Hasta La Gadget!

If Howard Hughes hadn’t shuffled off this Earth in a pair of tissue-box shoes 33 years ago, this is doubtless the keyboard the notorious OCD sufferer would be using.

It is, according to the maker Vioguard, the world’s first self-sanitizing keyboard. Rather than wait for you filthy shaved monkeys to get around to cleaning it, the keyboard automatically retracts into its own motorized home and is therein bathed in glorious, cleansing UV light, which will kill a satisfying 99% of germs (although it will do nothing for the cookie-crumbs languishing inside).

How much is this wonderful, sanitary machine? A mere $900, which will pay itself back in un-bought hand-sanitizer in just a few thousand years.

Product page [Vioguard via SlipperyBrick]

Take a peek at the new TwitterPeek, an always-on, always connected Twitter machine. It comes from the folks that make the Peek and Peek Pronto, two bare-bones email-only handsets that can be bought and used without monthly contracts.

The TwitterPeek stays with the simple approach, and does nothing but send, receive and search Twitter posts. It doesn’t do SMS, and it doesn’t even do email. At first we thought this was a joke, but the Amazon listing looks real enough and a quick visit to the Peek discussion forums shows this request from the company: “As usual we have a couple things cooking in the Peek oven. We’re looking for Peeksters that use Twitter a lot.”

The package will cost $200, and that includes a lifetime of Tweeting — you’ll never pay for your connectivity. We expect that we’ll start to see more and more devices with “free” internet connections over cell networks, where the seller does a deal with the telcos to provide low-bandwidth hook-ups. It has worked for the Kindle, so maybe we’ll get the long promised internet-connected Toaster after all. One which burns a Tweet into your breakfast slice.

The picture, by the way, is from Peter Hu’s (of Time and CrunchGear) Twitter feed. We’re running this instead of the regular product shot because a) it is ironically appropriate and b) there’s a huge WIRED logo on the front of the box.

Product page [Amazon via Peter Hu’s Twitter]

See Also:

• Peek Now Available in Cheap Packs of Five
• Peek Leak: Pronto Email Device is Twice as Fast
• Official: Peek Pushes Pronto with Unlimited Texting
• Peek Could Kill Subscription Fees For Its Email Device
• Review: Peek Device Delivers Peak Email Performance And Not Much …

The much-rumored inPulse – a wristwatch accessory for the Blackberry – has materialized. Now, instead of rudely checking your Blackberry every few minutes during meetings, you can instead glance at your watch, an age-old gesture of boredom guaranteed to offend everyone, young and old.

The quite lovely-looking inPulse connects to a Blackberry via Bluetooth and can either alert you to the full barrage of your very important email or can be set to filter it. These alerts are then displayed on the 1.3-inch OLED screen, and you are notified of their presence by the vibrator inside, and the whole watch, when fully charged (via microUSB), should last for around four days.

Pretty much anything that can be pushed to the Blackberry can be pushed those few inches further to your wrist. This includes RSS feeds, weather reports, SMS messages and the Twitter, guaranteeing that you can remain blissfully distracted during your next trial-by-PowerPoint. You’ll still have to pull out your crackberry to reply, but at least now you’ll know which messages to respond to.

The inPulse will be available in a limited first run “very soon” for a reasonable $150.

Product page [Allerta. Thanks, Eric!]

If you bike a lot, and especially if you bike a lot away from home or city, you need to carry a tool-kit. Luckily, you can repair any fairly modern bike with a toolkit small enough to fit into a tool-roll, saddle bag or even a repurposed pencil-case.

I have put together the perfect kit (for me, at least) over the last few months as I spend more time out on the road, but the one thing I could not find was a 15mm box-wrench small enough to fit in the bag. Finally I caved and ordered a Surly Jethro Tule from the UK. It cost too much, but it has the great advantage of incorporating a beer-bottle opener Here’s the kit:

You see the Jethro Tule (a great name, by the way), a Topeak multi-tool, a tiny Wrench Force mini-pump (which works very well, considering the size), a patch-kit in a section of inner-tube and a spare section of chain (five half-links). It all lives inside a Brooks D-Shaped Tool Bag, which comes in two parts meaning you can quickly remove the inner, zippered section from the seat.

With this kit I can fix pretty much anything short of the headset or bottom-bracket, including chain repair. The Jethro Tule is one of many 15mm wrenches aimed at fixed-gear riders. They are all distinguished by a high price and a beer-opener. But does it work? The short answer is yes, but there is a problem.

The wrench is short. If you have tightened your wheel nuts with a longer spanner you’ll have some trouble getting enough leverage to remove them. It can be done though: The tapered box means the handle points out, away from the wheel, and the large flipper-like plate is big enough to kick with a heel, just like you do with a car wheel. It’s not pretty, but it gets the job done, and the box itself is deep enough that it holds on tight to the nut.

The Jethro Tule won’t replace a standard-sized box wrench at home, but on the road, it works great. And did I mention it opens beer? Around $30.

Product page [Surly]

Almost unnoticed amongst Apple’s product updates yesterday was a new infra red remote control, a sleek new aluminum number which replaces the plastic one that has been around for the last few years.

As with many Apple accessories, the remote started off as a bundled extra with all consumer Macs, and then one by one the Macs started to ship without it. If you bought one of the first few generations of iPod, which came with a dock, FireWire and USB cables and a case, this will be familiar to you.

Still, the little remote is certainly very useful, although overpriced at $20. It lets you control Front Row, the Apple TV, iTunes, many third-party apps (the excellent and free VLC media player, for one) and even an iPod in a dock. I use mine (in my house they seem to multiply like USB cables) to control iTunes podcast playback while I’m cooking or getting oily hands while fixing my bike.

The new remote is smaller, of course – and amazingly for an Apple device – actually has more buttons. The play button has been moved from the centre to join the “menu” button below the main circle. It is backwards compatible with any Apple device with an IR port (introduced in 2005), and you can’t get it for free. If only Apple would fix the software so iTunes doesn’t “overhear” the commands when it’s in the background and you actually are trying to pause, say, a movie.

Product page [Apple]