The U.K. government has decided to make the non-personal data it holds available for web developers to create a new wave of public applications. It’s a bold move which will open up more data than even the U.S. government holds at its Data.gov. The new Data.gov.uk site is officially launched today by Web creator Sir Tim Berners Lee and been has been running for the last six months in beta with almost 3,000 data sets available. By contrast, the U.S. site Data.gov, has less than 1,000 data sets. So far over 2,400 developers have registered to test the site and 10 applications built. These include PlanningAlerts, a free service that emails you if someone has put in a planning application to build near your house and FillThatHole, which lets people report potholes and other road hazards across the UK. → Read More
Do you have a credit card? A bobbin of fishing line? A bolt? A drill? Tape? Then do yourself a favor and make yourself a credit card grappling hook. What else are you doing at midnight on a Wednesday? → Read More
There are so many music search engines out there based on YouTube music videos (Songza comes to mind) that it was only a matter of time until YouTube created its own music playlist maker. The YouTube Music Discovery Project just launched quietly out of TestTube (YouTube’s labs). The page is a search box on top of which says, “Find>Mix>Watch,” and once you enter a name, you hit the “Disco” button to find music.
You can enter any music group or artist, and a playlist pops up, along with a thumbnail video and a description of the band. You can find related artists, create a mixtape, and save playlists. As you are listening to music and watching videos, it is easy to add and delete songs. → Read More
Chances are you already have some furniture made of wood pulp and sawdust in your home — all that Ikea stuff? Yeah. But this is a little different. Some brave furniteers (?) decided that the texture of raw wood bits and resin was too attractive to leave in the workshop, so they put together a few casts and made a coffee table and some stools with it. I think it turned out quite nicely, and as they note at Make, the way the legs are attached organically to the table is particularly striking. → Read More
Adeo Ressi’s Founder Institute is going international. This Spring, the startup mentorship program will be expanding to Singapore, Paris, Los Angeles, and Denver, meaning that the Founder Institute is now active in nine cities worldwide. Interested entrepreneurs can apply starting tonight, with an early application deadline of February 15 2010 and a final deadline of February 28. These four new programs will start simultaneously this spring.
Ressi, who founded the program, says that the Founder Institute is the first incubator program to expand beyond the United States (though there are other entrepreneur-focused programs like Seedcamp). As the Institute grows, it comes closer to Ressi’s goal of training 1000 founders a year. Conservatively, he think that this year the nine programs in aggregate will graduate over 700 founders and 500 companies, though he wouldn’t be surprised if the tally is more like 750 companies. → Read More
If you’re a parent, you know that kids love them some wooden tracks. I’m serious. Kids could would totally spend hours whining about tracks and then, when they get them, refuse to play with them. That’s why I love Ikea’s wooden train set which costs like $10 and can make a few nice configurations.
But how many configurations can you make? According to this dude you can make nine permutations, shown above. In fact, with four extra curved pieces you could create 130 permutations which is quite a treat. → Read More
If you are going to try to steal Apple’s thunder just before its big Tablet announcement, you are going to have to do a little bit better than E-Ink Sudoku. Amazon is obviously concerned that the upcoming Apple Tablet, which will be able to function as a lush, full-color electronic reader for newspapers, books, and magazines might overshadow the black-and-white Kindle with its dot-matrix feel. So what does it do? It matches Apple’s rev-share with app developers by raising the royalty it gives publishers to 70 percent, starts to practically give away Kindles, and opens up the Kindle to developers.
That’s right, there is now a Kindle Development Kit and there will soon be Kindle Apps. So instead of just books, you will be able to play Sudoku and scroll through interactive Zagat guides. Maybe you’ll be able to play Space Invaders or Pong, if the E-Ink technology the screen is based on can ever refresh fast enough for you to shoot the aliens. → Read More
A new product being developed in London will help the deaf to hear, using vibrations which can be felt through the skin. While the technology is still rudimentary, it has exciting potential for people who are completely deaf or deaf and blind. → Read More
So it wasn’t all bleak last year, SSD manufacturers experienced a 14% increase in sales, along with a total of over 11 million drives sold. That’s a whole lot of memory chips. → Read More
One problem with all those external drives out there is that they aren’t really stackable or easy to tell apart if you have more than one of the same. There are a thousand and one ways around this, of course, but can you really tell me that there is a better way to differentiate your storage media than by sticking each in its own 80s-kitsch VHS tape and sleeve? Seriously. I know I say “greatest thing of all time” with great frequency (once already today, in fact), but I can’t help doing it again in this case. I’d want a Transformers: The Movie one for sure, though. [via The Daily What and Technabob] → Read More
Hesitant about ordering an Amazon Kindle? The online retailer is apparently making a very tempting proposition to some of its customers: go ahead and order a Kindle, and if you don’t like it, you’ll get your money back — and get to keep the device. In other words, if you’re not satisfied you’ll get a free Kindle (and an Amazon-branded cover). Talk about putting your money where your mouth is.
The screenshots we’ve received look legitimate, but we haven’t been able to find any mention of this offer on Twitter or elsewhere (this seems like the sort of thing people would be going nuts over). We’ve contacted Amazon for confirmation. If you see it yourself, let us know in the comments. Update: Amazon has confirmed that it’s real. → Read More
Sounds like technology is making a difference in the lives of the victims of the Haitian earthquakes. Several different companies that produce products that use solar power have been sending equipment as part of the aid mission. Among the equipment are lights for hospitals and solar panels to help with water purification. → Read More
Comcast is in discussions with partners to offer a music streaming service to its customers as an à la carte offering, we’ve heard from multiple sources. For an additional monthly charge of $5 or more, users will be able to stream on demand music online via a website and on their TV via their cable box.
For the last 18 months a Danish ISP called TDC has been offering customers in that country the ability to stream music online as part of their basic ISP packages ranging from $47 to $65 per month. From what we’ve heard from our friends in Denmark, the service is very popular.
The Comcast service would offer users the ability to stream music without any additional charges. Services like MySpace Music, Spotify and MOG (and the late iMeem) offer similar services today, but not through the cable box. → Read More
Buried all the way at the bottom of the Wall Street Journal’s latest piece about the Apple Tablet is a very interesting nugget of information. Apple is apparently gearing up to launch a cloud-based iTunes replacement called iTunes.com as soon as this June, WSJ states citing sources familiar with the matter.
Yesterday, we ran a guest post by Michael Robertson, the former CEO of MP3.com, who laid out Apple’s cloud-based media strategy going forward. An iTunes-in-the-cloud offering is the central part of this, and could happen “almost over night,” as Robertson laid out. And late last year we wrote about how a move to the cloud was inevitable for iTunes. The planets seem to be aligning for this to happen sooner rather than later. Apple’s recent purchase of the music startup Lala has potentially made this possible, because of that team’s talent, if nothing else. But there’s more. → Read More
Okay, this is the most dedication I’ve ever seen to model-making. Even more than those hentai fanatics and their Rei Ayanami figures. This guy spent I don’t know how long making a ~1/6th size model of a SU-27.
I started clicking through the pages, thinking there would be around 10. Spoiler alert: there are 83. And nearly a thousand photos, documenting every tiny, tiny rivet and detail being done.
Modelers, get ready to spend a couple hours in increasing astonishment. For the rest of you, I collected a few choice shots. → Read More
We did a little roast beast this year on Christmas, and although it turned out great, there was a huge amount of consternation involving variations in oven temperature, at what intervals to re-baste, and that sort of thing.
If only there were a precision cooking instrument in which I could put a vacuum-packed hunk of meat and have it suspended in a perfect mass of temperature-controlled water — oh, there is? → Read More
A new movie came out on DVD this week called The Invention Of Lying. It’s co-written, co-directed, and co-starring Golden Globe host Ricky Gervais and looks mildly entertaining enough that I want to rent it. So I load up Netflix to add it to my queue — but wait, according to Netflix, it’s not available until February 16. Why? Because it’s a Warner movie and as such is subject to Netflix’s idiotic new 28-day rule (they can’t rent Warner new releases on Netflix until after they’ve been available for purchase in retail store for 28 days). Well that’s just great. So all hope is lost, right? Nope. iTunes has it available for rent today.
Because Apple did not agree to enter into a deal with Hollywood that restricts them from renting movies during this 28-day window, it was available not only to buy but also to rent this past Tuesday on iTunes, the same day it was released on DVD. While iTunes has its own series of somewhat convoluted rules with regard to rentals (for example, some movies are restricted from being rented when airing on premium cable channels like HBO), in this instance, they hands down beat Netflix at their own game: rentals. And thanks to this new 28-day window, which the other major studios will undoubtedly have interest in getting from Netflix as well, this is something we could see a lot more of: iTunes, Amazon, Xbox Live, and yes, even Blockbuster Online being the go-to sources to rent new releases. → Read More
File this under “sounds too good to be true”. A Chinese artist has designed a projector into a clamshell, with a built in speaker. The unbelievable part? It’s only $50. I question what type of quality you are going to get from a projector that only costs $50. → Read More
You’ve probably seen OXO cooking implements on your many trips to Bed Bath and Beyond — you know, they’re usually grippy, silicone-enhanced spatulas and the like. It seems that OXO is looking to expand their ergonomic empire to the gadget realm, although they’re starting mighty small. This little cord caddy ain’t exactly headline news, but it’s nice to know that OXO is trying its hand at stuff I’m likely to use. It’s die-cast zinc with a nonslip base, useful for keeping a couple USB cords available on your desk without having them slip back behind it. Should be available in your neighborhood next month. → Read More
I’ll be doing a live interview with Lead Programmer Casey Hudson and Bioware’sDr. Greg Zeschuk tomorrow at 10:00am EST and I’d like to know what you guys would like me to ask them about Mass Effect 2 the latest Bioware title. → Read More
