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Tablo, Fabric Gesture Controller

August 1, 2008 by 8 Comments


[Adrian Freed] posted this interesting fabric gesture controller called Tablo. It uses a stretchy conductive fabric, laid over a framework to create a curve known as the Witch of Agnesi. Holding the center of the fabric up is an inverted bowl covered with sections of conductive material. The whole thing is wired to a microcontroller that measures the resistance fluctuations when you press on the fabric. It is capable of measuring displacement and pressure as well as being multitouch.

They mention that the simple interface allows it to be used as a foot input as well as a hand input. We’d love to see a video of it in action.

Breakthrough In Water Based Energy Storage

July 31, 2008 by 43 Comments


[Daniel Nocera], working with the MIT Energy Initiative, has come up with a method to easily and cheaply store energy generated from solar electricity with water. The method uses two catalysts of non-toxic and abundant metals to separate the water into both oxygen and hydrogen. These gases are then stored, and later recombined in a fuel cell to generate power. The process was inspired by photosynthesis, and helps to make sources such as solar power viable around the clock. Current storage technologies are both expensive and inefficient, so technologies like solar are only useful when the source is available. This will allow homes to cheaply and easily store power generated through solar and other technologies. While this is only part of the solution towards the current energy problem, it could go a long way towards decreasing our use of non-renewable sources. When combined with other new breakthroughs in the field, you can easily imagine more homes coming off the grid. Check out the short video after the break.

Continue reading “Breakthrough In Water Based Energy Storage” →

UnMouse Cheap Multitouch Prototype

July 31, 2008 by 11 Comments


A Microsoft research team has delivered a prototype called the UnMouse that could really be a big hit. This unit is a mouse pad sized sensor that is multitouch and pressure sensitive. It is flexible and thin enough to roll up. The article mentions that the construction of the device is “dirt cheap”. This is very exciting; is this the next mouse?

The idea of having low cost multitouch input is very enticing. While there are many ways to do multitouch right now, most are limited by their large size due to projector/camera setups or high cost such as the iPhone. A portable (fits in your laptop bag) pressure sensitive multitouch input device is something that a lot of people have been craving for a while.

Just imagine the uses. Audio engineers could create new interfaces on the fly. You could draw a key map on piece of paper and just lay it on top. Graphic designers could use different sized and shaped brushes. Gamers could make their own ergonomically comfortable gaming layouts. How about covering one in Velcro and attaching buttons to it?

Russian Homemade Telescope

July 31, 2008 by 4 Comments


In the Russian city of Barnaul, some enthusiasts are gathering their resources to revive a home made telescope and observatory. Built by [Mikhail Levchenko], in the mid 70’s, the telescope is quite impressive. [Levchenko] kept his hobby somewhat of a secret so as not to arouse the suspicions of his neighbors, but its pretty hard to hide a tower as tall as a house with a domed observatory on top. The telescope itself has a 16 inch glass lens that provides 500x magnification. His hobby would turn out to have a pretty big impact on the town. People would come to him hoping that his telescope could tell their fortunes. Not a believer in horoscopes, he tried to educate people with lessons in astronomy and physics. One man was said to have given up drinking after seeing Saturn.

[Levchenko] passed away in 2002 and his observatory fell into disrepair. Local thieves tried to steal pieces for scrap and the whole structure has sunken somewhat. Some of those who were inspired when young by [Levchenko] have decided to renovate it for the eclipse. Barnaul will be a prime location for viewing. The total renovation and possible relocation will cost around 2 million dollars.

In the past, we covered a high powered telescope made by some girl scouts, and this $40 USB telescope looks fun too.

British Hacker To Be Extradited To U.S.

July 31, 2008 by 26 Comments

British computer hacker [Gary McKinnon] lost his final appeal to block his extradition to the U.S. He stands accused of hacking into almost 100 U.S. military and NASA computers from his girlfriend’s aunt’s house in London over a four year period by the U.S. government. If convicted of the crimes in a U.S. court, he could face up to 70 years imprisonment. [Gary McKinnon] freely admitted to hacking into the computers, but claimed that he did it out of curiosity, not out of malice or any terroristic aims. He was looking for information on UFOs. The U.S. government claimed that in addition to hacking into the computers, he also stole 950 passwords and erased important files. [McKinnon’s] next move will be to appeal to the European Court, and if unsuccessful, he will have no other option but to stand trial in the U.S. court system.

WarBallooning At Defcon

July 30, 2008 by 3 Comments

[rocketman] has posted about a new event at Defcon dubbed WarBallooning. They are using a Kismet drone (a modified WRT54G), a webcam, and a few high gain antennas. The balloon will be launched at about 15 stories and will be remotely fed targets chosen directly by the Defcon participants. The the directional antenna will be mounted to the camera so pan and tilt can be controlled. The Kismet CSV files will be available for everyone after the event.

If you are interested in WarDriving or building you own high-gain antennas, we suggest you check out this WiFi biquad dish antenna mounted on a car. If cars are too boring, or you do not have one, you could always go WarSailing or WarFlying. Yes, the permutations are endless.

[photo: JoergHL]

Esquire’s Hackable E-paper Display

July 30, 2008 by 29 Comments


In celebration of there 75th year, Esquire magazine’s October issue will feature an e-paper cover. The display will be about 3mm thick flexible paper with four shades of gray and some animated text and images. The backside will also have a display featuring a Ford ad for the new Flex. The Ford ad is essentially subsidizing this whole production. The cover isn’t finalized yet, but Boing Boing Gadgets was able to get a few more details about it from deputy editor [Peter Griffin]. The battery isn’t anything exotic and they fully expect people to break the device open and do what they want with it. It will unfortunately still require you building your own controller, but at least you get two revolutionary displays to play with for the cost of a magazine. If you’re wondering what Esquire is, they apparently showed George Clooney 2 Girls 1 Cup. So they’ve got that to celebrate too.