Alright, we’ve seen a ton of devices that let you power multiple USB hookups, and they are all pretty convenient. But never have we seen anything as good-looking as the Converge Rest and Recharge by Quirky—one that we can finally picture sitting on our desk without looking out of place.
As your devices sit on the Converge and charge up, it won’t take up too much room, as it measures about 12.2” long and 4” high. It includes 4 USB ports in the back, and then an attractive rest for your devices to sit without the mess of cords with the “Stash” cable management system. The devices will charge from an external power source ranging from 110v to 240v.
Looking at all of the devices Quirky offers, the manufacturer lives up to its eccentric name. Who knew there was actually a way to operate your touch screen device even while wearing wool gloves, or a really super easy way to groom your broom?
A lot’s going on this coming Sunday, the solar eclipse, and a really exciting deal from Microsoft giving you a free XBOX 360 when you purchase a PC. Of course, the two have nothing to do with each other, but we think the alignment’s geometry is working in the favor of students. Plus, who doesn’t appreciate a game session here and there in between all those time-consuming assignments?
Microsoft has offered this deal once before in the past. If you purchase a PC at Best Buy, Dell.com, HPDirect.com, Microsoft Stores, or NewEgg.com worth more than $699, you get a 4GB XBOX 360 free starting May 20. Canadian students can also take advantage of a similar deal, purchasing a $599 PC or more starting May 18th.
If you’re in the market for a new PC, it’s not a bad time to buy, especially with Windows 8 coming up in the very near future (rumors are saying that there could be an upgrade program as soon as next month).
Alright, so when we saw that Facebook had this huge IPO (the largest ever in history), we all thought we were going to become millionaires. OK not really. But we thought that maybe we could bank a bit off of the social network’s stock.
Wrong. For two reasons: 1) there’s a huge line of shareholders and investors (see above image) that helped Facebook in the very beginning that get first priority 2) Those said investors usually overtake 90% of the shares before Mr. Joe Schmo can even think about investing. Bummer, major bummer.
So what about later? Well, good question. It might be good to invest in the future, but as everything goes in the stock market, it’s all about timing and how much you’re willing to invest. Will buying one $38 share guarantee you’ll come out with a thousand bucks? Possibly, but it’s not likely. You also have to consider: will Facebook continue to grow, or will it become obsolete in the next 10 years (think: MySpace)?
So basically, the wealthiest will continue to bank riches off their million dollar investments (Ahem…Bono), while the rest of us continue to Facebook the days away and advertisers steal all of our information, which is really unfair when all is said and done.
(via Gizmodo)
Facebook will officially go public tomorrow. Now hurry! Everyone get in line to buy Facebook stock!
Shares started off at $38 today, according to Market Watch. Given the high price of the IPO—making it the largest in history—not a bad way to start off, already ahead of the major established tech giants such as Amazon and HP.
Trading under the name FB, the company is selling 180 million shares, with another 241.2 million on the way from early shareholders such as Zuckerberg himself and early bankers.
Demand for Facebook shares were of plenty, which is no surprise. But don’t forget, though, while all of this news is exciting, the fact we can actually invest in our favorite social network, your private information is still at stake, on and offline. But the good news is there is a giant tax bill that comes with the IPO, which will be good for the economy in the end (especially in California).
Crazy to think that all of this happened in a Harvard dorm room, and Zuckerberg being a college dropout, was able to come this far (props to you, Mark Zuckerberg).
(via The Wall Street Journal; photo via Fox Business)
If you’ve ever been to a really big museum, you’d know those audio tours aren’t always as contemporary as our tech savvy minds are accustom to. And like those museums, the Wikipedia town is adopting that very same technique, except using advanced technology able to be detected by smartphones to promote an interactive learning experience in the Wikipedia town of Monmouthpedia.
You might be thinking, Wikipedia town? What does that even mean? The town is about 1/25 the size of Wales, and is located in the Welsh area of Monmouth. The goal of the Monmouthpedia project was to build a comprehensive database of articles to create a virtual tour using QR codes.
Back in January the organization behind the project said “The amount, detail, and quality of the information that the community could create is staggering [.] [...] Monmouth may well be first place in the world to offer its tourist information in over 250 languages.”
In and around the town one will find over 1,000 QR codes—on metal plaques, on building relics—all put up with permission by the council. Some of the notable locations include The Methodist Church and the Savoy Theatre.
The Wikipedia town is only a chunk of how Wikipedia is becoming embedded into daily life. Last year at the Wikimania conference in Haifa, Israel, there was talks of developing Wikipedia software to 3rd world countries for the knowledge that “isn’t always Googleable.”
If the Monmouthpedia project sounds like something you want to participate in, locals are being invited to suggest and write content, donate photographs, and recommend good reference materials.
(via The Verge; photo via Computer Active)
Who knew Bono got down in Silicon Valley? The U2 lead singer and a few partners—Roger McNamee from Silverlake Partners and Apple board member Fred Anderson to name a couple— started Elevation Partners, which owns 1.5% of Facebook. The guys got together back in 2004 in hopes to “help media and entertainment business develop and market content.”
Despite popular belief that Bono is “the worst investor in America” due to a $460 million investment in Palm, which was later acquired by HP and Elevation only received 1.5%, this is a huge 180.
Initially Bono entered the Silicon Valley world via Facebook’s COO Sheryl Sandburg. Bono assisted her in Facebook’s aid initiatives in Africa, then in 2010 Elevation Partners invested in Facebook, a rough $270 million. And now that the IPO is about to take place, Bono’s involvement will make him the richest rock star in the world (yes, taking Paul McCartney’s longstanding #1 spot).
(via The New York Times; photo via Wikipedia)
It freaked us out a little bit to know that there was a way for scientists to develop a skin that was able to actually “feel” with the “heartbeat” gel, but a robot that can actually possess a human soul? Russian scientists have decided to take on the challenge of creating a conceptual mind-transfer android, and no, we’re not talking about the Google kind. This technology would house a computer rig capable of acting like a “personal proxy,” aka a place to “upload” souls, so you know, robots can actually feel things.
Alright, alright, now before you get too worked up about the insanity of this concept, the actual technology is too far off for it to work right now, but by the year 2045 “A New Era for Humanity” might be leading the way in the technological revolution.
If you’re still in awe like we were when we first read about such a ridiculous-sounding thing, here’s the video for a more in-depth look at how the Russians plan on crafting this soul-possessing, eerily human-like robot.
Is there ever a real need to implant anything into your body, aside from medical use? We’re not sure, but this guy Dave Hurban implanted magnets inside of his wrists all by himself, just so he could wear his iPod Nano like a watch, sans the wristband—morphing him into a human iPod dock he’s calling the iDermal. Hurban said he “just thought it would be cool.” Talk about a DIY project.
It’s not easy, either—as surgical procedures like this are not supposed to be. But for Hurban he just wanted the convenience of the music on his Nano …forever? Or at least until he decides to remove the magnets.
We have to give the guy credit though, as odd and dangerous as the actual procedure sounds, this takes some serious guts to follow through with.
See the iDermal in action as Hurban shows off how he did the whole thing. We don’t suggest trying this at home.
(via Mashable; photo via Geekologie)
When Diablo III came out and said they would be making the newest game strictly online to avoid piracy, well, did they know what they were in for? With yesterday’s overload of people eager to start playing the game on the release day, millions and millions of players ranted on about the delays—how could they?
They meaning Battle.net, the host site of Diablo III. Gamers were outraged. Twitter and Facebook were abuzz with venting on and on about how, “Man, Diablo III is super hard. I’ve been playing for 30 minutes and haven’t even defeated the login screen,” and though Diablo III was “one of the biggest games to hit the gaming world in over 10 years,” “they took everything that was Diablo and flushed it down the toilet, from gameplay to graphics.”
Reportedly it was “error 37” that kept appearing, the name that easily translated into “we have a serious overload on our servers right now, and hopefully it gets fixed.”
Not a good sign that the most-anticipated PC game for a while was a major disappointment. But the good news for Diablo III is that it’s still ranked #1 on Game Spot’s top games, with TERA and Revelations ’12 not too far behind.
(photo via Technabob)
In order to fight off maritime piracy—so no, not the pirates of the Internet, real pirates—The Department of Defense will pair up with The US Navy to build apps aimed at targeting pirates and drug smugglers who travel the seas.
Developers in Chile, along with researchers at the Technical University of Federico Santa Maria in Chile, will collaborate with people in Africa to build the software that features specific detectors of potential maritime threats; sailors will have analytics to data that ties in with these threats, and can subsequently track down illegal traffickers, fishers, etc.
Once the application software is completed, they just need to figure out a way to make them compatible to all naval systems across the world, so everyone is aware of all that’s happening in and around the waters and to not be too alarmed if they end up coming across a black flag.
John Stansy, one of the engineers working on the project, said “We’ll take those tools and integrate them into a widget framework that can be part of a coalition-accessible web portal,” making the process sound like it won’t take too much trouble in the IT department.
Arrr!
(via The Verge; photo via Graham Owen)
