February 3, 2011
Magic smoke (also called factory smoke or blue smoke) is a tongue in cheek reference to smoke produced by malfunctioning electronic circuits. Smoke is frequently observed to come out of electronic components when overheated. According to the joke, manufacturers put a portion of magic smoke into every electronic component, and the device functions normally so long as the smoke does not escape.
The origins of the magic smoke have become a running joke that started among electrical engineers and technicians before it was more recently adopted by computer programmers. The actual origin of blue smoke is the black plastic epoxy material that is used to package most common semiconductor devices such as transistors and integrated circuits, which produces a bluish colored smoke during combustion.
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February 3, 2011
Bang snaps are a type of small novelty firework sold as a trick noisemaker. They consist of a small amount of gravel or coarse sand impregnated with a minute quantity (~.08 milligrams) of silver fulminate high explosive and twisted in a cigarette paper to produce a shape resembling a teardrop with a tail. When stepped on, ignited, or thrown on a hard surface, the friction-sensitive silver fulminate detonates, producing a sharp salute similar to that of a cap gun. Despite producing a legitimate (albeit tiny) high-explosive detonation, the extremely high mass ratio of gravel to explosive acts as a buffer to ensure that the devices produce only the audible ‘crack’ of the supersonic shock wave.
They are incapable of producing physical damage, even if discharged directly against skin, and the detonation frequently fails to even break the thin paper holding the ingredients. The explosion is also too weak to propel the gravel any distance, which usually falls to the ground. This makes them safe for use as a children’s toy, for which purpose they have been widely sold across the world since the 1950s. Currently the only US jurisdiction which restricts the use and sale of bang snaps is the state of New Jersey, which bans all forms of consumer pyrotechnics including sparklers. Other states impose the same age restrictions on purchasing bang snaps as that of permitted fireworks, usually 17 or 18.
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February 3, 2011
Poken is a device that utilizes a proprietary Near Field Communication (NFC) technology to allow the exchange of online social networking data between two keychain accessories. The primary information exchanged via the poken is a ‘social business card,’ a digital replacement for a physical business card. By touching two devices together, a unique ID is exchanged that links to contact information on the Poken website. Users of the Poken website can use a ‘social dashboard’ to manage, and interact with their contacts.
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February 2, 2011
Quorn is the leading brand of mycoprotein food product in the UK and Ireland. The mycoprotein is extracted from a fungus, Fusarium venenatum, which is grown in large vats. Quorn is produced as both a cooking ingredient and a range of ready meals. It is sold (largely in Europe, but also in other parts of the world) as a health food and an alternative to meat, especially for vegetarians. As it uses egg white as a binder, it is not a vegan food.
During production, it is textured, giving it some of the grained character of meat, and pressed either into a mince resembling ground beef; forms resembling chicken breasts, meatballs, and turkey roasts; or chunks resembling diced chicken breast. In these forms, Quorn has a varying color and a mild flavour resembling the imitated meat product, and is suitable for use as a replacement for meat in many dishes, such as stews and casseroles. The final Quorn product is high in protein and dietary fibre and is low in saturated fat and salt. It contains less dietary iron than do most meats.
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February 2, 2011
Near field communication or NFC, is a short-range high frequency wireless communication technology which enables the exchange of data between devices over about a 10 centimeters (3.9 in) distance. The technology combines the interface of a smartcard and a reader into a single device. An NFC device can communicate with both existing smartcards and readers, as well as with other NFC devices, and is thereby compatible with existing contactless infrastructure already in use for public transportation and payment. NFC is primarily aimed at usage in mobile phones.
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February 2, 2011
Keepon is a small yellow robot designed to study social development by interacting with children. It was developed at the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) in Kyoto, Japan. Keepon has four motors, a rubber skin, two cameras in its eyes, and a microphone in its nose.
Its simple appearance and behavior are intended to help children, even those with developmental disorders such as autism, to understand its attentive and emotive actions. The robot, usually under the control of a teleoperator, has interacted with children in schools and remedial centers for developmental disorders since 2003. Keepon is currently available for purchase at $30,000, though a price drop is speculated after simpler mechanisms are developed.
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February 1, 2011
Ronald Jenkees is an American composer and musician best known for his YouTube keyboard performances. He has released two independent albums: the self-titled Ronald Jenkees (2007), and Disorganized Fun (2009).
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January 29, 2011
Lifeloggers wear cameras and recording devices in order to capture their entire lives, or large portions of their lives. The first person to capture continuous physiological data together with live first-person video from a wearable camera, was computer scientist Steve Mann in 1994. Mann continuously transmitted his everyday life 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to his website for the world to watch.
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January 29, 2011
The Metaverse is our collective online shared space, created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical reality and physically persistent virtual space, including the sum of all virtual worlds, augmented reality, and the internet. The term was coined in Neal Stephenson’s 1992 science fiction novel Snow Crash, where humans, as avatars, interact with each other and software agents, in a three-dimensional space that uses the metaphor of the real world. Stephenson coined the term to describe a virtual reality-based successor to the Internet.
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January 29, 2011
A water pipe percolator a sub chamber within the shaft of a water pipe (or other smoking instrument) that provides smoke-water interaction via heat exchange and dissolution. Percolators come in different forms, such as dome, pedestal, tree, and double helix. Depending upon the form of the percolator, it may or may not be diffused. However, the primary purpose of the percolator is to act as an extra chamber to filter smoke through water. As diffusers can mostly be found on male downstems, the only percolator that diffuses smoke is the tree percolator.
A diffuser works by utilizing a pressure differential between its bottom and top in/outlets. Reduced pressure at the outlet end is usually provided by the users lungs. The fluid at the inlet (i.e.: a smoke, vapor, and air mixture) is directed to the bottom of a column of water, where the pressure differential causes the inlet fluid to pass through the water in small pockets (liquid bubbles), and then rise to the outlet. In short, diffusers make smoke cooler, and rise evenly through the pipe, due to the water bubbles hitting the surface simultaneously.
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January 28, 2011
FiveFingers are a type of shoe manufactured by Vibram. Originally developed as a ‘barefoot alternative’ for sailing and climbing, the footwear has thin, flexible soles that are contoured to the shape of the human foot, including visible individual sections for the toes. Vibram FiveFingers are meant to replicate being barefoot and allow for the natural biomechanics of the foot to work.
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January 28, 2011
The Heineken WOBO (World Bottle) was a beer bottle designed for use as a building material in the developing world. According to the company, when brewing magnate Alfred Heineken was in Curaçao in 1960 he saw many bottles littering the beach because the island had no economic means of returning them to bottling plants. He was also concerned with the lack of affordable building materials and the inadequate living conditions plaguing Curaçao’s lower-class. Envisioning a solution for these problems, he asked Dutch architect N. John Habraken to design what he called ‘a brick that holds beer.’
The bottle was designed to be interlocking, laid horizontally and bonded with cement mortar with a silicon additive. A 10 ft (3.0 m) x 10 ft (3.0 m) shack would take approximately 1,000 bottles to build. In 1963, 100,000 WOBO’s were produced in two sizes, 350 and 500 mm. This size difference was necessary in order to bond the bottles when building a wall, in the same way as a half brick is necessary when building with bricks. Unfortunately, most of them were destroyed, and they are now very rare and have become a collector’s item.
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