Hasta La Gadget!

Disembodied robots or “bots” or bodiless ghostly algorithms that haunt the Internet. Often bots spend their time spamming emails and comment sections with the newest deals on erection medicine. But bots can also be used for non-boner related content. Namely, Nigel Leck’s Twitterbot (@AI_AGW), which scours the twitterverse for echos of climate change denialism and automatically sends out rebukes to the offending tweeter.

Every five minutes the bot searches for tweets relating to climate change denialism, and will respond to the tweeters from a database of hundreds of rebuttals with links to videos or further info.

Forget the non-existent Twitter advertising, this is the future of spreading your ideas. The technology is simple enough to create that organization will be able to bombard you with responses based on certain words or phrases you use. Perhaps Twitter is really on top of what could be considered spam, but I’m surprised there hasn’t been more of this–for commercial, activist, or trolling purposes.

But how long will that really last?

via Discover

Last week we mentioned that a new line of Marshall-branded headphones are on the way, promising the full, loud, rock experience that you expect when you see a concert where the stage is surrounded by massive Marshall amps. If shoving your head against the amp isn’t enough for you, now you can shove the amp into your head with The Minor, a companion set of earphones that will be released at the same time as the headphones, feature an amp-like design complete with exterior knobs, and also carry the Marshall name.

The Minor are EarClick earphones, meaning they have an attachment on them that’s designed to “click” into place when you mount the earphones onto your ears. EarClick promises a better fit than traditional earbuds that have to be jammed deep into your ears to stay put or have wrap-around plastic that gets annoying to wear over long periods. The press release didn’t include pricing, but did say that the Marshall Headphones line – including The Minor – will be available worldwide on November 15th.

Dude. Those headphones are totally rad. Do the kids still talk that way on the slopes? If so, you could hear that in reference to a new line of headphones and earbuds designed by a group of seven pro-snowboarding friends — one of who is Olympic medal-winning Scott Lago. The hip-looking earphones range in price from $29.95 for earbuds, to $59.95 for headphones.

These earphones are rugged, and have been tested by the Frends crew for durability. According to Frends, “We test our gear on the mountain, at the party, in the Jacuzzi, in the mean streets–we make sure that by the time you get a product from Frends, it’s perfect. We don’t want to look like chumps, so we’ve made sure our products are legit. Nothing’s worse than when a friend lets you down, and here at Frends–that just doesn’t happen.”

Nothing is worse than when a friend lets you down. How true. Frends headphones come in four different styles, and in a variety of designs for each style. The Classic, and the Alli are both headphones, though the Classic covers more of the ear (see photo above). The Coupe, and the Clip are earbuds. Every Frends headphones feature the brand’s custom mic, which works as a play/pause feature in addition; and a fabric cord, which alleviates the frustrating cord-tangle problem that so many of us have suffered from.

Frends believes in using earth-friendly materials. “Using recycled corrugated cardboard and biodegradable plastic helps to satisfy our tree-hugging inner neo-hippy souls,” the group said on its site.

You can check out Wearefrends.com to find stores that sell Frends headphones. You can also buy them online at Zumiez.com. [Via Thrillist]

Wednesdays. Horrible horrible Wednesdays. The everyday horrors of the workweek are upon us, and the brief respite of the weekend seems an insurmountable world away.

Thankfully, we have the internet!

Some people like to virtually escape work by stalking friends on Facebook. Others pass the time harassing celebrities on Twitter. And still others read recaps of the TV shows they watched the night before so that some anonymous blogger can validate their opinions on the minutia of character development on Gossip Girl.

As for me? I like to watch water balloons exploding in slow motion on YouTube. There’s just something unworldly about water–especially when you slow it down to 1,000 fps. Water’s crazy. You just have to pay really really close attention.

Happy Humpday.

Magic is after the jump.