Filed under: Summer Fun

Asahi Beer has experimented with robot bartenders in the past, but it looks to have really outdone itself with its new Mr. Asahi bot, which just made its public debut at Selfridges in the UK. Apparently, the robot was built in about 200 hours and spent a full six months fine-tuning its bartending skills, which includes being able to serve customers in less than two minutes. That’s done with the aid of a discreetly-hidden PC that controls the compressed air and the robot’s various switching mechanisms, not to mention its pleasant demeanor.

Be sure to head on past the break for a video of the bot in action courtesy of Channel Flip.

[Via Tech Digest, image courtesy of Asahi Beer]

Continue reading Robot Bartender Serves Drinks In Less Than Two Minutes

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The Brickhouse Child Locator by Brickhouse is a device that lets you keep a constant watch on your child in public areas. This device works by attaching a tag to your child’s clothes or shoes to work as a homing device should your child leave the safety zone, the Brickhouse Child Locator will alert you when that happens. The portable tracking device will beep, vibrate, and visually lead you to your (tagged) child quickly and easily. This device also comes with a “panic button” on the homing tag for your child to use in the event of an emergency. The Brickhouse Child Locator with Distance Alert is priced at $189.95.

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Filed under: Audio/Video, TV

Roku’s Netflix Player got off to a hot start after launching just over a month ago, and apparently its creator has big plans for the plainly designed $99 box. According to a recent report over on Forbes, Tim Twerdahl, Roku’s vice president of consumer products, has affirmed that a routine software update would be hitting later this year to enable content to be fetched and streamed from other “big name” providers. Regrettably, the conversation ended there, so there’s absolutely no telling which “providers” he’s referring to. Still, we’re certainly intrigued by the idea of this thing becoming more versatile in the coming months, but wouldn’t the name have to be tweaked at the very least? [Via Silicon Alley Insider]

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A ten person line has been spotted outside Apple’s Fifth Avenue retail store as of this Friday afternoon. As ample supply is expected, it seems unnecessary to be waiting a full week outside the store. However, the lineup is acknowledged by both security and Apple employees, some who have left the store temporarily to talk to those in line. Chairs and other apparel make it clear that they are ready for the seven-day wait. No celebrities have been spotted this time (last year Greg Packer was there). The reason for the early waiting (camping?) could be that customers are required to activate their iPhones in-store this time around, as opposed to walking out quicky with their purchases, it is estimated that the time spent processing each customer will take at least 10 minutes versus a fraction of that time previously. Still, it’s crazy

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Filed under: Summer Fun

Getting your ashes shot into space when you die is so 2007. The space fad for 2008 is weddings! Or at least signing up for them. A Japanese company called First Advantage has joined forces with an American aerospace firm called Rocketplane to offer weddings 100 kilometers (62 miles) above earth. First Advantage now joins Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic in the space-marriage racket.

The $2 million covers not only the flight on the Rocket Plane XP, but also a ground-based party where friends and family can watch a live stream of the zero-G ceremony. The company will even even throw in a wedding dress! The first ceremonies will take place in 2011, beginning with the wedding of Cindy Cashman, entrepreneur and author, and Mitch Walling. [Source: Daily Mail]

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STARMAC is a multi vehicle test bed used to demonstrate new concepts in multi-agent control on a real-world platform. The fleet, consisting of six quadrotor vehicles that can fly indoors and outdoors as well as being able to carry computing and sensing resources sufficient for autonomous operations. Among the computing resources on board are a low level microcontroller board called the Robostix, the Gumstix Verdex for positive estimation and control, a PXA270 based single board computer and a PC-104 computer running Linux(Fedora) for onboard processing of vision information, optimal path planning and other high level automation tasks. These vehicles will be able to be used in real-world application with enough computing resources and excess lift capacity to get the job done… autonomously.

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The S41 is a mini-v which can handle full versions of Microsoft software applications such as Office. A mini-v is a new category of mobile device that is in between a large tablet PC and a small PDA. Since it can function as both a tablet PC as well as a laptop it is considered to be a mini version of both; hence the term mini-v. The S41 in tablet mode is a decent gaming device, having buttons on the side of its screen for that as well as a d-pad and mouse pointer on the left, and on the right there is left and right click and the scroll up ad down hardware keys which can be bound to an action. Specifications in the full post.

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Filed under: Cell Phones

It’s been a long, long time since we’ve heard from Germany’s “Future Store” — the ultra-futuristic German grocery store that might have sprung directly from the Sprawl trilogy — but they’ve got a new feature we thought you might be interested in. Shoppers in the store can now use camera-equipped cellphones (i.e., cellphones) to snap pictures of item barcodes, and then download the information at the checkout when they’re finished shopping. The system totals all of your purchases into one big, nasty barcode which you then scan and pony up cash (or cards, or fingerprints, or magical rainbow juice) for. It’s unclear how to store handles shoppers who don’t scan everything they’ve got in their cart, but if it’s anything like our favorite books, it’s not pretty.

[Via PHONE Magazine]

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Archos, the French consumer electronics company has announced in a joint statement with SFR that they will be teaming up to offer a 3G-enabled PMP by the end of 2008. The agreement Archos and SFR have signed is to integrate 3G+ HSDPA data modems into Archos players. With WIFI and now 3G, users will have the ability to download music on the move at all times.

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Filed under: Cell Phones, Green Tech

Cell phones are valuable things to have at all-day music festivals. It’s awful easy to lose your friends in the massive crowds and, with bands popping up on multiple stages all day long, it’s important to keep current on who’s on where and when. But long days of rocking, and spotty reception at a back-country venue, can leave batteries flat in hours. The solution? More dancing — at least it is if you have a new kinetic charger strapped to your arm.

It’s called “dancecharge”and had its debut last week at the Glastonbury Music Festival in Somerset, England. The device itself is about the size of a pack of cards and, through a series of magnets and other high-tech wizardry, can convert the rhythmic motions of dance into some additional juice for your handset. No, the blood pressure cuff design won’t win you any style points as you show your moves, but being the only one able to call for a cab at the end of the day could make you a hero. Take it to the Sustainable Dance Club in Holland, and you’ll be the most earth-friendly raver out there! [Source: MSNBC]

Continue reading To Charge Your Cell Phone, Just Dance, Dance, Dance

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