TOTWs

TOTW: Nintendo 2DS

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11 years
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Since the start of handheld gaming Nintendo has been the big-shot of that category. From Gameboys to 3DS’, Nintendo have always been pretty successful. But, now that the iPhone has come out, DS and their new Wii U sales have been falling. Since the iPhone is used for more than just gaming, but also has good games, customers have been swarming the Apple shops. To get back on track, Nintendo are trying to come out with new and interesting products. Their latest one is the Nintendo 2DS, and it’s probably the weirdest one yet….

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The System

As the name implies, the 2DS is NOT 3D. Even though you can play any 3DS games on it, it dumbs it down for anyone who doesn’t want or need 3D. This time, Nintendo went for the younger crowd who can’t handle 3D games and easily break the flimsy hinges. They game was to make the cheapest gaming console possible. They’re hoping the games will be their real money-maker.

The main difference between the 2DS and the 3DS is the absence of hinges. It just keeps on going with the bottom screen closer underneath. Another change that will more aggravate the gamers than anything else is that they took away the right joystick. That also may make it harder for developers, but they can live through it. Overall, it’s just like a tablet, but for gaming. At $130, Nintendo are hoping to break their streak and have a good Christmas.

TOTW: Makerbot Digitizer 3D Scanner

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11 years
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Makerbot have been the leading force in the 3D printing revolution since the start. Their cheap, easy and very popular systems are at the top of the 3D printers charts. With their new system, the Makerbot Replicator 2, you practically have your own mini factory in your office or home. Along with their Makerbots, they have been updating their software to make it really easy to design something from scratch. But, with their new Makerbot Digitizer, you may not have to start from scratch.

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The System

The Digitizer really completes the Makerbot set. If you want to produce your product, you can. If you want to play around with 3D design and print your results, you can. Now, if you want to scan something, scan it, and reprint it, you can. Yes, the Digitizer one of the first 3D scanners. But, now you can have one of these yourself, right at home. This will the ultimate tech tinker’s toy, or a engineers prototyper.

To scan an object, place the object on the mini turn-table. Once you set it up, the turn-table will spin. Then, lasers will scan the object, so that when you get on the Makerbot software, you can view a complete 3D rendering of your object. If you aren’t quite happy with your rendering, you can edit it, shape it and add to using other Makerbot software.

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A Sample Of What It Can Do

Overall, the Makerbot Digitizer is a great and amazingly useful useful companion tool to the Makerbot. You can scan anything you want in the size range, then edit them. It’s basically like a duplicator. But better. If you want this, you can preorder it for $1,400 to be delivered in October.

 

 

TOTW: Elon Musk’s Super-Train Hyperloop

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11 years
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Last year, the state of California gave 7.7 billion dollars to a project trying to build a high speed rail-train, California High Speed Rail (quite self-explanatory). But, this money was just enough to build a small section of the train, and in general, wasn’t that promising to the tech tycoons living, working and scheming in Silicon Valley. Elon Musk, the living comparison to Iron Man (though not as super-hero like), had an idea based off of the old 80s concept, the Hyperloop supertrain. The CHSR was just too expensive and slow, estimated to be around 220 mph. The Hyperloop will probably (hopefully) be 750 mph. Beat that, Californian government.

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Elon Musk Himself

While being able to go from San Francisco to LA in half an hour, we can’t help wondering, “How?” Well, as I said before, Musk took his idea off of the old vac-train concept. The train itself is in a tube, and because of California’s earthquake tendency, on pillars. On top of the tube are solar panels to help fuel the train. If it’s that fast, it might as well be green, to.

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The Train

The train, while in action, will ride on top of a floor of pressurized air, letting it, and helping it, gain and gain speed to 800 mph without those pesky sonic booms. To passengers, it will feel like a plane ride. But, after a recent announcement from Musk, we know that it just might be better. First of all, it will be cheaper for passengers. Musk said that the tickets will be cheaper and, not counting the machinery, the pods and tubes will be 6$ billion to build.

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The Tube

Secondly, Musk says that there will be a car option in some of the bigger tubes. You just drive into the train, take off, and be there in 30 min with your car, which can be very useful in cities like LA. Also, you save money, and hassle, from taxis. Overall, the Hyperloop train is so high-tech, cheap, green and revolutionary that I hope it carries through. It has the potential to take over from regular train everywhere. Then again, as Elon said, “Over 1,000 miles, the tube cost starts to become prohibitive, and you don’t want tubes every which way. You don’t want to live in Tube Land.” 

TOTW: Omni Virtual Reality Treadmill

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11 years
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Complete virtual reality is still something for the future, but many companies are trying to make this future come faster, including Google, Oculus Rift, Microsoft and more, but we are often still missing something very important: physical movement. Yes, there is motion-tracking like on an XBOX, but if you want to step into that virtual world and actually walk and jump around it like in Star Trek, you are – or were – out of luck. That’s where Omni comes in.

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The Omni Logo

Omni is basically a treadmill. But better. Much better. Omni lets you roam free in video games that come for the Oculus Rift. No more hitting keys and looking at a screen. Paired up with the Oculus, Omni lets you walk through games such as Skyrim, Minecraft and Call Of Duty, while also looking around. Gaming will be transformed from sitting on a computer to actually sweating and running.

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The Omni Itself

How does Omni take your movement and transport it into the game world? Well, the minute you step into Omni invisible magical leeches – erm, just kidding. Rather, you first don special motion-tracking shoes that give Oculus the information about how to move. It is not really a treadmill in the sense that the floor doesn’t move. But, the curve makes it easy to move around, jump, and run away from angry ogres. Secondly, there is a belt that keeps you from tripping and falling, which will be very important since this is such a new technology. And finally, the software.

You would think that the software for Omni would be really really complicated, due to the fact that you have to translate it into code that the Oculus understands. But it isn’t. The programmers were tricky. They coded it so that your foot movements get translated into key strokes, making it easy on the Oculus. Plus, the Omni software for Kinect for Windows understands many more movements including crouching, jumping and some arm gestures. With Omni and Oculus Rift combined, virtual reality is even closer than ever.

TOTW: Motorola’s Moto X

11 years
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Motorola have finally come to their senses. Recently, they announced the making of their new phone, the Moto X. After previously selling their very, ah, unique Droid Razr, something new will certainly be a money jackpot for Motorola. And from what we know, it would probably be a money maker anyway.

On the outside, the Moto X looks a lot like a HTC One, except a little bit more dull, rather than silver and shiny. Also, Motorola gave it a more rounded look, with rounded corners, curved glass on the edges and a slightly curved back. That gives is a smooth and easy-to-hold feeling while using it. A classic Android looking phone.

And guess what? It is Android!!!!! Well, more specifically, it will come out with Google’s Jelly Bean 4.2.2. For all you Android people out there looking for a new phone, this might be for you. Having goods specs and a good design, it might be one of the top Android phones out there.

TOTW: World’s Largest Building Open In China

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11 years
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You thought your local mall is big? Pah! Having took 3 years to build, the New Century Global Center in China recently opened up to the public and already dubbed it “world’s largest building”. And when China say largest, they mean LARGEST. The NCGC is 19 million square feet, which is big enough to hold 3 Pentagons.

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The Beautiful Entranceway and Building

So what in the world do they do with all that space?  Well, to be exact, they use it to make the best, most awesome building ever. First of all, they have a 4,305,564.17 square feet shopping mall with various shops and boutiques. A shoppers dream. And they do it in style, to. The building was inspired by waves of the ocean and flying sea-gulls, so the shopping mall and lobby take on a Mediterranean theme.

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The Mall

Going along with the “waves of the sea” inspiration, the middle section of the building is a incredible water park. The park is surrounded by a glass dome, but even in that, the managed to fit a 100 ft long artificial coastline, water slides and a fake Mediterranean Village/hotel. This certainly adds “amusement” to NCGC’s giant resumè.

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The Fake Beach

I could go on forever naming things the NCGC has in it, like a ice rink or a theater (which it does have), I would like to move on to the second and only other building in the NCGC complex (does not count in biggest building ranking), the Chengdu Contemporary Arts Centre. The CCAC is, really, a giant modern art museum, complete with a theatre that holds 2,000 people, another stage that holds 1,000 people, and a multipurpose auditorium which holds 1,000 people. World-renowned shows and performances will take place there all year, so that the CCAC can really complete your visit for anyone who likes that arts.

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The Finished Product

Overall, the New Century Global Center really shows that if we want to build big and grand we can. I mean, seriously, this thing even has it’s own artificial sun! But, money and tourism aren’t the only reasons they built paradise so big. Part of it is pollution. They need a way to distract tourists and get out of the heavily polluted air. It’s a step, and in this case and really BIG step.

TOTW: WigWag Home Customizable Sensors

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11 years
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There are many great products out there to help make life easier and do certain chores for you, such as the thermostat Nest. But, none really cover all the small things, like turning off the sprinklers when you walk by. Not surprisingly, Kickstarter holds one candidate to fix that, WigWag. WigWag goes even farther than that, though.

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The Logo

Physically, WigWag is a combination of sensors built in a way to be able to use any of them. It is built in a square casing, slightly smaller than your hand. That is the perfect size (it could always be smaller) to fit under beds or any other place for the main set. Smaller sensors or decor can be added on or connected to, like lights, so that WigWag can regulate more of your house.

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The Body Of WigWag

The software (i.e. the iPhone app) for WigWag works a lot like IFTTT (If This Then That). Except WigWag, it is When/Then. There are many (more if you add your own sensors) option for both When and Then. An example is When motion detected, Then brighten lights. This includes things like Tweet and Text, because we could always use a little bit more time on Twitter.

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Different Sensors It Can Connect To

Overall, WigWag is a great tool to make our lives simpler. If you want your own WigWag, you have to get it before August 18th when it goes off Kickstarter successfully (it has already passed it’s goal by 100,000). Hopefully it can follow through on it’s purpose, because people don’t want to have to do things, they want to Wag it.

TOTW: MYO Gesture Control Armband

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11 years
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Gesture control is a rising technology. It means to replace remotes and mouses, and is currently booming with developers. Leap Motion is a recently released gesture controller for computers, but Thalmic Labs wanted to make a gesture controller for many things, not just computers. So, they made MYO.

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MYO is, basically, an armband. With that on, you can control many things like iPhones, toys, and drones. You use it like how you would expect to use it. To control your object, say, drone, you move your arm up, down and side to side. It replaces the movement of a joystick or controller. Or, for other applications, specific movements with your fingers like turning an imaginary dial to turn up music. Developers are currently working on or applying for a developer API, which lets them make their own apps for MYO.

MYO-armband

How does MYO work? Well, MYO can read the electrical impulses in your arm, along with the position and movement. Technically, that means it knows what you want to do a millisecond BEFORE you do it. This capability has developers even more exited because it allows you to seamlessly interaction between the device and the armband.

MYO is probably the first real gesture control that works fast on tons of devices. Anywhere. This product has great potencial, because the more people work on it, and the longer they work on it, the more amazing ideas and apps come out of it. They could even make MYOs for other parts of your body. Then include Occlus Rift, and you have a full-body fully immersive game system. Who knows?

TOTW: Open Source Stuffed Animals Squishable

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11 years
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Social media is great for a lot of things, such as keeping in touch with friends or searching for interesting articles, but it has never yet been used like the way Zoe Fraade-Blanar and her husband Aaron Glazer use it. They are the founders of the 11 person company Squishable, who are out to make the cutest and most diverse set of stuffed animals to ever set foot on the market. They even made a Squishable Axolotl. Never heard of it? Point proven.

The Squishable Axolotl

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The Axolotl

So how do stuffed animals have anything to do with social media? Well, Squishable uses social media sites like Facebook to take advice and search for new ideas for their ever-growing collection of plushes! As an example, here is a post they did on Facebook last Wednesday:

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As you can see, Squishable takes the public into account, which greatly boost the customer satisfaction. Squishable is probably the only toy company that does that, which explains it’s huge following. Plus, I personally think Squishables come out better than competing brands. But that’s not all Squishable has to do with the public.

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Squishable Cuthulhu

Open Squish is Squishable’s biggest advantage over other toy companies. Open Squish is a program where anyone over the age of 18 to can submit a design for a future Squishable! First, you can download a template and use that as a base for your design. Then, you upload your design to Squishable’s website to be approved. If it is approved, your design gets put into a contest, in which people can vote on all the approved designs for the best one of the week. All of those will be prototyped and the few successful prototypes will be made into Squishables (mini or regular)! You can even look at and critique the prototypes. If it is not as successful or has something wrong, it could end up as a Limited Edition, where only 1,000 will be made commercially available. Plus, the prize for getting your design picked is $500 ($250 for mini), a $100 ($50 for mini) Squishable gift card, and your name on the tag if picked.

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Squishable is probably the best and biggest stuffed animal company out there. Any animal you can think of has already been made or prototyped. They even have some food, like waffles or bacon. But seriously, Squishable uses social media and the public to their own advantage, securing success. Like no toy company has done before.

 

TOTW: Innovative Lytro Camera

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11 years
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This has got to be the most awesome camera that ever set foot on the market. There are great cameras that has WiFi, interesting filters (which Lytro has), and great specs, but Lytro is just out of this world. And galaxy. And universe. What makes it so special is it’s in innovative design and interesting and new capabilities. Also it’s untraditional shape may change cameras forever.

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The Slick Lytro

The design of the Lytro features a square body, with a grid-like grip at the end. On one side of the grip, there are 2 controls: a button for the shudder release (the button for taking the picture) and a row of touch-sensitive squares for adjusting zoom. On the back side, there is a touch screen used for setting up photos and doing basically everything a regular camera does. On the front, the lens resides like a hobbit hole door. And just to put icing on the cake, the top 3/4 of Lytro has a slick aluminum housing available.

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The Touchscreen

The software of the Lytro is really what puts it out by itself. First of all, it has a couple ingenious filters, such as through glass, a carnival painting and more. But the most important, the most amazing, the most spectacular feature is that Lytro can make GIFs. Well, sort of. What Lytro can do is change the perspective of the photo after the photo is taken. Then, you can change that into a GIF. But if you don’t like the perspective of the photo, or want to change it slightly, Lytro can really help. Plus, all the filters are also “living”. To see some examples, click on this link.

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The Glass Filter

Not only is Lytro a great camera, it’s new app allows you to wirelessly upload photos to your phone, then instantly share them on varios social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Also, Lytro has it’s own photo sharing network the allows you to see other peoples work. Then, if you want to email it, Lytro make a GIF of the photo rotating perspective. Lytro truly thought of everything. They even have a slick carrying case and purse. Who knows? This might be the camera of the future.

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