Wi-Fi-Blocking Wallpaper Protects Your Web Fortress by Keeping Neighbors Out

Scientists from the institut polytechnique Grenoble INP and the Centre Technique du Papier have developed a novel new product so gratuitous, it almost seems necessary: a silver-crystal coated wallpaper that can block neighbors from freeloading off your Wi-Fi network. The silver crystals are arranged in such a way that they are able to block certain wireless frequencies, not least of which is the same frequency as a WiFI router.

But, what about just setting up a password-protected network? I don't know. You most certainly can—and should—do that. But if, for whatever reason, an open network is what you desire, this silver snowflake-speckled wall-covering will have your back. Unless you have windows. They're still working on a clear coating with protective power equal to that of the paper.

Also, there will of course be somebody out there who will buy this, someone who both delights in a room covered floor-to-ceiling in metallic snowflakes and believes said remediation is superior to setting a password (which is free, mind you—this wallpaper, when it's released in 2013, will cost about as much as mid-grade conventional wallpaper). More here.

Hundreds Of Balloons Fall Victim to a Giant Laser

The laser in this video, not surprisingly, comes courteous of Wicked Lasers. Specifically, its 1W Spyder III Krypton which blasts through these specially weighted balloons like they were well: inflated balloons. But it's still fun to watch it tearing through 100 of them one after the other. And maybe next time they can fill the balloons with something more volatile than just air.

Your Chariot Awaits Your Snacks

Imagine loading this table up with snacks on the top shelf and beverages on the bottom, then rolling it out to your immaculately decorated modern living room for some serious hedonism—maybe a long movie marathon or a serious gaming session. Sure, there are lots of glorified TV trays that can do that. But few do it with the grace and sophistication of the Chariot table.

Designed by Italian designer Gam Fratesi for boutique Casamania, the Chariot's visual differentiation comes from its simplicity. There are few parts; the entire piece is comprised of acetate shelves, wooden wheels, and a metal handle to keep it together. But it's still visually striking: most food trolleys minimize the wheels, but this piece of furniture has wheels are comparable in diameter to your car's. It's available now, but the price is only by request. More here.

You Can Get Your Face Frozen In Carbonite Now

You no longer have to be a smuggler who drops his shipments at the first sign of an Imperial cruiser to be frozen in carbonite. As part of its Star Wars-themed weekends, Disney World is now offering that service to all of its guests.

But you don't have to worry about how you're going to get home afterwards because they don'treally freeze you in carbonite. Instead, when you enter the 'Carbon Freezing Chamber' several cameras capture your facial features from all sides, and the resulting 3D model is used to create an eight-inch carbonite figurine featuring your likeness.

At $100 it makes for one expensive souvenir, and it takes four weeks for it to be delivered. Which makes sense given how long it takes to print a 3D model, but having to wait is still pretty lame. You can also order additional copies, but they'll set you back $75 each. More here.

Ruin Your Kid’s Rep with This Nerdalicious Math Sweater

For the parents who have obviously forgotten that most children are borderline sociopaths when it comes to teasing one another, this sweater will pretty much guarantee your kid will be bully fodder until he graduates from high school—probably college.

The Seven/Eight Year Math Sweater is hand-knit of machine-washable wool and designed to fit the average 1st or 2nd grader. According to Etsy shop proprietor Amarinalevin HandKnits:

The main body of the sweater is a pattern of adding numbers in block shapes. There are also little x's in black. Circling the bottom in green on a dark blue background are Fibonacci numbers. Also circling the bottom and wrists in dark blue on periwinkle is the symbol pi. The back and front are identical. The sleeves have descending and ascending blocks with the prime numbers. Circling the wrists in green on a dark blue background are the various mathematical functions of add, subtract, multiply, and divide. The neck, wrist, and bottom trim is varying shades of green with blue stripes.

It retails for $130 on the amarinalevin Etsy page.

The Future of Grocery Bags Is Here and It Involves Pockets

They might be helping the environment, but with everything banging around in that large re-usable shopping bag, your fresh fruits and vegetables don't always get from the store to the stove unscathed.

Made with a strategic combination of cotton, canvas, and nylon mesh, the Mercado bag's got six interior pockets and three large compartments so you can separate softer delicate items like produce, from harder items like cans and bottles. It's probably also the perfect bag for the obsessively organized, since you can spend hours at the checkout resorting your groceries until you find the perfect arrangement to get everything home safely.

But the best feature of the $25 bag is the adjustable over-the-shoulder strap that lets you carry everything home while keeping your hands free to answer the phone or fumble with keys. Why do most re-usable bags assume that everyone only has to carry them from the driveway to the kitchen? More here.

Fuel Cell USB Charger Resurrects Your Dead Phone Up To Fourteen Times

Unlike backup batteries which have to occasionally be plugged into a wall for hours like your various devices, the fuel cell charger uses small cartridges—about the size of a cigarette lighter—filled with butane to generate power. Pricing for the charger hasn't been revealed just yet, but the replacement fuel cartridges are expected to sell for roughly the same price as a Starbucks coffee. Possibly forcing you to choose between your addictions: caffeine, or browsing Facebook.

Each cartridge is able to fully recharge a dead iPhone from ten to fourteen times, which helps make the cost of the replacements more reasonable when you break the down the per-charge price. The charger should particularly appeal to those who travel a lot, since the fuel cartridges are allowed on planes just like cigarette lighters. And a few dollars to recharge your phone again and again is a far better solution than scouring airport lounges looking for an available outlet. More here.

Is Telephobia Really a Thing?

It's no secret that people are talking on the phone less. We're texting, we're emailing, we're Gchatting, we're Facebooking. There have been many articles bemoaning the death of the phone call in recent months, and Nielsen said in a December report that voice calls have dropped by 12 percent since 2009, while text messaging has absolutely blown up.

With no dearth of mediums on which to communicate, our attentions are divided. But is it possible that we've developed an actual fear of talking on the phone?

Salon's Sarah Hepola argues that this so-called Telephobia is a very real thing.

It's just plain scary to talk to other people. We avoid it not because people don't matter—but because they do. And each of us brings emotional baggage to to these interactions. when my phone rings, and I don't recognize that number—forget it. I'm too scarred by the years I spent dodging credit card companies to take that kind of dare. I also don't jump off cliffs, or do cartwheels on the highway. In fact, it's amazing to me that there was a time when the phone rang, and someone just answered it. Who could it be? Could it be the guy who was currently making your heart pound? Oooh, let's pick it up and find out! Now, when I see an unfamiliar number, I feel nothing but outrage.

A good portion of that is, in fact, crazy talk. We are constantly inundated with information about other people. Pictures from their vacations, posts about their ailing grandmothers, rants about their horrible bosses. Sometimes you just want to flip off the noise. Are we over-saturated? Yes. But are we actually so scared of human contact that we can't stomach a phone call?

Telephobia is hogwash. The truth is, it's an excuse for the fact that communicating has gotten easier, and a by-product of that is we've gotten lazier. More here.

The Real Reason the Avengers Assembled Was To Help Back Up Your Files

In The Avengers movie, S.H.I.E.L.D. has a hell of a time assembling the superheroes to battle an alien army attacking the planet. But convincing them would have been far easier for Nick Fury had they all known that joining forces would have spawned these awesome flash drives.

Available in four different versions including Thor's hammer, Captain America's shield, Iron Man's helmet, and the Hulk's decapitated fist, the 8GB flash drives include retractable USB connectors and can be yours for $40 a pop. Sadly, both Hawkeye and Black Widow are once again left out of the party, proving that unless you've got super powers or billions of dollars, you're just too hard to market to the masses. Get them here.

11 Other Uses for Toothpaste

Besides keeping your teeth sparkly, toothpaste offers a wide range of cleaning, cosmetic—even healing abilities around the house. Just be sure to use the white pasty stuff, not gel. And for any of these tips that call for an actual toothbrush, just consider that tool off-limits for the mouth from here on out.

1. Perfume your palms

Cutting onions, cleaning fish, or handling garlic can leave a strong odor on your hands. Wash them with toothpaste to remove the smell.

2. Clean your Jewelry

Use a soft toothbrush with a tiny amount of toothpaste to brush dull metal jewelry, then rinse and polish it to a shine with a soft cloth. Soak seriously grungy metal in a cup of water with dissolved toothpaste. Don't use it to get a pearly white finish on actual pearls—toothpaste damages the surface.

3. Put paste on a damp sponge to wipe crayon off painted walls

4. Defog goggles

The mild abrasive in toothpaste is perfect for removing the crud that causes your sporty eyewear to fog up. As a preventative measure, just lightly rub toothpaste inside a diving mask, motorcycle goggles, or on a hockey helmet face guard. Wipe and rinse the surface clean. (Note: YMMV—toothpaste can remove special coatings like anti-glare treatments.)

5. Clear zits

Cover pimples with a dab of toothpaste before you hit the sack, then wash your face clean in the morning. This works for bug bites and bee stings too—just remove the stinger first. The paste will dry out and shrink your offending blemishes.

6. Do your nails

Toothpaste works on toenails and fingernails like it does on teeth. Clean your nails with a toothbrush and paste to make them strong and shiny.

7. De-funk a bottle

Wash baby bottles with toothpaste and a bottle scrubber, making sure to rinse them very well with water. The paste will get rid of that nauseating sour milk smell.

8. Remove soap scum

Rub a glass shower door with a damp sponge and a squirt of toothpaste. For heavy scum and soap stains, let the toothpaste sit on the door for several minutes before rinsing it off.

9. Polish chrome faucet fixtures

10. Hide drink rings

If you aren't fanatical about putting coasters under your drinks, then you probably have water rings on your wooden furniture. Rub them off with toothpaste and a soft cloth.

11. Remove stains

Scrub a carpet stain with toothpaste on an abrasive brush, then rinse with water. Tough stains require a couple of scrubbings. Toothpaste can also remove stains in cotton clothes, but it doesn't work for all types of fabric.

BlackBerry 10 Will Reportedly Include Screen Sharing

Now that RIM has shown a preview of BlackBerry 10, more rumors are surfacing about the updated OS.

The latest, from CrackBerry, claims that the platform will have a new screen sharing feature, which means you could show someone what's on your phone's display during a video call or while you're messaging. It's something you can already do on the desktop, as with Skype, for example, and it would be a very useful addition for mobile. Images of the OS also show that it will finally get a native Twitter app, something it desperately needs.

There are a few other tidbits that popped up on the forum, one being that the plug has been pulled on a 10-inch PlayBook. RIM has decided to focus its efforts on the existing 7-inch model. Additionally, a 4G version of the tablet should be released next month, as possibly well as updated Wi-Fi models, in order to support BBM.

And what about the first BlackBerry 10 phone? CrackBerry says it will be the BlackBerry Colt 2. The only problem is, there's no release date for the sleek new OS yet. More here.

Simple Paper Flashlight Folds As Flat As a Bookmark

LEDs are not only incredibly energy-efficient, but they're also small enough to be squeezed into the tiniest of gadgets. Or in the case of the Lite Lite, a simple piece of paper that folds into a working flashlight.

There is some assembly required, of course, but it's as simple as folding a piece of paper into a long square tube and slipping an elastic band around one end to hold it together. That's it. The$13 flashlight is powered by a single cell-sized battery which should actually keep it shining for a while, and turns on automatically whenever you grasp it. More here.

HTC Launches Kickstand-tastic One S Cases

Kickstand lovers rejoice! These come in four colors -- gray, granita (red), navy blue and black -- the latter featuring a tweaked design with an integrated kickstand. Unlike most third-party products, build quality is top-notch -- the accessories use a precision-molded flexible plastic shell covered in a soft touch finish. 

The kickstand is made of a metal alloy and is spring-loaded, but blocks access to the micro-USB port when in use. While the cases protect the back and sides of the One S, the front remains exposed to potential damage. Availability is slated as "soon", but pricing is $24.99 for the plain model and $39.99 for the kickstand version.  

Change the Shape of This Lamp With the Pull of a String

Overhead lighting is possibly the least flexible way to illuminate a room. Flip a switch, the bulb goes on, and light shines down. End of story. It you want to switch up the lighting for, say, a little more mood, you're out of luck. Unless you've chosen the impossibly clever Greta pendant lamp, which can throw light onto your ceiling with the pull of a drawstring.

Designed by Whatswhat, a trio of young designers who met at school, Greta began as a class project but is now a fully-realized piece which can add some personality to your living room. The 22-inch tall lamp comes in six colors and is priced like the attractive centerpiece it is. But some will find it worth it for the ability to see a room in a new light by pulling a string. More here.

Roll-Up Bottle Is Big

The Bübi Bottle may look like a normal plastic water container, but it's actually made from firm, yet supple, silicone. This means you can roll it up when you're done to save space, but we wouldn't suggest reaching for it in a bar brawl.

It's probably not going to help you win any fights, but it can certainly help you recover from one. The bottle's flexibility, combined with the insulating properties of silicone, means it can pull double duty as a hot water bottle for soothing your bruises. It's like getting two bottles for the price of one, or rather the price of two in this case seeing as it costs $30. More here.

Rovio Intros Angry Birds Facebook Share & Play

Granted it's not quite, you know, organ donation, but Rovio's offering up some Facebook magic of its own. The casual game maker has rolled out the Share & Play feature, which lets users embed their latest Angry Birds level onto their friends' Timelines for some slingshot-happy bragging rights. Sharing goes beyond just Facebook however -- you can embed the playable level on other sites as well.

PoP Video Peripheral Turns iPod Touches and iPhones Into Pico Projectors for $99

The PoP Video pairs up with iPod touches (3rd / 4th generation) and iPhones (4 / 4S) via Apple's proprietary 30-pin connector, essentially turning your device into an unorthodox pico projector. According to PoP's site, the 3.5 ounce peripheral's capable of 960 x 540 video output and can give you up to two hours of "playtime" on a single charge -- achieved by way of micro-USB. 

It all wouldn't be worth it without the free iOS app, though, which lets folks tinker with settings and do what it's intended to do: project videos, pics as well as browsing within Safari. The $99 PoP Video is up for pre-order now here.

Windows 8 Won’t Play DVDs as Standard

Microsoft has recently been dribbling out news of the media functionality of Windows 8, and little has been surprising. But here's something weird: unless you buy the Media Center version of the OS, Windows won't offer any native facility for DVD playback.

Of course, you'll be able to use a piece of free third-party software, like VLC, to watch a DVD. And to make it clear, we are only talking about video DVDs, not data DVDs. But, uh, it still seems like somewhat of a step back in time. So what gives?

The Windows developers justify the decision by explaining DVD use on computers is "in sharp decline", adding that it would have to spend "a significant amount in royalties" to offer support for optical media. Instead, online media is the focus for Windows 8: H.264, VC-1, MP4, AAC, WMA, MP3, those kinds of file types.

So, what seems like an odd decision is just a big money-saver for Microsoft. And it won't really affect end users, who can just download a piece of free software. But that doesn't stop it feeling plain weird.

Heat-Conducting Spoons Make Ice Cream Scooping Hassle-Free

There's nothing like a heaping serving of perfect, barely melted ice cream. But when you take the tub out of the freezer, it's so hard and cold, you have to use some serious elbow grease to force out a proper scoop .

You just can't wait, either. The good news is now, you don't have to. Japanese designer Naoki Terada has invented heat-conducting spoons that slice right through your rock solid ice cream, softening as it cuts through the frosty fare.

Tereada deserves some kind of medal for his innovative utensil, dubbed 15.0%, a reference to the Japanese regulation that requires ice cream to include 15 percent milk solids. With a wide handle, the spoon is designed with the shape of your hand in mind, in order to give you more power when you exert the brute force to required to extract your desert from the carton. More here.

Made out of aluminum, it comes in three styles specific to different flavor, each shaped for optimum bowl-scraping. The vanilla version has an egg-shaped tip, the chocolate model comes with an angular end, and the strawberry one is more like a spork. While the spoon is supposed to be sturdy enough to help you gorge on ice cream, you might not have the strength to resist.

Treasure Hunters Flock to California Searching For Pieces of Six-Billion-Year-Old Meteor

A stay-at-home mom was out walking her dog recently when she stumbled upon a weird, 17-gram rock. It turned out to be 4 to 6 billion years old. And from space. And it's worth $20,000. Is El Dorado County due for another gold rush?

Space rocks have been on the county's mind ever since a mini-van-sized meteorite exploded over it, creating a sonic boom. Tiny fragments of the rock—which predates the formation of the sun—were scattered all over the hills, setting off a red alert to fanatics of a certain stripe. the local CBS affiliate reports that thousands of geologists, scientists, and treasure hunters have descended upon the town from all over the world hoping to get their own piece of precious space rock. Brenda Salverson, the lucky local mom, isn't the first to find a chunk of the pie. At least one professional hunter found some fragments, and if people keep hitching their wagons for gold country—many other's will likely get lucky as well. More here.