As they say, this seems more suitable for posh restaurants and VIP rooms (not so sure about hotel rooms), so grooming isn't a concern. It surely looks pretty, 'to.

Around here there's a cool new mall established last year that features only small movie stores, art galleries/studios and two small open-air meeting plaza. It's by far one of the most pleasant spaces around, and a must-visit in Porto.

http://www.ccbombarda.blogspot.com/

It surely is pretty. But how well built it is? I mean... Dell?

I'd like one of those, if it was barely modular and ergonomically sensitive. I mean, the ability to safely use the space above the computer desk to store more useless junk is very appealing...

Well, I'd rather see this headline than "cop ignores baby in car; dies of heat stroke". And I'm pretty sure anyone reasonable agrees...

Also, this: "Gympie Sen-Sgt Phil Edwards said last week's incident had been frightening for both police and members of the public who genuinely believed a baby was dying." suggests me the cop was alerted to the situation by other mall-goers, and he acted in the interest of public safety. It's true that the ye olde ACAB motto has a reason to exist, but in this case it was a perfectly valid action.

The Art Lebedev Studios are pretty much the only guys right now doing something with the decades-old keyboards. At least they're not cramming in aluminium, cold-cathode lights, pointless multimedia keys, reorganizing the navigation keys or making wavy "ergonomic" design and call it "innovation".

While I'm completely unfamiliarized with the Tactus (particularly the size of the sensors), this has some potential in a few situations... slider interfaces (such as audio equalizers), custom and "on the go" interfaces (kind of a mix between the Prime, a Wacom and a ZBoard), screen extensions to videogames (showing a functional dashboard in flight/racing sims)... All it takes is some thinking out of the box to see some possible uses.

However, other than a few hacks, I doubt that there will be many adopters of this, so it will remain as an expensive geeky keyboard for rich sci-fi fans who dream of translucent screens and laser-drawn keyboards.

If he's anything like other typists I know, the X is so worn because he used it to black out typing errors. A guy I knew used to hammer the key for whole paragraphs because he was not allowed to use correction tape or pens on typewritten paper due to office policy.

@3: I agree, but maybe they tried to avoid the cliché.

Some of those might even be slightly older: I remember seeing one with less images slightly after both HL2 and Doom 3 were out.
Doom 3 being my favourite.

@1: That would be a great idea. "From Sokoban to Half-Life 2: The Big Book Of Videogame Crates"

Can he retrieve his mum's wedding ring from the egg-boiler?

To be honest, harassing the kind of people that spend hours queuing for luxury goods seems fair play to me. And strikes me as "journalism" as much as the onslaught of completely trivial news segments done by people with their mouths firmly pressed against Jobs' crotch dedicated to a mobile phone most people can't even afford.

And if he was harassing, dunno, Zune buyers, I doubt most of you would be so pissed.

I've been saying this is the future since I've seen all the third party Sega Mega Drive/Genesis hardware done by Amstrad (the Mega PC), IBM (TeraDrive), JVC (Wondermega) and the Aiwa Mega CD.
Leave the console manufacturers to develop the hardware and set a rigid standard, then allow other manufacturers to build their own variations, each with their advantages.

It was a viciously sharp slice of mango, wasn't it, sir?

The MPAA boss ran over my cat yesterday. Unfortunately, as he was driving a large SUV, I can't find any proof my cat even existed.

However, I still demand 5 mil. in compensation.

Blister packs are awful. I made a large dent on my brand new X360 Windows gamepad while trying to open one.

I bet someone from Franz Ferdinand is making a bid on one right now.

It's not only compression that has evolved: the Grim Fandango resources (mostly videos and background bitmaps) could be downsampled for the DS 256x192 screen(s), which would reduce the size even more. I doubt the console can output crystal-clear audio, too, so perhaps they could also be downsampled a bit without harming the experience. I'm not 100% sure if it would fit on 512MB, but it would surely be a lot smaller than 2 CDs

I really don't understand the space limitation excuse. Big companies are usually moronic when it comes to excuses to rehash games from their past (unless it's on a zazzy new genre with a whole new bad-ass atitude), but they've outdone themselves in this one. Even a GBA cartridge would be enough, I think.

Oh, and that first ScummVM link needs fixing. And it's Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis :p

This stuff is useless. If I had to look at the keyboard in search of a hotkey, then the whole point of *being* a hotkey is kind of defeated. For the less used commands that I can't remember or don't have muscle memory, the regular menus work fine without hindering productivity.

Of course, if the idea is to prevent the keyboard innards from getting dirty, then it's a fine (yet too pricey, even for a poor man's Optimus Maximus), well executed idea.

Well, I'm pretty sure carjackers would be scared shitless if they approached a car spitting flames.

This is just stupid. I remember a teacher of mine that refused even to remove his laptop in presence of a blackboard because of chalkdust. This could have been done just as easily with a regular paper sheet, duct tape and a pencil. Which is the basic idea behind my mousepad.

What's wrong in having the alarm clock out of an arm's reach? Last time I've jumped out of bed was when I've forgot to charge my mobile, and by 6am it was happily reminding me it needed to be fed. After 8 years, I kinda hoped it would be less of a baby, but nooooooooo...

When I was around 12 I used to make small fortresses for my WWII plastic soldiers using discarded cardboard, or taken from leftover briefcases my mother brought from symposiums her boss organized because it is a lot sturdier, not to mention stone grey. I remember fondly of one that had two floors and a working door that could be bolted inside, all this without using glue.

The price seems way off, and children should be given cardboard as a way to boost creativity, not to stifle it.

What scares me is that this makes a good case for those pushing for DNA databases - I mean, one can lose fingers, have feet amputated, even have his eyes gouged or needing major facial reconstruction, yet DNA is stable...

Well, not that the same people that push it care about public excuses. They just make the things behind the curtains, and they aren't being that subtle anymore...

That doesn't surprise me one bit. Only the most naive "free Tibet, boycott China" crowd would be shocked if they looked at the tiny letters in the labels of their high and low-priced electronic gizmos, clothes and other every day objects.

To be honest, anyone who buys, or more appropriately "licenses" music from any outlet that DMRs their product deserves to be ripped off.

That said, I still hope the EFF kicks the ass out of Microsoft bigtime.

There's a city named "Pörtö"? Damn, and I thought this city was metal enough.

I'd probably get an electric guitar, a drum kit composed by a floor tom and a snare and out-JAMC the thing.

I'm pretty sure a lot of people call them just that, so it's appropriate

Well, on a laptop, wouldn't overclocking permanently suck more juice from the batteries than allowing the user to choose when it needs a boost?

I really don't know much about laptops and overclocking but yes, turbo buttons are cool. Especially if it has a large red button surrounded by red LEDs that light up as the user presses the button.

It was a million to one shot, Doc. Million to one...

I do a lot of virtual "window shopping" - that's why most online stores have things such as Wishlists and "If you like this you might like..." links.
The only difference I see is that virtual window shopping is often focused and tailored to the costumer's experience - My Amazon recommendation page often presents me with great bands I've never heard before, instead of being presented with, dunno, Gogol Bordello's latest or Thom Yorke's solo album on display at an indie I usually go.

As for being "sterile"... meh. Only wankers go to real-life "posh" stores just to be seen there, which seems to be Apple's idea here.

It's bad, but as it lacks any formal structure, I don't process it as a song. I find the whole output of, say, Nelly Furtado to be far worse than this.

I don't think this looks enough of a chick tract: everyone looks human, the backgrounds are too good, there are no talking windows, random dog-and-cat action and fails to patronize the reader as a moronic heathen.

I give it a 3/10 on parody/satire points, but a 10 on the awesome scale.

I remember similar artwork for local Disney comics advertising EPCOT, this around 1984 or so. Really cool drawings, they still look "the future" to me.

Of all things, I never expected BB to make me hungry. I could really go for some spaghetti right now :|

What a disappearing rich, blonde little english girl can do for the coverage stats of your country...

I'll be buying the 2CD version later this month. Reznor is awesome, and one of the few people that holds understanding of the market (his market, at least), as well as HUGE respect for his fanbase, even if most of them are "filthy pirates" as he says :P

I think mine had a fixed camera just outside the double-door entrance, and the hand basins were perfectly visible, even from those coming down the stairs. TBH, I've always found the double doors being open all the time more disturbing than the camera itself.

Uuuuh... Right. This coming from the guy with more than a slight obsessed with drawing butts.

I've been looking for this for a while. Thanks Joel and Bjarne :)

His concept is awesome. If there's something I miss from my younger days were the countless Saturday mornings making racing cars from stock pieces: I still find my late-80s F1 designs better than the cars in the proper Ferrari line, and my late 60's car, which I still remember how to build... A shame I did not owned enough pieces (lack of the big wheels was a problem) to make more than one each time.

For some reason, they remind of those awful models on some videogames circa 2000, where a photo of face is plastered on the head, resulting in sudden changes on skin colour.

Riot police are robbing banks now?

Aspergillus and Stachybotrys? Was this used in some kind of House episode?

This vaguely reminds me of the drawn sections of Franz Ferdinand's Fffire videoclip.

As a male Portuguese citizen, I must carry or at least take care of the ID card (which is a large, non-standard size lump of plastic-laminated paper), National Health Service and Fiscal Identification (regular ISO 7813 sizes), Registred Voters' card (same size as the ID Card, only it's not laminated, and thankfully, not required anymore), military registration card (which is a bunch of folded paper) and possibly a few more I'm forgetting or don't have, such as Drivers' License or Passport.

Like #5 Peter K. I'd trade all this for a unique card - which is on the works. The only thing I'm concerned about is how easily RFID protections are circumvented. I'm fine if for some twisted reason stores track my purchases, but when it comes to identification purposes, I'm not comfortable at all (I mean, not many people know my b-day and even less know my middle names, for instance)

I have a photo with me ostensively holding a Pizza Hut tray while sitting under a "McDonalds Costumers' Only" sign. Inside a no-photo mall, before you couldn't tell of someone was taking a photo or having trouble reading their mobile phone.

The only "social networking" thing I've joined is last.fm, and only because it provides me with a somewhat stable listening habits platform (don't use or read journals, keep group activity to a minimum and only use shoutboxes with people I can't contact elsewhere). I feel very uncomfortable if there's too much information on me circling around teh interwebs - even if that information could be kept away from public eyes, I doubt most of those sites are that secure.

I agree with #4 JIMWICh. Obama's logo might be slightly unconventional when it comes to candidates' logos and might look more appropriate if he's selling dairy products, but it surely catches the eye for escaping the "CANDIDATE NAME"'"YEAR" template.

Also, the font choice for hillary isn't all that "interesting". A lot of serif fonts have their lowecase "L" resembling ones. Heck, even old typewriters used "l" for ones. If they managed to add anything with a "g" a bit over and left to the "ll", then it surely would be interesting (even if more appropriate to Rudy). And I doubt that choosing her first name is being on a "first name basis with the candidate". Most people wouldn't go with "Rodham" and "Clinton" is still a bit of a dirty name.

I'll give it a shot one of these days. I'm generally more fond of tracing images myself when it comes to logos, but this could be of some use for some of the graphic work I'm doing now...

This should be fun for Paul Hardcastle wannabees.

Before, the most important date for presidential candidates was November.
Now it's nineleven
ninininine eleven

No love for ProFont?

#4 defty:
I was thinking that myself. That has to be one of the most unflaterring, "mug-shot picture taken for sex-offenders registry" looakalike picture I've ever seen.

Good idea, but the lack (?) of customizable interface skins in the iPod makes it... weird to look at. The regular Apple glossy interface goes poorly with the rest.

And like #7, this struck more closer to Fallout than Steampunk.

Teresa: That's part of my point, as far as I know, reference books feature only brief excerpts of the original work. Most likely, it will deal on facts, so her greatest asset is well covered.

And yes, all people I know that read HP books do it because of the captivating writing - I tip her my non-existing but symbolic hat for that.

Teresa: Yes, I know, or else I would have pushed a little further than a brief note. But there are many accusations that her work isn't all that "original" to allow her to be so anal about a simple reference book.

On another subject, if she's writing a reference book, rather than focus on the *written* elements of the series and present them, I'm pretty sure there will be a lot more "I just decided that Dumbledore is gay" moments. Greedo shot first style.

Ack, deleted the last paragraph...

The franchise has been exploited commercially in every way possible, many times with official products of questionable quality, so unless there are gross mistakes, fanfic or wild speculation in the reference, this is plain money grabbing, sorry.

Given Ms. Rowling was accused of basing Harry Potter on other books, I find this somewhat amusing.

I really don't see why the fuss. If she's planning on writing her own reference guide, it is automatically granted hers would get a lot more publicity and interest from regular fans of the franchise. Unless, of course, she's afraid fans would do a much better job.

I learned to type on a HCESAR typewritter :P

As I type on QWERTY pretty much by intuition now, learning a new format would take too much of my time.

I've started to care for music once I had the option to listen to the bands I've read about on Wikipedia or All Music Guide. When most radios (don't get me started on MTV and the like) around here are pretty much dedicated to either Modern or past Top40 stuff, downloading was pretty much the only way to listen to bands like Chameleons, Sound, Cocteau Twins, Psychocandy-era Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine and like. All these I've discovered through downloads.

Now there's Last.fm and YouTube, which provide a somewhat legit way to listen the bugger hits (I still don't get why labels are so fast on taking them down - free advertising, and nobody will stop getting their DVDs because of YouTube's shoddy quality videos), but downloading is still the best way to go. I've doubled my record collection in the past 9 months once I was certain that *this* is the music I'd still be listening in some years' time instead of random "flavours of the month".

My usual theory is that more than piracy, MP3 distribution affect the record companies' strategy by allowing people to have much less focused musical preferences, so by locking out all freely available alternatives, they force most people to follow the path of the Nelly Furtados, U2s and the like that gets played every hour on your radio station.

It is not surprising then that these prominent bloggers have no professional training in the collection of news.

Fine, I'll give that to him. But to be honest, I'd rather take an amateur, identified, knowledgeable blogger interested in presenting the unbiased truth with good writing skills than someone who follows his own/someone's agenda presenting just the facts that they see fit, and just happen to have a degree in journalism. Which, to be honest, are the vast majority when the stakes are raised. There's a lot more than a diploma to be a good journalist.

Also, as far as I know, his background isn't on technology or journalism. Then what are his academical credentials to write and gloat on the subject?

Very impressive.

TBH one of the reasons I dislike how Flash is how overused it is these days. Examples like this one right here just reinforce my perception that most people that get into web design are nowadays clueless about properly doing their job. I mean, I'm possibly less qualified onpaper than any of them, but my websites use pretty much only HTML, CSS and images, even if making a flash-only website would be quicker and less troublesome to adapt to Internet Explorer/Mozilla/Opera/Everything Else.

C'mon, who needs a fake Sid when you can have a real player that looks just like him ? He's even worthless "on stage" and all...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/digitolga/1749721416/

The White Stripes spring to mind.

Hear hear.

Well, I've always heard stories a few of the allegedly "fakes" are actually the real deal, except they have minor faults (usually on stitching or printing) and are destined for outlets in the areas they're manufactured, except someone manages to import/export them over the western side, so this doesn't surprise me one bit.

Along the much-needed Zune improvements, Microsoft seems to be adapating the "do what they do best, do the opposite of their worst" tactic. Will it work? Don't know, but the Zune might be a contender now.

This stuff is excelent. I had written a text about deep sea fishes I've meant to "webisode" for months, and this have given me the inspiration I needed.

Wasn't the unusual red sky in Munch's Scream reported to be the effects of the Krakatoa eruption in the Northern hemisphere?

A few days ago, he told Radio Renascença (a catholic station) that he was misinterpreted. To be honest, I really don't see how that might have happened - his statement was clear as water.

Earlier this year there was a similar initiative in here (Portugal), but the REN (responsible for the power grid) and Quercus (green association) both warned to the possible danger of it (story here, sorry, only Portuguese, sorry).

As they put it, electricity from thermal power stations is constantly generated regardless of the consumption, and sudden changes aren't planned by the system. The practical example given is a truck that has the trailer suddenly detached: there's a sudden surge of power that can result in the truck going out of control. He also presented two actual examples, after a 9-11 memorial in Germany following and in Spain for 3-11.

I'm just wondering, why there are so many people willing to reveal their e-mail adress/password in a website they've just discovered? To be honest, I only login to my GMail account in Google's services and once on Pidgin, to check their GTalk support (MSN is often blocked these days in offices).

Then again, I'm very suspicious of "social networking" websites. Last.fm is the only one that I've found to be interesting, all the rest look too much like the pick-up spots at your local bar.

A lot better than the first episode, with all the nerdy jokes I've missed. Also, Denholm's son might prove to be a terrific character.

I'm not a movie-goer, but as a massive Joy Division and-everything-Factory-and-Manchester fan, I'm more than willing to put up with annoying people and overpriced everything to see it on the big screen.

Out of curiosity, earlier this year there was a bit of an uproar about a blog-turned-to-book of an "escort" in Porto (Portugal), named "A Tua Amiga" ("You Friend").