor Micro 85mm f/3.5G VR and the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8G.

If you were in the market for lenses, we hope that you read our previous post and waited until this was made official. Knowledge is power and it can also save you a buck or two.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Huge Rebate Plan For Nikon Lenses Coming [Rumor], Amazon Announces ‘Amazon Coins’ Virtual Currency,

For the past week, news stations around the world have been mentioning an asteroid called DA14  is expected to pass extremely close to Earth some time on February 15. What we didn’t expect was for another completely unrelated 10-ton meteorite to crash to Earth earlier this morning in Chelyabinsk, Russia, which is located 950 miles away from Moscow.

When the meteorite entered the Earth’s atmosphere at around 9:20 a.m. local time, it flew across the sky at 33,000 mph and broke into pieces 18 to 32 miles above ground, according to a statement released by the Russian Academy of Sciences. (more…)

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You read it correctly. Facebook is all set to roll out a brand new feature for promoting posts. Users can now pay to promote posts of their friends on Facebook.  The promoted post will have greater coverage, as it will be pushed to the top of the newsfeed.

To promote a post, click on the menu button on the top right corner of the post and click promote. Users can promote friends’ posts without any permission requests. However the promoted post will only be made visible to the people, with whom the original post was shared with. This is done so that privacy concerns do not become a problem. Also, users who have 5,000 friends or less in their profiles can subscribe to this feature.  Charges are $7 for promotions and varies by area and number of people the post can reach.

Facebook began testing the feature to pay for posts in October, when it rolled out the feature to pay for promoting your own posts at $7 per promotion.  This feature did not receive warm reaction. However the new feature might help people who actively promote charity events or fundraisers, or simply people who help their friends renting out their apartments.  Would you want to pay for promoting a friend’s post, or is it a backdoor to let people pay their friends to promote their own posts? What do you think?

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