Hasta La Gadget!

The Time Switch is a design which has its purpose fully 180º backwards. The designer, Ryan Harc, conceived the switch to stop time when the poor chap was up against a deadline (aside: if designing a new kind of light switch is his response to looming deadlines, we suggest some procrastination counselling, starting tomorrow).

The idea is that flipping it will “stop” time. In fact, hitting the off switch just, erm, switches the thing off, just like every other device.

What Harc should have done was simply reverse the wiring, hook the back-projected switch up to an actual light, and have the time actually stop when the lamp is fired up. That way, the display would freeze when you switched on the light, perhaps guilting people into turning it off a little earlier.

Of course, this wouldn’t work with everyone. John Brownlee, for instance, gadget blogger extraordinaire, still can’t shake his wasteful US upbringing despite several years spent in eco-fanatic Berlin. He recently spent a week as a house-guest in my home and would regularly run into a room, switch on all the lights and then leave, closing the door behind him. In the daytime. True story.

Product page [7760 via Noquedanblogs]

What if you could take the almost infinite re-configurability of a touch-screen and marry it to the tactile, no-looking-needed interface of the old-fashioned button? Researchers at Carnegie Mellon university have done just that, using what at first looks like a big, flat balloon:

The display is made up of several layers, the topmost of which is a latex sheet. Below that lies a sheet of acrylic with holes cut in it where the buttons are to go. Pumping air in and out of the device causes the buttons to expand and stick out (or get sucked in, like an inny belly-button). And because the latex is translucent, images can be rear-projected onto these “buttons”.

It’s not quite as configurable as a touch-screen, as the design is limited to where you place the button-holes (ha!). But the rear projection offers a fair degree of on-the-fly customization and the moving buttons could prove very helpful in, say, a car where you don’t want to take your eyes from the road. Optical sensing tech inside means that there is also multi-touch functionality. Try that with a regular keypad. Finally, the semi-3D images that can be laid onto the buttons, like the global map in the clip, are just plain rad.

Next For Touchscreens: Temporary Pop-Up Buttons? [Pop Mech]

The Shweeb is a person-powered monorail. The theme-park ride is a combination of the most futuristic of transports and the oldest: pedal-power meets sky-train.

The Shweeb lives in the Agroventures Adventure Park, Rotorua, New Zealand, and is essentially a row of recumbent bikes inside a clear plastic bubble, suspended from a rail. The efficiency means that a team can run at around 40kph (25mph) without too much effort, and in fact the track record for one man is 36kph (22mph). Because of this speed, the capsules swing out around the corners and the result apparently gives you quite the rush.

The tech page on the ride’s site bangs on about the transportation of the future, but is is? the beauty of the bike is that you can go anywhere, when you like. A monorail, whether powered by oil, coal or legs, is still public transport and still tied to a track. Yes, it’s safer, it’s dry in the rain and it looks like a lot of fun, but the transport of the future is already here. It has two wheels, and it’s called a bike.

Product page [Shweeb via Oh Gizmo!]

Q: What’s the difference between the USB cable on the left and the USB cable on the right? A: When you plug the one on the right between keyboard and computer, it will transmit every key press to a remote receiver, one secret password or adult URL at a time.

The cable is in fact a disguised extension piece, and the round nubbin contains the electronics. It is available in kit form from Keelog, a company that will also sell you a ready made hardware keylogger for both USB and PS/2 keyboards.

The beauty of the hardware logger is that it doesn’t require anything to be installed on the victim’s machine, and is therefore both undetectable by software and doesn’t require any hacking to install. Yes, you need physical access to a machine to hook it up, but once you have that, setup is trivially easy.

Once done, you can sit back, hook the receiver to your own machine and watch as the letters and numbers appear on your screen in real time. The maximum range is 50 meters (56 yards), and when walls and the real world get involved, you can expect around 20m.

The kit involves not only soldering but the loading of firmware onto chips and, of course, building the cable so it looks convincing enough. $40, plus possible jail time.

Product page [Keelog. Thanks, Andrew!]

Ok, ok, “she” isn’t really getting married, that would be illegal outside of Massachusetts. Besides, HRP-4C is already hitched, apparently, to her creator Kazuhito Yokoi who appeared at the Osaka fashion show dressed in a tuxedo. Looking wobbly, perplexed, and creepy as hell, HRP-4C bravely slipped on a helmet of taffeta and lace in what’s being called her first professional runway appearance. The crowd seemed to enjoy it until HRP-4C turned on them with her green lasers. Really, see for yourself in the unsettling video embedded after the break.

[Via Crave]

Continue reading Video: HRP-4C ‘fashion robot’ is getting married, won’t shut up about it

Filed under: Robots

Video: HRP-4C ‘fashion robot’ is getting married, won’t shut up about it originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jul 2009 02:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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