Viewing items with Tag: "technology"

Mattonabike from ShigaJet found this article which mentions DoCoMo's most recent "look in to the future", via a small video presentation displaying what the near future holds for technology.

Some pretty cool things like GPS built in to glasses and lots of other star-trek-esque gadgets worth having a look at in the video.

Despite not mentioning exactly when this near future is that they are so optimistic about, we have to give them credit as a previous DoCoMo look in to the future video revealed video conferencing on mobile devices, something which was laughed off at the time as unrealistic, which we can find in the majority of Japanese mobile phones these days...

Also, if you have some spare time and are interested:

If you happen to be in Japan, you can arrange a tour to Docomo's R&D Center, in the city of Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. we haven't been there ourselves but they have an exhibit called WHARF (Wealth, Human Activity and Revolution for the Future) that looks interesting. We guess the name says it all.

Japan's biggest wireless operator, on Monday unveiled a new mobile phone equipped with a motion sensor that lets users play games like the popular Nintendo Wii console.

With DoCoMo's D904i, made by Mitsubishi Electric Corp, users can swing the handset like a tennis racket or wield it like sword to control game play, instead of punching on the keypad.

I fail to see how this will work since you have to be looking at the tiny screen in order to play these games, and 'swinging like a tennis racket' with both my head and hand is not something I want to be doing on the train...



I had a look at the Specification on the DoCoMo Japanese site, and it does look pretty cool though, although 'not quite' Wii-like just yet. But it appears to have other features, like turning the phone on its side and the display will also switch to a widescreen display automatically.

It also shows off some of the motion sensing game capabilities here. Mitsubishi are also introducing a couple of other phones which have games that take advantage of the built-in camera, I guess much like the PS2 eye-toy.

The phones were just announced, and are set to be on sale in May 2007, just a couple of weeks away. I also love this final quote from Yahoo News, absolute quality:

Earlier this year, DoCoMo, which caters to 54 percent of Japan's mobile phone users, introduced a phone that features a touch-sensitive screen and a model that gives off a relaxing scent.

I hate those guys on the streets of any main city in the paper thin black suits and the dragonball Z hairstyles that harrass girls walking down the street to come to their snack bar or to work at their snack bar or to 'go for tea' or whatever, and if the trend is anything to go by these guys could be replaced by robots in the near future! Now this is not exactly true, its a wild guess by myself, but thats the way things are going in Osaka.

Due to new laws introduced in 2005, informing the public about local adult information centers via street solicitors is now against the law. This didnt stop them however, as they were replaced with (mostly old, homeless looking) guys holding signs pointing the direction of these centers, with "ore ni kike" written on them allowing interested clients to ask the guy for more information, which is not considered illegal. Well not until the end of last month.

So have the police and government finally ridden the streets of these nuisences? Of course not. They have come up with an ingenious, very Japanese solution to the problem. Dress a robot in a sailor suit school uniform and give the sign to him! This ridiculously expensive 'touting tool', which underwent a $4000 upgrade since its previous road traffic directing job, will occassionally raise and lower the "Ask me!" banner and attract customers that way.

“It’s a robot, so no problem” says a spokesperson for the information center. Yer and thats gonna last long... I'm looking forward to robot bankrobbers where the owners will be able to give the same argument destroying excuse "but... its a robot! so no probem!"

JapanToday.com reports that as of yesterday Apple had sold its 100 millionth ipod which debuted back in 2001. Conversely, Yahoo has just launched the new Sansa Connect, a wireless MP3 player intended to intimidate their nearly omnipotent rival.

Consumer demand clearly shows that if the quality is right the customers will come...and line up 10 days before the release date, weather and hygiene be dammed. Feeding this endless hunger for music, message boards, and microchips is a detriment to society. Social interaction is being plugged up behind earphones and the awareness of our surroundings is being narrowed to the size of a hand held screen.

When was the last time you went outside and took in the world around you without an artificial soundtrack? Who can sit and think for more than 10 minutes without being interrupted by a cell phone? Was your last meaningful conversation typed or spoken? Yes, I see the irony of my medium, but it does not devalue my message: Get out there and physically connect with the world.

Save your electronic cocoons for the winter.
Happy spring!

Since oil and water don't mix, these fish can live 5 to 10 years under a deep fryer! The video apparently describes a new kind of oil that doesn't explode when combined with water. Food in a fryer usually gives off little drops of water that splatter everywhere. This new kind of oil limits splatter and allows the water to flow into a lower basin...



(via Consumerist)

Homaru Cantu and chefs from Chicago's weird-science restaurant, Moto, faced off against iron chef Morimoto in January. The challenge ingredient was beetroot, and Moto's chefs stole the show with this postmodern beet maki surrounded by edible paper printed with maki-zushi ink.



Another favorite was a frozen sphere of beet -- "made by injecting a balloon with liquified beet, freezing it with the liquid nitrogen, and burning the balloon off with a baby blowtorch--over yogurt with a spike of yuzu." Despite the iron chef's more traditional preparations, and one future-forward liquid nitrogen encrusted beetroot ice cream, Moto won!



First Science: "Perhaps Cantu's greatest innovation at Moto is a modified Canon i560 inkjet printer (which he calls the "food replicator" in homage to Star Trek) that prints flavoured images onto edible paper. The print cartridges are filled with food-based "inks", including juiced carrots, tomatoes and purple potatoes, and the paper tray contains sheets of soybean and potato starch. The printouts are flavoured by dipping them in a powder of dehydrated soy sauce, squash, sugar, vegetables or sour cream, and then they are frozen, baked or fried."


Cantu is now working with superconductors and handheld particle guns to create a system for levitating food in front of customers.

More details in the Chicago Reader article.

A Video of the HAL-5 Robot Suit "HAL 5: Hybrid Assistive Limb 5".



This group started the HAL project at Tsukuba University. Their site isn't so hot, but check it out at Cyberdyne. And just for the sake of comparison, the BEAR suit by a guy with a mustache.

Does your neck hurt from too much gaming? Are you tired of those useless things called muscles getting in the way of your time spent pressing buttons? Do you miss the contact with other human beings you used to know before this hardcore gaming lifestyle took you by the balls (and/ or/ (and) breasts)?

Well, look no further, as "Game Dutch", from Japanese company Lofty is here to help. This "chest pillow" is designed to allow you the comfort of sleep while still being plugged in to your own virtual world. And it solves the problem of human contact by giving you something to hug whenever the occasional pangs of lonliness manage to creep through the constant battling of otherworldly creatures. Now thats what I call a chest pillow. If they could only make one that gives hea.... uh... back massages.



read full article here
http://www.tokyomango.com/tokyo_mango/2007/01/game_dutch_for_.html .

Well, its about friggin time!

After a string of attacks on school children in the Kyoto area by crazed perverts with knives (who probably practiced first on nearby shrubbery- I mean lets face it, these guys' cheese has definitely slid off thier crackers), the Kyoto board of education has finally decided to be proactive and has come up with a FANTASTIC plan to prevent these attackers from ever nearly harming another school child again.

The incredible idea: A stick! Now now, don't shrug it off just yet. Its not just any stick. This is a stick meticulously constructed of genuine PVC with an American Football goal looking thing on one end, designed to stave off evil until help arrives.

The genius here is in its simplicity folks. Simplicity and the inherent fear invoking power of sticks. These miniature football goals, conveniently located in the shokuinshitsu, or teachers room at every school (of course the very place a school invader is least likely to end up), are desigend to allow the small children to hold off the lunatic invaders at sticks length until help arrives in the form of equally loony police officers, who are, we can only assume, armed with even longer sticks, and possibly some kind of food to distract the invaders while some even more loony inventor designs a trap in which to catch the unsuspecting victim as he feeds. One step at a time here folks, one step at a time.

Useless crime fighting paraphenalia, you ask? Not at this price! We were given a wonderful demonstration by the Kyoto Sensei himself, dressed, like all evil men, in a black ski mask (these kids will be terrified if they ever incidentally stumble upon a ski-jo). Afterwards, I was given the inside scoop on the incredible bargain these schools are getting.

Each stick, which could easily be constructed with items in most peoples' back yards for about 15 dollars, cost the schools only 3 man yen, roughly 300 bucks a pop. Now thats what I call a bargain. Deeeeeeeee-liscious! And, fortunately for the students, (of which roughly half are strong enough to even lift the stick), each school is required to have at least two or three, which are very strategically placed in the same inaccessible corner at every school.

If you don't believe me, Kyoto ALTs, check your shokuinshitsus. That thing you have oft seen and never grasped the meaning of? Yup, thats "the stick."

So hats off to you Japan! When my friends suggest that you might be involved in frittering away the education budget on useless junk, I'll just disagree, and think of your ingenious crime-fighting technology!

Apparently its called a "Thorn Crotch." Check this article out from Boing Boing.