Recent post
Archive for Mei 2014
In our "Weekly Innovation" blog series, we explore an interesting idea, design or product that you may not have heard of yet. Do you have an innovation to share? Submit with this form.
If this egg scrambling tool works as promised, your egg can come out of its shell with the yolk and egg already mixed. You could hard or soft boil, fry, scramble or devil them into what creator Geraint Krumpe calls "golden eggs," named for the eggs' creamy, soft yellow color when they come out.
"I was laid off from a company I worked for for 11 years," Krumpe says, when asked how this all started. "So I had to get creative."
Krumpe started a product design company, and last Easter he was surfing YouTube videos and found inspiration. "I found a video with a science guyspinning an egg inside a shirtsleeve. So I said, I have to try this. I stayed up late and broke a bunch of eggs trying to get one to work," he says.
Eleven months later, after a lot of development and testing, Krumpe and his company released the kitchen creation he calls the Golden Goose. It works by rotating an egg back and forth at an accelerated rate to mix the yolk and egg together without introducing any outside air. A soft cradle nestles the egg and holds it center, keeping it from breaking during the back-and-forth motion.
The device scrambles an egg inside the shell in about 15 seconds.
"You haven't entered any outside air or other gases into the mix of protein and fats, and it allows for this chemistry to happen that has culinary benefits, because depending on what temperature the egg is at and for what time period, you can achieve a range of different flavor profiles and even different colors," Krumpe says.
Imagine all the golden egg creations! Krumpe tells us that a hard-boiled golden egg comes out tasting like savory custard. And if you simply scramble the egg in its shell and crack it into an iron skillet, it creates a tasty scrambled egg dish because you never whisked in any outside air. Plus, there's a little less dish washing.
"This way you don't have to wash a fork and bowl, and it has been suggested that you could spend a lot of time as a prep cook scrambling eggs and putting them in the fridge for breakfast or baking. Here they're pre-scrambled. It doesn't take much effort and it's the best possible way to scramble," Krumpe says.
This invention is already funded, reaching more than $60,000 in support from 1,800 backers, way above its original $34,500 fundraising goal.
Now that it's funded, the plan is to manufacture the devices for the donors this summer and then take Golden Goose directly to consumers. Krumpe says it will retail for around $24, but probably won't be for sale until November at the earliest.
source: http://kalw.org/post/innovation-gadget-scrambles-egg-inside-shell
With traffic accidents caused by distracted pedestrians reportedly on the risethroughout the world, Kotaku reports that legislators in Taipei have proposed fining people for crossing the street while looking at their phones. Rooted in an apparent fear of smartphone “addictions,” the bill would enact penalties of about $10 per infraction. It evidently seeks to model a (failed) traffic bill in New Jersey.
The biggest challenge may be defining “distracted walking.” As Kotaku writes:
legislators say anyone who has their head down looking at a screen is considered distracted. That includes texting, gaming, and websurfing. However, people are concerned that it may also include talking on the phones.
Texting-while-walking has been mocked around the world, with videos of people toppling into water fountains and down stairs while using their phones going viral online. The phenomenon prompted comedians to escort pedestrians around New York City, and there’s even an app that alerts smartphone users to surrounding dangers.
Mockery aside, there have been some pretty serious “distracted walker” accidents in Taiwan: This March, a young woman who was using her phone while crossing the street in the city of Kaoshuing was struck by an oncoming taxi and later passed away in the hospital. In 2013, a Taiwanese tourist had to be rescued after accidentally walking off a pier in Melbourne, Australia, while reportedly checking her Facebook page. In the United States, at least, a Pew Research survey revealed that 53 percent of cellphone users have encountered distracted walkers, and about half of 18- to 24-year olds admit to having bumped into something or someone while using their phones.
If Taiwan’s bill passes into law, the paltry fine seems unlikely to deter many of the country’s 14 million mobile Internet users. Making a real dent in the problem will probably require safety education programs, as well. As one Utah state representativequipped in the Salt Lake Tribune in 2012, in response to similar efforts in his state: “You can’t legislate [not being] stupid.”
source: http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/05/07/taipei_looks_into_fining_people_for_gadget_induced_distracted_walking.html
Once upon a time, touchless toilets were the domain of airports, fancy steak restaurants, and Japan.
Now, Americans, your very own throne can flush itself, thanks to a new gadget from a Kohler. Via Gizmodo, last week the plumbing giant announced the Touchless toilet flush kit, a do-it-yourself product that can be added to almost any toilet to make it flush without your touch.
The battery-powered kit is centered around a sensor that activates the flush. Wave your hand over the sensor, and the toilet flushes. The kit eliminates the need to touch that germ-y tank lever while also making you feel like a toilet-controlling wizard.
Here’s what you get in the kit. (Four AA batteries included; the bulk of the system sits inside your tank.)
The Kohler FAQ webpage claims that “most people” can install the system in under 20 minutes. So we wouldn’t recommend trying to install this thing if you really have to go.
The Kohler system also eliminates the little flushing lever that you and your houseguests will be familiar with, patching it over with a little plug. This could cause some embarrassment and super-awkward moments; however, Kohler does also include a little decal that you can paste onto your toilet that indicates where the hand sensor is located.
You can order the kit for $100 from Kohler’s website, though we also found it for $75 at Home Depot. At $75, the retrofitting kit is far cheaper than just buying a fancy steakhouse touchless toilet, which Kohler also sells starting at $363 and which have been available in various forms for years. So, if you’re committed to going touchless, are looking to save some dough, and are handy with a screwdriver, Kohler’s touchless kit could make for a fun and sanitary weekend project.
Happy touchless flushing, America.
source: https://www.yahoo.com/tech/make-your-toilet-touchless-with-this-75-gadget-84920428289.html
LG announced the release of its Lifeband Touch fitness tracking device to the Australian market this week. The fitness device market is certainly not short of competitors, with various bands, straps and watch-like devices jostling for a share of the Australian market, so it will be interesting to see if the Lifeband Touch can gain traction with the sweaty masses.
In its media release to announce the availability of the product in Australian stores from mid to late May, LG assures us the device is “designed with the pace and demands of modern life in mind”.
“Beneath a stylish asymmetric and flexible design, the Lifeband Touch features a built-in 3-axis accelerometer and altimeter that accurately measures distance, speed, number of steps, calories burned and projected pace. Along with time, activity and music controls, information is available at the swipe of a finger via a crisp touchscreen OLED display that automatically turns on when you rotate your wrist. And there’s no need to miss a call or text while on the move, with alerts synchronised from compatible smartphones,” LG says in the statement.
After digesting all that you might want to lie down and have a bit of a rest. But rest assured, there’s no rest for the wicked, including tech reviewers.
LG released the Lifeband Touch in the US and UK markets earlier this year and reviewers gave mixed reviews about the device.
PC Advisor was taken with what is said was the cool, sleek styling of the device, an important factor considering the amount of criticism usually levelled at the clunky-not-funky look of most wearable devices.
“The Lifeband Touch has a clear touch OLED display that is pretty funky and unique in the way that is shows you the time – it’s displayed vertically rather than the conventional horizontal way, not a major issue, but we imagine it will take a little bit of getting used to.”
Style is not something everyone agrees on and over at Tech Radar the thought was that this device was not as pleasing to the eye or wrist as what could be hoped.
“We’re not overly taken by the design of the Lifeband, mostly because it’s very mobile on your wrist and the display can be hard to use sometimes, as it’s mostly interacted with by swiping up and down, or left and right. Given there's a very small space to be able to hit, this isn’t always the most accurate.”
Pocket Lint compared the device to the market-leading Nike FuelBand, but said the LG product didn’t quite match up.
“Aware that LG isn’t a sports band compared to the might of Nike, the company has already teamed up with apps like RunKeeper to help it out, although you'll still have to use the LG app and export the data rather than use its app as you do other wearables such as the Pebble smart watch.
“As to the styling of the band, it’s certainly not as pretty or subtle as the FuelBand.”
The Lifeband Touch is compatible with both Android and iOS smartphones, transmitting data via Bluetooth to the intuitive, easy-to-use LG Fitness App, where you can set daily goals and track your progress. It also links up with popular third-party apps such as MyFitnessPal, Runkeeper or MapMyFitness.
It might not have the muscle, speed or style to outgun the big players in the market like the Basis Carbon Steel Edition, Garmin Vivofit or the Fitbit One, but the Lifeband Touch might tuck in behind the pack and find a niche among those who want to sync their LG smartphone with a handy fitness device.
source: http://www.smartcompany.com.au/technology/41831-gadget-watch-lg-lifeband-touch.html#
source: http://www.smartcompany.com.au/technology/41831-gadget-watch-lg-lifeband-touch.html#
Lenovo made headlines earlier this year when it took Motorola Mobility off of Google's hands, giving it a boost in smartphone markets outside of its usual stomping grounds. But that wasn't the first time it snatched up another company for industry leverage. In 2005, IBM gave up majority control of its PC business, allowing Beijing-based Lenovo to take over and effectively expand its reach to a global audience. The timing of the deal was a little bit off, however. One of the first products to launch under Lenovo's new ownership was the ThinkPad X41 Tablet, a laptop/tablet hybrid, which had already rolled off the assembly line and was still sporting an IBM logo.
It was a niche product back in 2005, but if you were an early adopter, it might have been the perfect tool. Though the X41 wasn't the first hybrid tablet/PC to debut in the ThinkPad line, it did arrive with significant upgrades over its predecessors, like wireless networking, a 12.1-inch display, vastly improved processor capability and a 180-degree rotatable display.
The X41 Tablet also sported many familiar ThinkPad flourishes, including the iconic red TrackPoint nub, a stowable stylus and an irksome display latch that got caught on just aboutanything when the device wasn't snapped shut. Lenovo eventually eradicated that latch from the ThinkPad's oeuvre of quirks during its 2013 overhaul, and continues to make progressive changes to the line's design.
At the time of its launch, consumers appreciated the X41's relatively slim 3.5-pound weight and the pleasant paper-like feel of its screen when used in tablet mode. Its software experience, however, wasn't exactly polished -- it was the first ThinkPad to run Windows XP Tablet PC Edition software. Sure, it had a dose of digital pen support, handwriting recognition and speech input added to the mix, but it was still undeniably Windows XP underneath. Some users who tried the X41 Tablet remember it more for its glitchy software experience than the convenience of its combined form factors.
The X41 Tablet also sported many familiar ThinkPad flourishes, including the iconic red TrackPoint nub, a stowable stylus and an irksome display latch that got caught on just aboutanything when the device wasn't snapped shut. Lenovo eventually eradicated that latch from the ThinkPad's oeuvre of quirks during its 2013 overhaul, and continues to make progressive changes to the line's design.
At the time of its launch, consumers appreciated the X41's relatively slim 3.5-pound weight and the pleasant paper-like feel of its screen when used in tablet mode. Its software experience, however, wasn't exactly polished -- it was the first ThinkPad to run Windows XP Tablet PC Edition software. Sure, it had a dose of digital pen support, handwriting recognition and speech input added to the mix, but it was still undeniably Windows XP underneath. Some users who tried the X41 Tablet remember it more for its glitchy software experience than the convenience of its combined form factors.
The X41 Tablet may have been an ungainly oddity when it first launched, but its hybrid form has gone on to become something of an industry standard for today's post-PC devices.
source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/05/11/gadget-rewind-2005-lenovo-ibm-x41-tablet/
