News flash, guys: a 32-inch Digital Photo Frame is actually a really crappy HDTV with all the tuners and inputs pulled out of it. It is not a photo frame. Selling it as such is a way to use the products weaknesses as its selling point and to remove money from the wallets of the rich and stupid. Seriously, this thing costs more than many fully-functional HDTVs of the same size. Urge to kill… rising…
Yes, this OptiPix SP3200 32-inch HD "Digital Photo Frame" will set you back $840, which is more than many 32-inch HDTVs from brands such as Sony, Samsung, Sharp and Toshiba. And you can even watch video on it, albeit only when its loaded on from an SD card, making it the most tedious and annoying TV ever. But guys, it has a frame around it! A frame!
But hey, your grandparents like these things, right? Isn't that how you justify their existence? This is just the logical extreme of the complete ludicrousness of this entire genre of products. If you buy one of these things, you deserve to have your credit cards taken away from you for your own good. [Product Page via TFTS]
Virgin Mobile, the little MVNO that could, is introducing what it says is the lowest-priced unlimited nationwide calling plan on the block—$80 a month for "totally unlimited" calling, starting July 1. Unlimited text and messaging adds another $10, so the super duper unlimited plan will run you $90 all told. Hopefully they'll offer it to poor Helio customers if that deal goes through. Full detailage:
VIRGIN MOBILE USA TO INTRODUCE LOWEST-PRICED UNLIMITED NATIONWIDE CALLING WITH NO ROAMING OR LONG DISTANCE CHARGES, NO ACTIVATION FEES OR ANNUAL CONTRACTS
New "TOTALLY UNLIMITED" Calling for Just $79.99 Available July 1
With No Annual Contract or Credit Card Required
WARREN, N.J., June 24, 2008 – For many Americans these days, expenses seem a lot more "unlimited" than wireless phone offers. With the cost of gas, air travel and other items, it seems the sky is the limit for what we have to spend. That's why Virgin Mobile USA will unveil its new "Totally Unlimited" calling plan for $79.99 on July 1, the lowest priced and first unlimited nationwide calling plan without roaming charges or an annual contract that can be purchased by cash or credit.
"'Totally Unlimited' for 79.99 per month is simply a better value than postpaid plans offer," said Bob Stohrer, Chief Marketing Officer of Virgin Mobile USA. "It is simply not necessary to sign a two-year contract to get real worth with your wireless plan. This offer surpasses the regional carriers' unlimited calling plans as well, as most add on roaming charges that can cost customers as much as 79 cents per minute. With 'Totally Unlimited,' Virgin Mobile USA is providing consumers unlimited talk without all the limitations."
Consumers who opt for Virgin Mobile USA's new "Totally Unlimited" calling plan will be able to talk as much as they want each month across days, nights, weekdays and weekends. The Totally Unlimited plan – like all Virgin Mobile USA calling plans – will be available for purchase with cash using Top-Up cards, or with credit/debit for maximum convenience. For just $10.00 more per month, consumers can add Unlimited Text & Messaging, with texting, IM, email and picture messages. Initial information on "Totally Unlimited" is available now at http://web.virginmobileusa.com/unlimited. As of July 1, customers can get information in more than 40,000 retail outlets, at www.virginmobileusa.com, or by calling Customer Care at 888-322-1122.
The "Totally Unlimited" calling plan joins a range of new enhancements to Virgin Mobile USA's voice and messaging plans – both Pay As You Go and Monthly – that were unveiled this past March. Those new offers include a host of highly competitive Monthly and Pay As You Go plans without annual contracts, as well as new Top-Up card denominations and a range of Text & Messaging Packs including the $10 Unlimited Messaging offer that is available on all Monthly plans.
Virgin Mobile USA also offers a range of high-quality and affordable cell phones from leading manufacturers ranging from $19.99 to $99.99, including the new Flare and Slash, and the popular Wild Card. There is no additional charge for voicemail, call waiting or Virgin Mobile USA's award-winning customer service. The company has attractive international rates as well, such as calls for as low as five cents a minute to Mexico.
Virgin Mobile USA spells out for consumers exactly how its prepaid voice and text & messaging options stack up overall against other carriers with easy-to-understand comparison charts posted at http://web.virginmobileusa.com/about/why-choose-us.
The recent Sichuan Earthquake in China was so intense, tremors were felt all the way over in the tallest completed building in the world—the Taipei 101 building in Taiwan—a whole eight minutes after the quake originated. (The title of tallest building period was taken by the Burj Dubai back in May.) What's interesting about the 101 is that it has a gigantic suspended tuned mass damper, or hanging ball, which takes up four stories and works like this to prevent the building from falling over and tragically crushing office workers. This 730 ton sphere looks intimidating when still, but wait until you see it in motion during the earthquake.
The guy in the video keeps asking whether it's an earthquake, in case you were wondering.
Deputy Dog dug up this clip, which I then found via DVICE. It reminded me of my own visit to the Taipei 101 last year (see my photos in the gallery below). The ginormous ball, of which the Burj Dubai has nine, was installed on in-place from 41 discrete steel plates because the combined weight of 730 tons would have been too heavy to lift by crane. The people even came up with a nickname for it: the Damper Baby. Don't look at me. The best I could come up with is some combination of "stabilizer" and "testicle".
The architects were forced to install it because of high winds and the fact that the Taipei 101 is only 600 feet from a fault line. In order to get up to the observation floor where you can see the top of the ball, you have to ride in the world's fastest elevator. I actually might have my own video of my ride up somewhere, but it's possible that it was deleted shortly after the world's fastest elevator ride turned into the world's stinkiest elevator ride. I had a lot of good food.
One of the commenters on Deputy Dog wondered why there haven't been reports of people climbing over the barrier and trying to sit on it or swing it manually. To which another commenter responded, "perhaps it just says that the Chinese are able to restrain themselves from such boneheaded acts, while too many Brits just go crazy and can’t act with appropriate restraint." No, I don't think it's that, although Brits are pretty nutty. I think it's because nobody wants to be crushed to death by a 730 ton ball. [Deputy Dog via DVice]
While Asus has brought mini-notebooks to US shores, for the best stuff you've still got to import. The Kohjinsha SX Series is a 2.8lb laptop with a few interesting quirks. Powered by an Atom processor, the 8.9-inch Vista system can convert to tablet with the rotation of the convertible touchscreen. And to make sure you can teleconference in either mode, the system features two cameras to capture those dazzling whites. The 1GB of RAM will need a boost, but the 60GB hard drive, internal DVD writer and expandable multicard reader do a lot to make up for it (and if only we could take advantage of that 1seg tuner...). Buy it now for $1,199.00. [DFJ via jkkmobile]
While Asus has brought mini-notebooks to US shores, for the best stuff you've still got to import. The Kohjinsha SX Series is a 2.8lb laptop with a few interesting quirks. Powered by an Atom processor, the 8.9-inch Vista system can convert to tablet with the rotation of the convertible touchscreen. And to make sure you can teleconference in either mode, the system features two cameras to capture those dazzling whites. The 1GB of RAM will need a boost, but the 60GB hard drive, internal DVD writer and expandable multicard reader do a lot to make up for it (and if only we could take advantage of that 1seg tuner...). Buy it now for $1,199.00. [DFJ via jkkmobile]
With 12 megapixels of creamy goodness, Ricoh's GX200 is an upgrade of last year's GX100. The Smooth Imaging Engine III processing engine gives you better noise reduction, there's a 2.7-inch, 460,000-pixel HVGA LCD screen, an electronic level function for horizontal and vertical shooting, and 5fps continuous RAW mode. Cost in the UK is either $700 or $800, depending whether you get the VF-1 electronic viewfinder. Bonus pic and interminably long press release are below.
Ricoh GX200
The Ricoh GX200 compact digital camera for professionals is the 12 megapixel successor to last year’s GX100 model. Other significant improvements offered by the GX200 include better noise reduction thanks to the new Smooth Imaging Engine III processing engine, a larger 2.7-inch, 460,000 pixel HVGA LCD screen, 5fps continuous RAW mode and an electronic level function for horizontal and vertical shooting. It also offers the same 24-72mm zoom lens, 25mm thick body and removable tilting electronic view
A team of US and UK scientists have invented a portable scanner that may be useful in the hunt for life on Mars. And it sounds a whole lot like a Star Trek tricorder: it uses a beam of ultraviolet laser light and detects fluorescence from organic molecules, so it works remotely and doesn't damage samples. Under simulated-Mars conditions, they've used it to detect polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (found on comets, thought to be building-blocks of life) in masses as small as 1.5 micrograms. Plus they think the tech could be adapted to be rugged and fitted onto a future Mars rover. Just wait for the handheld version, and for an astronaut to start going "widdlywee..." as they stomp around Mars. [Eurekalert via IO9]
For most of us, the deciding factor against getting satellite radio are those pesky subscription costs. Now Sirius has just signed a deal with Automobili Lamborghini to offer the car customers free lifetime service of Sirius. One word of caution: The deal starts with the 2009 Murci
A brilliant use of old tech, the Tapehead Inspector is a manual tape reader not meant so much for playback of your favorite 80s power ballad mix, but for new music creation. Constructed by removing the tapehead from an old Walkman, it sounds quite a bit like a mixer as it runs over old tape and/or magnetized cards in your wallet. Oh, and it's stored in a giant cassette tape, which is more than a little fantastic. [Zero-Waste via MAKE]
Bow to Walter the Merciless, for he definitely influences the market and can decide if a product is worthy of living or not. At least according to "The Value of Quality: Stock Market Returns to Reviewed Quality of New Products", a new research paper that has analyzed Mossberg's product reviews and their effect on companies' valuations during a ten year period. The conclusion: he could make stock prices to tank or soar by as much as 10%. And that's without using his mental control powers.
The study, by Gerard J. Tellis—from the University of Southern California—and Joseph Johnson—from the University of Miami (well, hello there alma mater), points out that the average change in actual stock valuation is $200 million down (a 5% drop) for bad reviews and $500 million for good product reviews.
Abstract: Product quality is probably under-valued by firms because there is little consensus about appropriate measures and methods to research quality. We suggest that published ratings of a product's quality are a valid source of quality information with important strategic and financial impact. We test this thesis by an event analysis of abnormal returns to stock prices of firms whose new products are evaluated in the Wall Street Journal. Quality has a strong immediate effect on abnormal returns, which is substantially higher than that for other marketing events assessed in prior studies. Moreover, there are some important asymmetries in the effect. We discuss the research, managerial, investing, and policy implications.
When they say policy implications read "send russian mafia thugs to Walt's flat." [SSRN via Business Week]
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News flash, guys: a 32-inch Digital Photo Frame is actually a really crappy HDTV with all the tuners and inputs pulled out of it. It is not a photo frame. Selling it as such is a way to use the products weaknesses as its selling point and to remove money from the wallets of the rich and stupid. Seriously, this thing costs more than many fully-functional HDTVs of the same size. Urge to kill… rising…
Virgin Mobile, the little MVNO that could, is introducing what it says is the lowest-priced unlimited nationwide calling plan on the block—$80 a month for "totally unlimited" calling, starting July 1. Unlimited text and messaging adds another $10, so the super duper unlimited plan will run you $90 all told. Hopefully they'll offer it to poor Helio customers if 
The recent 
The architects were forced to install it because of high winds and the fact that the Taipei 101 is only 600 feet from a fault line. In order to get up to the observation floor where you can see the top of the ball, you have to ride in 
While Asus has brought mini-notebooks to US shores, for the best stuff you've still got to import. The Kohjinsha SX Series is a 2.8lb laptop with a few interesting quirks. Powered by an Atom processor, the 8.9-inch Vista system can convert to tablet with the rotation of the convertible touchscreen. And to make sure you can teleconference in either mode, the system features two cameras to capture those dazzling whites. The 1GB of RAM will need a boost, but the 60GB hard drive, internal DVD writer and expandable multicard reader do a lot to make up for it (and if only we could take advantage of that 1seg tuner...). Buy it now for $1,199.00. [
With 12 megapixels of creamy goodness, Ricoh's GX200 is an upgrade of last year's 
A team of US and UK scientists have invented a portable scanner that may be useful in the hunt for life on Mars. And it sounds a whole lot like a Star Trek tricorder: it uses a beam of ultraviolet laser light and detects fluorescence from organic molecules, so it works remotely and doesn't damage samples. Under simulated-Mars conditions, they've used it to detect polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (found on comets, thought to be building-blocks of life) in masses as small as 1.5 micrograms. Plus they think the tech could be adapted to be rugged and fitted onto a future Mars rover. Just wait for the handheld version, and for an astronaut to start going "widdlywee..." as they stomp around Mars. [
For most of us, the deciding factor against getting satellite radio are those pesky subscription costs. Now Sirius has just signed a deal with Automobili Lamborghini to offer the car customers free lifetime service of Sirius. One word of caution: The deal starts with the 2009 Murci
Bow to Walter the Merciless, for he definitely influences the market and can decide if a product is worthy of living or not. At least according to "The Value of Quality: Stock Market Returns to Reviewed Quality of New Products", a new research paper that has analyzed Mossberg's product reviews and their effect on companies' valuations during a ten year period. The conclusion: he could make stock prices to tank or soar by as much as 10%. And that's without using his mental control powers.