Archive for May, 2008

10 Lamps I Want In My House

Alien Abduction Lamp

“the alien abduction lamp is something new, unique and original for the lamp industry, a really good alternative to the old boring lamps. some of you might already want to purchase this lamp, but this lamp is still in the concept stage. i know that this lamp is awesome, but we’ll have to wait until lasse klein (the designer) will produce this lamp.”

Trojan Arc Lamp

“troja arc lamp recieved the design-report special mention award 2007, according to his designer hansandfranz. hansandfranz was founded in 2006 and is situated in munich, germany. there, designers konstantin landuris and horst wittmann, born 1979 and 1980 in munich, work on solutions for objects and spaces. the troja arc lamp is a really big lamp, than can provide a high quality light for a very large space. the design is simple and modern, but if you want this lamp you’ll need some space, because she is quite big as you can see.”

Paperclip Lamp

“the paperclip lamp is a really innovative lamp designed by ben collette and david wykes. they decided to make a lamp with a really unusual shape, a paperclip. So they made a big stylish paperclip that is used as a lamp. the paperclip lamp is notonly bendable, it’s posable as well. until now this lamp is just a prototype for now, as the designers are seeking manufacturing partners.”

Pipe Lamp

“professor fzz’s has created a lamp, inspired by the look of a steam engine water level tube (much like the one on the back of a fire engine). professor fzz really does have a way with steampunk themed light sources, it must be said, and an ingenius use of all those shiny connectors and pipe bits that I so frequently see in my local diy warehouse, but cannot think of an excuse to let me buy.”

Retro Lamp

“these insanely gorgeous retro creations, created by frank buchwald. i’m guessing the cost of there is close to $10,000, and i’d probably still try to buy one, and my kid wouldn’t go to college. “

Zebra Lamp

looks like the stripes of a zebra. when the light is on.. on your wall you will see some stripes, from the empty space in between each line.

Gravity Lamp

“front has a concept design for a new lamp called the gravity that goes totally soft when you’re not in the room and then when you walk in automatically wakes up, gets upright, and starts illuminating your world”

Solar Lamp

“dutch designer damian o’sullivan, has found a way to bring sunlight indoors with his solar lampion. the ingenuous lamp is composed of 36 standard-sized solar cells that collect sunlight during the day, and then shine at night.”

Helium Balloon Lamp

“the light source consists of 35 ultra strong diodes hanging on a helium balloon, with adjustable floating height. available in two models, one with cord and one limited edition powered by rechargeable batteries. it’s available in white or metallic. the batteries for the limited edition lasts for about 42 hours and the recharging of the batteries take 8 hours. after filling the balloon with helium it will last 2-3 weeks, after that it needs refilling.”

Mario Mushroom Lamp

“the mushroom lamp is a glowing feat of technology. but it’s not the power efficient led’s that will stretch the life of the 4aa battery power supply that has us impressed. it’s the lawsuit-avoiding tech of unlicensed merchandise. clearly reminiscent of the mushrooms floating around in nintendo’s famous mario bros. franchise, buyer beware.”

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

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My Setup

My current setup right now is a 13 inch white Macbook (with 2 gigabytes of RAM). This is the computer which I do my day-to-day browsing on the web. It is extremely portable, and for what I’m using it for, the Macbook Pro, wouldn’t benefit me at all.

Sitting beside that is my 19 inch Dell monitor, which I basically use for reading blogs. I have rotated it 90 degrees, so I get extra screen real estate. I rotate it back to normal when I game. Lately I have been playing some old Warcraft (online).

Hooked up to that monitor is a Dell XPS (XP installed), with some pretty good specs. (I think the WSJ reported that they killed the XPS, oh well)

Also connected to that monitor is a old PC which I found lying around in my basement. I added a bit of RAM and new graphics card to it. I then installed the latest release of Ubuntu (Hardy Haron). The fan is really loud, so at night, I just shut it down. I find the UI to be very well done, the simplicity and ease of use is just mind blowing. I would have to say that it is better than XP but not quite as good as a Leopard.

Overall, I think my setup is complete. Although I was thinking of getting a Mac Mini, which I would watch (and store) my music and movies. Yes, I know, a lot of computers!

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This week’s note-worthy stories – May 9th

Stories

17 minutes and 4.4 seconds. (1 and a half minutes is around my longest) That’s how long David Blaine held his breathe for. Putting him into the Guiness Book of World Recolds, for longest amount of time under water. He broke this record on the The Oprah Winfrey Show, on April 30.

David Roberson, general manager of Hewlett-Packard’s StorageWorks division, predicts that by 2013 the storage industry will be shipping a yottabyte (a billion gigabytes) of storage capacity annually

World’s tallest Lego tower. Made from 500,000 bricks and stands 100 feet tall

Comic

Penny Arcade made this comic in response to EA saying they are going to put Internet-required DRM on new games. Click on the link above for the full view of the comic.

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Bloggers and Blogs I admire

Bloggers

Michael Mistretta. He is a really passionate blogger talking about technology and life in general. Just recently launched a podcast called Discovr.

Chris Thompson. He really does a great job at going in-depth into new technologies and applications.

Glenn Wolsey. He blogs about tech. Just two weeks ago he launched a site called Desktop Vibes. He has really grown to have a huge voice on the web.

Leo Babauta. Zenhabits has grown into a huge blog over the years. Leo blogs about productivity, simplicity, and basically how to live a happy life.

Jeff Atwood. “Programming and human factors” Yep, that pretty much sums him up. He also has a site called Fake Plastic Rock, which talks about Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

Tina Su. She really tries to help us think simple. Enjoying the little things in life!

Blogs

Slashdot. It has been around for a long time, but Slashdot really does serve my geeky needs.

Techdirt. Covers a wide rage of technology. Going into detail about different issues.

Engadget. This is an obvious one. Ryan Block really does a great job at managing a blog.

Neatorama. Alex covers some really neat stuff he finds on the web.

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What makes social news so addictive?

What makes us keep logging back on? And submitting and voting on stories?

The community

You really get to know the community on these sites. When you start adding people as your friend, you will start to vote and take note of their interests. If you vote for their stories they might start voting for yours. But in the end you have to enjoy the content you are voting for. (Yes, I do)

You then start to get to know these people better through Email and IM. You get to know that they are real people, with real lives ;) . What I’m saying is that you really get attached to the community and their story submissions.

The competition

Social news is sort of a competition (in a way.) To see how many of your stories you can get popular. And sometimes you get mad when that certain story, you thought was interesting and cool, didn’t make the front page. But when stories do make front page you feel a sense of joy, knowing that X amount of people have enjoyed that submission.

I remember when my first story on Digg reached the front page. It was a while ago, but I do remember it. I literally felt this feeling inside that was so great, that I literally wanted to scream. Haha. Nowadays, I find it a lot easier to make front page, because: I know what the community wants to read about, I know what sites are a go and a no go, And, I have built relationships with other users, who vote for my stories.

Way better than a newspaper

It has been way easier for me to just log on to a social media site, and see the day’s news. And as a plus it is totally free. I don’t see the newspaper dying anytime soon, at all. All I’m saying is that social news is gaining momentum, fast. Like I said in my previous post, I have never picked up a newspaper in the last year, and I don’t intend on doing so anytime soon.

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