Where Are All The Girls On Google+?

According to information from Google+ stat trackers SocialStatistics and FindPeopleOnPlus, the new social network is dominated by men.

 And it's not even close — up to 86.8% of all Google+ users are male. This distribution is much different from Facebook which has a 50/50 split of male and female users.

Even Batman Would Be Jealous of This Turbine-Powered Batmobile

The helicopter engine was originally used by the US Navy but has now been repurposed for this Batmobile. It packs 365hp and uses its jet thrust to "internally propel turbine blades that spin an output shaft after going through a planetary reduction gearbox". 

The Batmobile seats two in the cockpit where an iPad is set on its dashboard for no other reason than to have an iPad in a Batmobile dashboard. I'm sure Michael Keaton would even be impressed at how awesome this Batmobile replica is. 

 

 

These Retro Headphones Are Perfect for Any Era

IDEA International, the design shop, teamed up with one of Japan's oldest audio companies, Ashidavox, to create a pair of cans that look like they're from the 1970's. Or 60's. Or 50's. Whatever! They look as timeless as ever.

These IDEA x Ashidavox Dyanmic Headphones are obviously inspired (if not, directly related to) by the Ashidavox ST-90. The minimal retro design is the same but the headphone's internals have been reworked and rejigged around to provide better sound and comfort. The headphones can deliver a frequency range of 25-18,000Hz and use a special urethane material on its ear cups for more comfortable listening with the price of $140.

 

 

Bread In a Can

Mmm. Bread. Delicious (well, somewhat) canned bread. In Japan, canned bread is a tasty treat for otaku. Among the t-shirts and hug pillows being offered at an upcoming event for Xbox 360 gameDream Club, there are cans of bread. The cans feature characters from the virtual hostess game.

If you've never had Japanese canned bread, there is a novelty factor. Hey, bread in a can! But with so many delicious bakeries in the country, there's the simple question of why anyone would want it. Sure, you can carry it around, chuck it in your backpack. What canned bread does allow is the commodification of popular games or anime in way that bread wrapped in plastic bags does not. Slap an illustrated label on a can of bread, and bam, you've got Dream Club canned bread. Magic! It's much more striking than, say, Pokémon bread.

Canned bread is not a Japanese innovation. It's been available in New England for decades—B& M Brown Bread is a camping and emergency food stash stable. Boston brown bread was born out of necessity. Colonists baked bread from the resources they had, and since not all settlers had ovens, they cooked the bread in cans.

Magnetic Carabiners are the Next Big Thing

Black Diamond is developing carabiners that use magnetic power to lock themselves as opposed to the traditional twistlocks and screwlocks.

The Magnetron carabiner is supposed to be easier to unlock than traditional systems but still provide the same safety. Here's how it works:

• Magnetic attraction to a steel insert in the carabiner nose keeps two independent arms securely locked
• Locking arms must be individually depressed before the gate can be opened
• Once open, opposing magnetic fields repel the arms to ensure smooth and reliable gate operati

Ideally, it'll be a lot easier to use than the old method and can let people focus on scaling a cliff rather than screwing and unscrewing a carabiner. Sadly, the Magnetron carabiner won't be released until 2012. Guess my keys will have to wait.

Google+ Now Lets You Keep Your Gender Private

Google listened, and now lets you make your gender private in Google+. It also uses gender-neutral language—"they" as opposed to "him" or "her"—to make things simpler. Well done!

 

 

This Harry Potter Crop Circle Maze Definitely Wasn’t Created By Aliens

Neither aliens nor goblins had a hand in creating this "maize maze" near York, England—the farmer "Top Pearsy" (that's a name, yes) owned up and said he merely wanted to mark the ending of the Harry Potter moviethon.

Thank god he didn't carve the four Sex and the City women's likenesses in his corn fields.

 

 

Samsung NC215S Snetbook Delayed, Won't See Sunlight Until August

There was reported that Samsung's solar NC215S netbook was up for pre-order and now it's been delayed. Despite earlier estimates of a July 3rd US shipping date.

The solar-powered laptop won't make it to consumers until sometime in mid to late August, due to hold ups involving the machine's custom panels. They are hoping this doesn't spoil anyone's plans to journey out of the house this summer.

Klipsch’s Headphones Keep On Noise-Cancelling For 45 Long Hours

They can be used as normal stereo headphones should the battery run out of juice.

Coated in leather and with a 40mm woofer and 15mm tweeters inside, Klipsch's Mode cans haven't been priced yet but will be on sale sometime this Fall.

 

 

Bowers & Wilkins C5 iPhone Headset Oozes Luxury Into Your Ear Canals For $180

Crafted mostly from aluminum, its bullet-shaped earbuds look like a posh blend of the Zeppelin Air and Mini geared for mobile. The 'buds are iDevice compatible with an inline remote / mic to get a handle on phone calls or swap though playlists, and have a few unique features to boot. To ensure a proper fit on-the-move, you'll find Secure Loops that can be adjusted to hug the inner cartilage of your ear, along with added heft (Tungsten Weighting) near the inner-ear side for a tight seal. Internally, there's a Micro Porous Filter to widen the perceived soundstage, while also preventing any leakage to folks around you.

 

 

Why Google+? Your Parents Can’t Find You There

Presenting the next logical step in the "Google+ is good because it isn't Facebook" argument: you're much less in danger of constant parental surveillance. For now, anyway. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Acer's C110 Pico Projectors Aim to Please, Travel Well

The  DLP-powered beamer gets all the juice it needs via USB, measures just 110- x 85- 25mm and offers up a WVGA (854 x 480) native resolution. The LED bulb is said to last up to 20,000 hours, and it'll go from dead to dazzling in five seconds flat. 

Complete with an optional external battery good for two hours, a 1,000:1 contrast ratio and an identical WVGA resolution. This guy is to hit UK shops at the end of the month, with prices set at £199.

 

 

Steve Jobs Impersonator Officiates Mock Keynote

Well, there's clearly no better way to legitimize any new product than to have a faux Steve Jobs hawking it on-stage, in front of dozens of applauding mock journalists, with a 20-foot iPad 2 projected behind. The Jobs / John Stamos hybrid dropped by to pitch a Taiwanese company's vast selection of tea, of all things, for a TV advertisement that's apparently currently airing in Taiwan.

 Decked out in light jeans, a black mock turtleneck and sneakers, the impersonator even matched Steve's hair color, rimless glasses, and current weight. The only thing missing was an actual Apple product -- and months of media speculation. The "keynote" even ended with "one more thing," as they often do: Tea drinkers will have a shot at winning a bonafide iPad 2 with each purchase of oolong, milk, or Apple-infused Tong Yi Cha.

Pioneer's SE-CL331 Earbuds are Just Begging to Be Washed

The first-ever earbuds designed to be drenched they aren't, but they just might be one of the first to actually be "washable." Sure enough, Pioneer's new SE-CL331 headphones ($59.99) -- available in white, pink and bright blue hues -- can reportedly be "soaked and washed after every sports session without damaging sensitive electronic equipment." 

Furthermore, they boast a newfangled ear holder that keeps 'em in place while your body's in motion, and there's a two-layer mesh and rubber ring that'll prevent water from seeping in while submerged up to one meter of goop. The built-in 9mm drivers probably won't live up to Westone standards, but then again, you can't exactly take your ES5s into the kiddie pool.

 

 

Zuckerberg Is the #1 Most Popular Person! (On Google+)

Mark Zuckerberg is so rich and incredible that he's not only running the universe's most beloved social network, but is the most beloved person on Google+—his competition! What a guy. He's even beating Google's own CEO.

According to Google+ stat-tracking site SocialStatistics, Zuck's topping out the Google+ popularity contest with over 29,000 followers. Google CEO Larry Page is a distant second with almost 20,000, and everyone he works with has to follow him, or else they get thrown into the giant Google people-masher that powers their data centers. So, that's pretty sad right? Furthermore, isn't 29,000 a pretty paltry number?

 

 

Concrete Speakers Sound Solid

Concrete isn't usually associated with elegance and beauty but Israeli designer Shmuel Linski wants to change that. His "Exposed" concrete speakers are the latest in a series of high-end concrete product concepts.

It is worth pointing out that concrete is an awful medium for making traditional speakers. Its stiffness distorts any sound it comes in contact with. That's why most speakers tend to be made of wood or plastic which can vibrate with the sound waves.

 Linski embraced this "problem" by selecting special Horn drivers which work with the material rather than against it. The sound is channeled from the Horns through the hollowed out body and out the bottom, resulting in what he refers to as "a sense of nirvana for concrete lovers and audiophiles."

Twitter and Flickr Light Up the Planet

People love visualizing internet usage, mostly because it's very pretty. But photographer and NYT tech editor Eric Fischer's outdone himself with perhaps the prettiest one of all, mesmerizingly mapping Flickr and Twitter use across the dark surface of the Earth.

The data from North America is pretty surprising! Twitter use is heaviest on in the Southeast and Eastern Seaboard, with much less action on the typically tech-heavy west coast. The central states are, unsurprisingly, something of a dead zone.

The rest of the world is mostly dark—according to this visualization, Twitter and Flickr are almost entirely an activity of the Western World. Oh, and New Zealand. Which loves Flickr.

 

 

Western Digital's My Book Studio Jumps to 3TB

Hard to say how long WD's going to keep its My Book line. Thy just announced a gently refreshed version of its My Book Studio, now available in capacities reaching 3TB and sporting a flashy new exterior that should blend right into your Mac Pro + Cinema Display setup.

These new models are equipped with a brushed aluminum casing and rely on Western Digital's Caviar Green HDDs to handle the ints and outs. You'll also find FireWire 800, FireWire 400 and USB 2.0 interfaces, meaning that Thunderbolt aficionados should probably be turning their nose up right about now. The new guys are available with pricing set at $149.99 (1TB), $199.99 (2TB) and $249.99 (3TB).

Someday You Could Say Goodbye To Sunburn Pain

You learn very quickly that most over the counter medicines only mask the agonizing pain of a sunburn for a short time. Medicines can't remove this terrible discomfort, because, until now, scientists didn't what caused it.

In a significant discovery, researchers from Kings College London may have identified one protein responsible for this searing pain. Called CXCL5, it shows up in large quantities in the sunburned skin of human and mice test subjects.

When the researchers injected this protein back into the mice, it caused a level of pain similar to the original burn. The team then added an antibody that neutralizes CXCL5 and the pain went away. This discovery is not a panacea for those who fall asleep while worshipping the sun, but it could lead to the development of medicines that block, not just dull the pain of a sunburn.

Surgeons Perform the World’s First Synthetic Organ Transplant

For the first time in history, a patient has been implanted with a synthetic windpipe that was created using the patient's stem cells and a replica of his original windpipe. It's amazing even though it kinda looks like PVC piping

It's the future of medical science: there's no donor needed and no depressingly long wait times. Scientists from London created the replica using 3D scans of the 36-year-old patient. The material was made from polymers with a spongy and flexible texture with stiff rings around the tube to recreate a more human-like trachea. They coated and soaked the trachea model in a solution of stem cell's taken from the patient's bone marrow and after two days, the patient's own tissues had grown to cover replica. 

According to the Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, a professor at the Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm that performed the surgery, said the "stem cells from the own patient were growing inside and outside. This structure was becoming a living structure." It's been a month since the surgery and the patient's body has accepted the synthetic organ and he should be released soon. The doctors hope that it can lead to more artificial organs for future transplants. Not cloning!

 

 

US Army Bans Toe Shoes for Looking So Damn Goofy

FiveFingers running shoes and the rest of the quasi-barefoot movement are a pretty zealous bunch—they wear a pretty polarizing shoe. But the debate is now quashed in the military, with an official ban. Why? They look too silly.

According to an official Army memo, FiveFingers and any similar shoes "that feature five separate, individual compartments for the toes" are banished from military footsies on the grounds that they "detract from a professional military image."

 

 

Acer Starts Rolling out Android 3.1 Update For The Iconia Tab A500

Acer has started pushing out an update for its Iconia Tab A500 that will upgrade the 10-inch slate to Android 3.1. The update actually leaked late last month, but would have required folks to take the risk of flashing their tablets.

 

 

The Zilch Is as Minimal as a Sport Sandal Can Get Away

The Zilch by Teva is a sport sandal for minimalists, and it lives up to its name. With a thin footbed and highly flexible design, you'll want them mostly for casual hiking and camping. Plus you can fold them away at a whim.

Don't expect to do anything too out of the ordinary in these, though. They're just a step above walking barefoot, even if they're more than your average flip-flop. $80. You can find them here: GearJunkie

iPad Makes up One Percent of Global Web Browsing

This is surely the sort of thing Apple likes to see -- it might not be the prettiest graph in the world, but it certainly drives home the fairly consistent growth of the iPad's global web browsing share. Back in April of last year, the company's "magical" tablet had nabbed 0.03 percent of global web traffic in its first week.

The decimal point has moved a couple of places, according to NetMarketShare, with the device now making up more than one percent of worldwide web browsing. That number is even higher in the US, at 2.1 percent, with the iPhone and Android devices pulling in 2.9 and 2.6 percent, respectively. As for Apple's share of tablet traffic -- well, there's not a heck of a lot to report on that front.

Nokia 700 'Zeta' Gets Classy

The Nokia 700 "Zeta," with the 1GHz, Symbian Belle opting for a white front and chrome back instead of the black and candy-apple combo. This could mean that, like many Nokia handsets before it, a rainbow of various hues will be available to choose from the moment the device launches.

Veho Bluetooth Headphones Gumball Edition

Veho's entry into the reasonably saturated market sits just above the pricing sweet spot at $110, but it does sport some nice features like touch controls on the side for manipulating your iDevice or smart phone, and a mic for use as a hands-free headset.

The lithium-ion battery inside can keep these folding over-ear phones pumping out Springsteen bootlegs and Joell Ortiz mixtapes (gotta cover all your bases, right?) for up to ten hours. And, if all black isn't you're thing, the Gumball 3000 edition adds some bright orange flair.

Corsair's Speedy, Flaming red Force GT SSD

These bad boys also promise up to 85,000 random write IOPS and are rated for impressive read / write speeds of 550 MBps and 525 MBps -- a shade higher than the specs being bandied-about when Corsair showed it off back in March. The drive also supports SATA 3, is backward-compatible with SATA 2, and ships with a 3.5-inch adapter that'll work with both desktops and laptops. Look for it this month in two sizes: 60GB ($149) and 120GB ($279).

 

 

Toshiba Reveals the Qosmio F750 Glasses-Free 3D Laptop

Toshiba just unveiled what it claims is the world's first glasses-free 3D laptop, the Qosmio F750. It's a heavy-set beast dedicated to gaming and movies, with a 15.6-inch Full HD lenticular screen that can display 2D and 3D simultaneously in separate windows.

 It also rocks an HD webcam that follows your movements and adjusts the 3D effect accordingly, so you can peek at the that lovely third dimension from almost any angle you like. Innovative stuff indeed, but how well does it all stack up? As for pricing and release, the laptop would be on the shelves in early August, with a price of £1300 ($2100).

 

 

Soda Now Comes in Convenient Foam Spray-Can Form

Look at this young man! Look at how happy he is! The can, which retails for about $2.50 US, might remind you something of a Cheez Whiz container. 

That's fine, we should all be thinking about Cheez Whiz as much as possible. But the real breakthrough, the one I'd like to see in my lifetime, is a foam soda that's Cheez Whiz-flavored. That's the grail, science. Seek it. 

 

 

Facebook Will Launch Video Chat Powered by Skype?

Microsoft's $8.5 billion acquisition of Skype hasn't closed yet, but it looks like Redmond is already working behind the scenes to make the service even more ubiquitous. According to an anonymous source interviewed by TechCrunch, Facebook is going to introduce video chat next week, and that service will be powered by none other than Skype. And while the service will be browser-based, it's also said to include a desktop component. 

What's more, Facebook sent out invites for an event next week, where Mark Zuckerberg was clear the outfit would unveil a new product from its Seattle team. That's in Microsoft's backyard, of course, the invites themselves have chat icons on 'em, and, most tellingly, that Seattle office has been snapping up engineers specializing in desktop software. 

 

 

Samsung's Galaxy S II Becomes Company's Quickest Selling Phone: Three Million in 55 Days

Samsung sold three million of its original Galaxy S phone in 85 days. A few months later, a full ten million had been moved. Now, it looks as if the superphone's proper successor may put that latter statistic to shame. The outfit just announced that it took but 55 days to move three million Galaxy S II handsets, which works out to one phone every 1.5 seconds.

It's Sammy's briskest-selling smartphone ever, and if it'll keep up the pace once that AT&T variant lands on US soil. Which iscoming soon, right Samsung?

Droid 3 Leaks Reveal Manual, Confirm July 7th and 14th Release Dates

The oft-leaked Motorola Droid 3 is dripping information yet again, this time over on Droid-Life where an internal flyer confirms it will be available at retail locations July 14th, with direct fulfillment orders starting a week earlier. Iis a confirmed price for Verizon's QWERTY slider w/ 1080p camera and dual core processor.

 

 

GSM Turns 20 today

Happy birthday, dear Global System for Mobile Communications! 20 years ago today, on July 1 1991, the world's first GSM call was made by Finnish Prime Minister Harri Holkeri. The historic call used Nokia gear on GSM's original 900MHz band. Today GSM is all grown up and ruling the world -- connecting 1.5 billion people in 212 countries and serving 80% of the planet's mobile market.

It was the first fully digital cellular system using TDMA to cram more information into less spectrum and provide better sounding, more reliable calls using less power. It introduced the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM), the idea of switching handsets at will (something carriers have sought to subvert by locking phones), and the reality of international roaming.

Short Messaging Service (SMS) was first launched on GSM networks, along with packet data (GPRS and later EDGE), which made internet access practical on mobile devices. Eventually, GSM expanded to the 400, 800, 1800 and 1900MHz bands and evolved into WDCMA-based UMTS (3G) and later HSPA and HSPA+, followed byLTE (4G) networks.

So next time you're at the coffee shop sipping on that latte while uploading that video to YouTube at 10Mbps using your LTE phone, remember to be thankful for that first GSM call 20 years ago -- that's when the mobile revolution really started.

Where to Get the Best Fireworks in America

If you're really into fireworks, maybe you should move your butt to any square state. But whatever you do, don't move to New York, New Jersey, Delaware or Massachusetts. They have a total ban. The awesomerest state is South Carolina.

There they have prohibited any small rockets less than 3 inches long and half an inch thick. That's right: They have a ban on ridiculously sized fireworks.

The nation's capital is, ironically, the lamest when it comes to celebrate the 4th of July. It doesn't have a total ban, but look at their description: Prohibited products include, but are not limited to, "firecrackers of any kind of description. Any fireworks that explode [...] or intended to move after the piece is placed and fires."

 

 

Windows Phone Marketplace is Growing

It's not just Apple's App Store striding past milestones today, Microsoft's Windows Phone Marketplace has also rounded a notable marker in its development. Specifically, it's now reported to have passed 25,000 apps by one site tracking comings and goings within it, though that figure's up for debate as the other WP7 apps tracker still lists the total at just under 25k.

 The main point is that the WP7 ecosystem is growing, and faster than previously at that -- it took until the end of March to accrue 11,500 apps, a span of five months from its launch, whereas the last 13.5k have come in the brisker period of three months. Provided this acceleration continues, and there's no reason to expect it'll slow down with Mango on the horizon, Microsoft's mobile OS reboot promises to be in pretty competitive shape in time for its first anniversary.

Samsung Galaxy Z: Galaxy S II's 'Affordable Little Brother'

Been lusting after the Galaxy S II, but aren't willing to break the bank? Apparently Samsung does too. Billed as a more affordable spawn from its Korean progenitor. The Gingerbread-toting handset will sport a 4.2-inch Super Clear LCD, 1GHz dual core processor (rumored to be Tegra 2), and 8GB of onboard storage, extensible with microSD.

Fret not camera junkies, also present is a 5 megapixel sensor plus flash and "HD" video recording. All that stands between you and this little Galaxy, are 4,000 kronor (about $630) and your undying love of Swedish meatballs.

 

 

Hanako 2 Robot Acts Like a Human Dental Patient, Makes us Say 'aah'

No, she's not in a state of shock, nor is she hunting for plankton -- she's simply waiting for the dentist to polish her pearly whites, just like any other conscientious robot. Known as the Showa Hanako 2, this humanoid was originally developed last year as a tool for dentists looking to practice new procedures. 

Now, engineers at Japan's Showa University have updated their dental denizen, adding a motorized head and replacing her PVC skin with a more realistic silicon coating. She also boasts speech recognition capabilities and can execute freakishly natural movements, including blinking, sneezing, coughing and, under more unsavory circumstances, even choking. 

 

 

An App That Pretends Your iPhone Is Dead

Don't you hate it when your friends with Android phones loaded with games asks to borrow your iPhone to play something? Then they bleed the battery dry and you feel like a used tool. Crappy!

Play Dead is an app that fakes like your iPhone is dead with a loop of the shutdown screen. That way the next time your friend asks to borrow your iPhone, you just fire up the app, flash the screen and say sorry dude, phone's dead. Get it here.

 

 

Samsung Galaxy S II Gets Official for Canada

Bell and Virgin Mobile -- neither of then are confirming a price at the moment -- plus regional carrier SaskTel, which plans to offer the phone for $79.99 on a three-year contract. SaskTel and Virgin Mobile both also say that the phone will be available in the coming weeks, while Bell isn't offering much more than a chance to win the phone in a contest that ends July 19th -- it was previously heard that the phone will be hitting Bell on July 14th. Perhaps not surprisingly, it's looking like the phone will also alternatively be known as the "Galaxy S II" or "Galaxy S II 4G" depending on the carrier.

 

 

HTC Status for AT&T Announced on Facebook

The HTC Status (formerly known as the ChaChaCha, the ChaCha, and "the Facebook phone that's not a Facebook phone") is inching ever closer to its AT&T debut. Now it's been revealed for all the world to see, appropriately enough, on Facebook.

This social networking-focused, QWERTY candybar has had its CPU bumped up to 800MHz -- price and availability are still as much of a mystery as ever. 

 

 

Delkin Intros 64GB SDXC Card

Months after taking a victory lap to flaunt the world's fastest SDHC card, Delkin is back, this time with a superlatively speedy SDXC. The 64GB Elite633 card promises read and write speeds of 95 MBps and 45 MBps, respectively -- that compares with 95MBps and 80MBps for the company's 32GB SDHC.

With a price of $539.99, of course, it wasn't exactly intended for those of you who are too lazy to dump some 17,000-odd photos onto a hard drive. Rather, it'll come in handy for the enthusiast crowd, especially folks with a penchant for high-def and 3D video. As for the rest of you casual shooters, we're quite partial to a game we like to call, "How much camera could I get for that $540?"

Angry Birds Lands on Windows Phone 7

Nowadays, you can't really claim to have a mobile OS worthy of the title if your users can't run Angry Birds on it. Good news from Microsoft, then, as Windows Phone 7 can finally be admitted at the grown-up table now that it has released its port of Rovio's epic bird-launching experience. $2.99 is the Marketplace price for the full version, though there's also the option to try out the first few levels for free.

 Because, you know, there might still be people out there who haven't yet been exposed to the charms of this perniciously addictive little game.

 

Google Launches all Out Social Networking Assault With Google+

Social networking has long been Google's white whale. The company has done plenty of dabbling in the space, snatching up Orkut, which has failed to catch on in the US, and rolling out Buzz to the relative indifference of its massive user base. Announced today after seemingly endless leaks, Google+ represents a major push for the software giant. The service began showing itself to a smattering of users last night, as a black bar across the top of various of the company's properties. A "+You" button on the far left of the bar currently brings you to the service's landing page, offering a tour of the many features that fall under the Google+ umbrella.  

Among the sub-services is Circles, which lets users divide up which of their friends / followers can see which content, assuring that only your "Epic Bros" and not your boss sees what you were up to at last night's bachelor party. Hangouts, meanwhile, offers up multi-person video chat with members of your Circle. Sparks is a customized feed aggregator of content you curate from across the web -- remember when RSS feeds were a thing? This is kind of like that.

There's also, not surprisingly, a mobile element to the service. Huddle offers up group messaging, largely targeted at arranging real-world meetups for those times you actually want to, you know, socialize with humans in the flesh. The Instant Upload feature makes it easy to transfer photos to private albums in the cloud. Google+ is still in a limited trial mode and has a few "rough edges," according to the company.

Tag Heuer Outs $6,700 Link Phone for Those Who Like Alligator Skin With Their Froyo

As far as most of us are concerned, if we're going to pay a lot for a phone -- you know, like, $350 on contract -- it had better come with the works. We're talking a qHD display, dual-core processor, 8 megapixel camera with 1080p recording, NFC, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, and a 4G radio, to boot. If you're someone who buys things made by Tag Heuer, you've got different priorities. The company just introduced the Link Phone, a darling clunker of a handset festooned with steel, 18K rose gold, or titanium, topped off with leather, alligator- and lizard-skin, rubber, and diamond accents -- a medley that'll set you back no less than €4,700 ($6,712). 

What's that you say? You want specs? The Link, named after the Swiss outfit's storied watch line, runs Android 2.2 -- a clear step up from its feature phone predecessor. Other ho-hum features include the 3.5-inch (800 x 480) display, 5 megapixel autofocus camera, 256MB internal memory, an 8GB memory card, 1400 mAh battery, and EDGE / HSUPA connectivity.

 

 

LG's DM50D HDTV / Monitor Promotes a Passive 3D lifestyle

LG is talking up its forthcoming DM50D 3D monitor -- not a lot, mind you, but just enough to get people interested. It has "Flicker Free" capabilities borrowed from its Cinema 3D TV line, and double the brightness of conventional 3D sets. The display has a built-in DTV turner, HDMI capabilities for connecting with 3D-capable consoles and the like, and the ability to view images and videos directly from a USB flash drive. It'll be hitting Europe in July, with more of the world getting a crack at it later.

 

 

Acer's AC700 Chromebook Coming to the US This Month for $350

Samsung's Series 5 Chromebook too expensive? Fear not, Acer just announced that its Chromebook, dubbed the AC700, will go on sale in the states this month for $349.99, to be followed by a 3G-equipped version later this summer.

If you're part of the niche market that would happily live in Chrome OS in exchange for instant-on access, be advised that it runs on an Atom N570 processor and 2GB of RAM, and has 16GB of flash storage, a 1.3 megapixel webcam, two USB 2.0 ports, and a 4-in-1 memory card reader.

MasterCard App Bringing Mobile Payments to iOS, Android and BlackBerry

Shortly after MasterCard announced plans to become entangled with Google Wallet, it looks as if the company is diving into yet another mobile payment arena. And this time, it's personal. MasterCard and CSI Enterprises already offer a smattering of customized business cards for those with highly specific needs, and soon that partnership will extend to iOS, Android and BlackBerry OS.

The CSI Virtual MasterCard app is currently scheduled to launch in July, presumably enabling folks with a GlobalVCard to use their mobile device of choice to make payments. What's interesting here is the inclusion of RIM and iOS; there's no BlackBerry device (nor iOS device) on the market today with NFC, which leads to one of two things: that's either changing by July, or this here service won't rely on NFC at all.

iOS 5 Beta 2 Blocks Gevey SIM Unlock

It's only been a few days since Apple released iOS 5 beta 2, but developers spent some quality time with the update and uncovered a few of its more salient features. Here are some highlights.

• It looks like Apple has blocked Applenberry's Gevey SIM software, which allowed users to unlock devices running iOS 4.3 or iOS 5 beta 1 without having to jailbreak.  
• According to Dev Team member MuscleNerd, iOS 5 beta 2 can still be jailbroken using the RedSn0w 0.9.8b1 tethering tool, released earlier this month.  
• The beta refresh also brings a few tweaks to iOS 5's notifications system. Traditional alerts and reminders now pop up on the lock screen in larger typeface, alongside their appropriate icon. If left unattended, the notifications will eventually be added to the Android-like banner menu, at the top of the lock screen.  
• Users can now create and curate photo albums directly from their iDevices.
• The next beta release might be issued over the air. When a tipster checked for updates on an iPad running beta 2, he received a "No updates were found" message, suggesting that users may be able to find future refreshes without syncing their devices with iTunes.

 

 

Nokia's N950 With a 12-megapixel Camera Lurking Within

Friends over at the FCC have somehow both scored and already torn asunder Nokia's new flagship MeeGo development phone. Slicing and dicing Espoo's latest confirms the watered-down N9 spec with a 12-megapixel camera. 

An intriguing addition, as the N950's official specs list an 8-megapixel shooter, which the Finnish firm touted as "different" than the unit in its brother. Perhaps different means the additional 4-megapixels we spotted earlier this year? 

3D Printer Harnesses the Sun to Transform Egyptian Sand Into Glass

After starting off with what looks like a jaunt through the dunes of Tatooine, this3D printer uses the immense power of the sun to turn sand into glass.

The 3D printer, called the Solar Sinter, was conceived of by Kayser to create shapes from the vast nothingness of the Sahara Desert, specifically the portion that runs through Egypt.