Hasta La Gadget!

As an ex-Brit, I’m well aware of the authorities’ love of surveillance and snooping, but even I, a pessimistic cynic, am amazed by the governments latest plan: to install Orwell’s telescreens in 20,000 homes.

£400 million ($668 million) will be spend on installing and monitoring CCTV cameras in the homes of private citizens. Why? To make sure the kids are doing their homework, going to bed early and eating their vegetables. The scheme has, astonishingly, already been running in 2,000 family homes. The government’s “children’s secretary” Ed Balls is behind the plan, which is aimed at problem, antisocial families. The idea is that, if a child has a more stable home life, he or she will be less likely to stray into crime and drugs.

It gets worse. The government is also maintaining a private army, incredibly not called “Thought Police”, which will “be sent round to carry out home checks,” according to the Sunday Express. And in a scheme which firmly cements the nation’s reputation as a “nanny state”, the kids and their families will be forced to sign “behavior contracts” which will “set out parents’ duties to ensure children behave and do their homework.”

And remember, this is the left-wing government. The Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling, batting for the conservatives, thinks these plans are “too little, and too late,” implying that even more obtrusive work needs to be done. Rumors that a new detention center, named Room 101, is being constructed inside the Ministry of Love are unconfirmed.

Sin Bins for Worst Families [Sunday Express. Thanks, Annaliza]

Photo illustration Charlie Sorrel, original image public domain

As a dedicated lazy-bones, I think that the best thing about the Truck Farm is that, to make it, you don’t have to lug garden supplies back home. You just drive over to the store and load up on, say, topsoil, and you’re done.

The mobile allotment was built by “four-wheeled-farmers” Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, two Brooklynites with no garden, but a 1986 Dodge Ram with an empty load-bed. It uses technology proven in roof gardens, with custom drainage by rainwater management company Alive Structures, and even the soil itself is a special, gas-friendly lightweight hybrid, mixing up styrofoam, gels, clay and organic matter.

What’s the point? The Truck Farm is a business, and works a lot like the vegetable box schemes found around the world. You pay a monthly fee and the Truck Farm will pay a visit to your home, where you can pick produce fresh out of the dirt. The guys have even made a series of short movies (see part one, below) showing the history and making of Truck Farm, complete with their own music.

Project Page [Wicked Delicate via Inhabitat]

(Credit: Kyleakoch.com)

All right, this isn’t the flatbed scanner we are more familiar with, but more rightfully a stand for the iPhone. What it does is let you take 8.5 x 11-inch documents on a fixed pedestal, so your snaps look consistent. It seems like a DIY …

Can a fanny-pack ever be cool? The answer is a resounding “no”, but try telling that to the worldwide tourist throngs that carry their valuables in one easy-to-snatch pouch on their waists. The only good thing about it is the name, which in British English means something quite different.

But the fanny pack is as useful as it is dorky. What if somebody came up with a hipper hip-bag? You’re ahead of me here. Fabric Horse make a whole range, only they’re not fanny packs. They’re utility belts. Like Batman wears. Awesome.

The packs, sorry, belts, are designed for cyclists, and are especially handy in the summer when heavy messenger bags or rucksacks make you sweat. They come in full and half sizes (more or less pockets), have clip or Velcro fastenings, metal loops for clipping carabiners and wrenches. They also have the Lock Holster, a loop at the back designed to carry a Kryptonite Evo Mini, apparently the bike messenger’s lock of choice. The holsters are “made from seat belts pulled from junk yards,” so they’ll last.

Could it be that Fabric Horse has finally made the fanny pack not just acceptable but actually desirable? Maybe. Packs run from $55 up to $120, and a standalone (hang-alone?) lock holster is just $10.

Product page [Fabric Horse. Thanks, Google!]

According to the French magazine Chasseur d’Images, a dead-tree publication dedicated to photography, Nikon is readying a camera with a buit-in LED projector, which will throw images of up to 8 x 12 inches onto the wall of a darkened room.

The reason we like this rumor (or leak) is because of the pedigree of the French magazine: Chasseur d’Images, because of the long lead times for printed publications, often gets the scoop early. This was the magazine that broke the Leica Noctilux 50mm ƒ0.95 lens well before its official birth.

Nikon is certainly focusing (ahem) on the more interesting side of photography. Since it dropped out of the megapixel race we have seen some amazing work on low light imaging, an extraordinarily good strobe (the SB 900) and a consumer camera with built in GPS. A camera with a projector inside doesn’t seem so far-fetched now, does it?

Groundbreaking Nikon news = code name Nikon VP650 [Nikon Rumors]

Photo: pedrosimoes7/Flickr