Sure, this video must be fake, but the sound is so clear I find hard to believe that it is inside a case. Then again, I find even harder to believe that any iPhone can survive this.

There's only one way to know the truth: Get your iPhone 3GS to the pool today, submerge for a few seconds, and tell us. Come on. You know you want to do it. Send me your test video to jesus@gizmodo.com.

For background info on what the image means, see this post on Valleywag about the plagiarism scandal around Wired editor Chris Anderson. Then this and this and this. For full sized image, hit up Boing Boing Gadgets.

NASA's Jeffery Hanley went to the US Human Spaceflght Plans committee in Washington to do a show and tell on Constellation, the space program that will take us to the Moon and Mars. He played this report on its state.

While there are some naysayers who claim that Orion, Ares I and V are not the best option to take us back into real space exploration, NASA thinks the contrary. The Right Stuff people says that only after three years they are already testing actual components, and they have all needed hardware and software in various stages of development.

I tend to believe the folks who took humans to the Moon in record time, only to be shut down just when the fun started. [Hyperbola]

Reposted in MJ's Memory: At first I thought my first was a cassette single of Bel Biv Devoe's Poison I bought from the Bergen Mall, but then I realized I had a record of Michael Jackson's Thriller at 5.

I was only a little bit older than when I confused my father's records for frisbees that would shatter when they hit the fireplace's brick mantle.

Soon after, I got my own Fisher Price record player—since I was not allowed to play with daddy's anymore— with an indestructible needle that would always collect lots of dust bunnies before I had to clean it up. It had a cover with a handle on it, making it portable. For some reason, it was brown. I'd played plenty of Disney records on it, like disco duck, but Thriller was my first piece of pop chart Americana. The album cover folded out and showed MJ coddling a baby tiger, and the songs were written in a pink-red cursive on the back. Epic was the record label, if I recall.

Quincy Jones helped produce it, and Michael Jackson's concept was to make every song on the record a hit. I suppose that's why it's the best selling album of all time, at its height selling over 1m records a week. They wrote 300 songs for the album, whittling the list down to the final set, with Billie Jean only just making the cut. (MJ liked it, Quincy thought not so highly of it.)

I'd listen to it over and over again, but saved the Thriller for when my brother Jonathan was around. We'd queue up the song, and quickly dart under a blanket, to protect us from the zombies we'd seen on MTV. We were genuinely scared of that song, even more scared then when that dude would pull the heart out of that guy's chest in Temple of Doom a few years later at my first movie. When actor Vincent Price's voice came on with the monologue, it was fun to tear the blanket off my brother, tucking it under my sides as he tried to get back inside before the imaginary undead cracked his bones in his teeth and drank his marrow. I laughed in accord with Vincent Price's cackling, little brother Jonathan, squealing, making an easy sacrifice to the lords of the dark.

Billie Jean was an early education that women would sometimes claim you were their children's father. And that sidewalks could be backlit.

And Beat It was the other song that was musically gripping but also fashionably inspirational.

Then, and in more recent decades.

It's just a shame the jacket's zipper pockets were totally just zippers, no pockets. Except one or two which were a mistake to put things in, because you'd lose stuff in the sea of XYZ.

[Michael Jackson's Official and Totally Not Embeddable YouTube Channel]

Listening Test: It's music tech week at Gizmodo.

Gawker is reporting that Michael Jackson has died. No, this is not gadgety, other than the fact that Thriller was my first album. OK, that's not gadgety either. [Gawker]

It turns out, even if you don't weigh in all the slightly confusing Windows 7 upgrade deals, Microsoft's latest OS is its least expensive to date, and a real bargain compared to Vista.

Looking at full (non-upgrade) pricing of consumer Windows editions really tells the story: When you compare sticker prices, you can see that most editions hovered around the $200 mark, with a rare spike found in the $260 Vista Home Premium. When you adjust for inflation, that fairly regular pricing becomes a downward cascade—except for that Vista price hike.

The pro versions of Windows, starting with NT, tell the same story. $320 across the board, with a dip when XP Pro followed quickly on the heels of Windows 2000. But when you calculate for inflation, it's just a smooth downward curve.

[Windows 7 Pricing: The Full Story; prices sourced from the following multiple or official locations: Washington Post, Businessweek, Microsoft, Cnet, Wired, Microsoft, CBROnline, Microsoft, Microsoft; inflation calculations made with Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI Calc - Special thanks to Don the Intern for doing a ton of research on this!]

This clever oven concept is flat, creating a closed-in space for baking by folding up sections of its surface.

The Oven Re-Constructed works as a normal cooktop, but when you want to back something, you can fold up its sections to create an oven sitting right on top of the surface. How exactly it works is not clear thanks to the standard vagaries of concept designs, but it's certainly an interesting take on an appliance that hasn't seen much innovation in a while.[a href="http://www.yankodesign.com/2009/06/24/the-oven-re-constructed/">Yanko Design via Ubergizmo]

Nerds of the world jump of happiness, for HP has brought the legendary HP 15C Scientific Calculator and the HP 12C Financial Calculator for the iPhone and iPod touch, complete with custom skins and programming.

What are these "calculators" I am talking about, you ask? Please, allow me to pull a Chris Anderson here:

The HP-15C was a high end scientific programmable. To the HP-34C's numerical integration and root solver the HP-15C added complex numbers and matrix calculations.

The HP-12C is HP's longest and best selling calculator. Though it has been followed by many newer models, with both more and less features this model continues to sell well. In fact an EduCALC catalog says of the HP 17BII (in bold type): "It's 15 times faster than the HP 12C, and displays more than 4 times as much information." And of the HP 19BII: "It's 15 times faster than the HP 12C, and displays more than 9 times as much information." In addition, both newer calculators can print via infrared to compact printers, have more memory, general purpose solvers, menus etc.*

Oh man, that was easy. Now the question is: Do you really want to spend $15 on a financial calculator or $30 in the scientific one? If you are asking that, probably you shouldn't buy it, but here is the answer: Yes, get the iPhone version because the actual financial calculator is $80 and the 15C doesn't even exist anymore—and newer models are more expensive. [HP 12C and HP 15C]

HP Announces Calculator Software for PCs, iPhone and iPod Touch

HP announced that some of its most popular calculators will be available as software applications on PCs, iPhones and iPod touch devices.

HP 12c and 12c Platinum software are exact replicas of the original calculators that millions of business professionals and students use. The software is built with the same algorithms and calculation sequences and has the identical layout and functions as the originals. The Platinum version of the industry-standard HP12c adds the choice of time-saving Reverse Polish notation or traditional algebraic data entry as well as convenient editing features such as "backspace" and "undo" keys.

Ideal for engineering professionals, teachers and science students and professionals who already use the HP 35s Scientific Calculator, the software version offers quick, accurate answers from the PC. The software offers the identical HP 35s calculator layout and functionality and provides quick results to scientific and engineering calculations. The software was developed by HP, recipient of the IEEE Milestone in Engineering for the original HP-35. The HP 35s software also offers more than one hundred built-in functions, HP Solve where the user can store an equation, then use it to solve for any variable and the ability to copy and paste calculations directly into financial documents.

Designed for business professionals and students, the software version of the HP 20b Business Consultant is identical to the calculator. It is designed to be a convenient tool for finance, business, and real estate functions. The large two-line display enables the user to view up to 12 digits and scroll through variables, detailed real-text labels, menus and worksheets, and prompts as well as copy and paste answers into other documents.

The HP 15C application, designed for iPhone and iPod touch, replicates the original calculator's layout, functions, algorithms and calculation sequences. Used by college students and career people alike, the programmable HP 15C was revolutionary when it was introduced in the 1980s. Like the hardware version, the software application provides an array of matrix calculations plus complex functions and a Solve key that finds the root of an equation.

Pricing and availability

The HP 35s application for iPhone and iPod touch is available on the iTunes App Store. Software for the HP 20b and 15C is available at www.hp.com/buy/calculators. Software versions of the HP 12c and 12c Platinum are available on both sites. Most of the software is available now on the iTunes App Store and through HP at prices starting at $9.99.(1) The 12c Platinum solution is expected to be available in late summer.

About HP
HP, the world's largest technology company, simplifies the technology experience for consumers and businesses with a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure. More information about HP (NYSE: HPQ) is available at http://www.hp.com/.

* All this from HP museum site.

There's something terribly wrong and at the same time impossibly charming about these Ketchup Charlie and Mustard Marvin spread heads. They are even better on video:

For $4 each, the Peter Pan in me can't resist the urge to buy. And squeeze. [Perpetual Kid and Perpetual Kid via Walyou]

Nokia's E72 is just like the E71, but improved in lots of little ways: Same solid feel, but with tweaks like a less crowded d-pad that's an optical trackpad too. Now if Nokia can just sell it for $99 too.