My buddy Lou tells this story: he was with his girlfriend at the time and he got a call from a couple they knew. They couple invited them over for “boardgames and wine” and Lou said “Sure.” Then his girlfriend told him that they were not going over for boardgames and wine because, in that couple’s special code, “boardgames and wine” as some sort of weird partner swapping game involving lots of… → Read More
The SmartFish aircraft is a concept vehicle created by an engineering firm in Germany, based on the aerodynamic shape of a fish. So far, they have only built a remote control version of the aircraft, however a prototype is in the works. The prototype will be built from kevlar and carbon fiber, however the designers expect the vehicle to be relatively inexpensive to build. → Read More
Remember that OLPC design that had two touchscreens joined at the hip, kind of like we saw with the Courier later? Yeah, it got canned, but the basic design seems to have lived on in this MSI concept. → Read More
The common wall socket is, despite what you may think, a very well-engineered piece of work. There’s no way to put plugs in wrong, it’s difficult to electrocute yourself, and they put through plenty of juice as well as grounding your device. Ain’t nothing wrong with that, but people seem set on fixing it anyway. The pull-out looked good, but the Node was a disaster waiting to happen.
This… → Read More
Although the concept here is good, I can’t help thinking that if you need a Band-Aid (elastic bandage, sorry) longer than an inch or so, you probably need something more than a Band-Aid. Except for things like grass and paper cuts, injuries more than an inch in any direction generally don’t just go in a straight line.
And what about covering up hickies? → Read More
Product differentiation is getting more and more difficult these days. The lozenge-shaped, touch-enabled, all-purpose computing device is fast on its way, and while things like the Courier are still serving up surprises, you could be forgiven for thinking most of these big blank screens are pretty similar. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised to see some smart additions to the tablet form… → Read More
Apparently this phone is getting ready for a big Muay Thai match. It’s a Vertu—“vertu” is “virture” in French!—designed by one Norihiko Inoue. No, you cannot buy it, I just thought it looked neat. → Read More
Yum. Ice cream bars and external data solutions are, without a doubt, two of my favorite things. Actually, I don’t back up all that often (I’m in the cloud, baby!) and frozen confections give me headaches. But this concept actually makes a whole lot of sense and it looks good, to boot. → Read More
When appliance heavyweight Electrolux has a design contest, you know there’s going to be some crazy stuff coming out it. This year is no exception, as designer Ludovic Peperstraete has come up with his “Cooking in the Futur” design, which suggests that 90 years from now we’ll be using laser beams to cook food instead of gas or convection ovens.
Do you hear me? Lasers, people! → Read More
So due to the financial crisis, you’ve lost your mcmansion, the wife left and took the kids, the bank took the car, and all you’ve got left are your clothes, and maybe your bicycle. Don’t despair, you can still look stylish while being homeless! → Read More
If you’ve got about 40 of the same keyboard lying around (aww, I only have 37!) then might I suggest fashioning them all into a chair of some type? That’s what designer Dante Bonuccelli did with his “Text-ile” chair for the 2009 UMUL (Use More, Use Less) workshop in Milan, Italy. → Read More
Designed to battle internet addiction, the Support Radio concept from designer Joe Malia is aimed at “partners, parents and kids struggling to cope with the non-involvement of an excessive computer user in the home.” The idea is that, for instance, if your spouse is addicted to Facebook and/or Twitter, you record a message into your radio and then someone else on the other side of the world… → Read More
Wading through miles of devices gives tech journalists a unique outlook on what exactly everybody’s doing wrong, but it’s not always possible to take all that and turn it around into something that’s exactly right. TechCrunch is working on a simple, cheap tablet PC (with some success) because there’s nothing that fills that role right now. T3 felt the same way about mobiles, and has decided to… → Read More
If the river were lager and I were a duck, I’d buy a Trufill concept device designed for stadiums that can fill ten pints of beer in ten seconds and drink it all up. This amazing new concept uses magic and space technology to fill up glasses from the bottom up. How? I don’t know. No one knows. All we know is that we have to go visit FoodBev next week and if this amazing system is true… → Read More
Blast has a story about the cars of the future, a collection of kickass concept vehicles from all over the world – well, mostly Europe and Japan but there is one Buick. American makers are busy figuring out how to get a cup holder next to the gas pedal. One interesting little car is the Mini SUV with Center Globe. The Globe is a glowing orb that shows most of your GPS and read-out functions… → Read More
The design studio of Art Lebedev, perhaps most well known for their pocket-melting Optimus OLED keyboard, has been working on some WiMax handset concepts for Scartel, a Russian wireless carrier with plans to blanket Moscow and St Petersburg in WiMax coverage by the end of 2008. Though it’s likely little more than an idea at this point, the penned out concept specs are drool worthy. Tucked… → Read More
Normally my gadgets run out of juice at the most inopportune times, so it’d be a bit agitating for me to have to play with a yo-yo in order to charge them up again. But if I were a yo-yo enthusiast to begin with, the iYo would almost certainly be fully charged. See, the iYo concept uses induction to charge a battery inside of the apparatus. You simply plug a USB-chargeable device into the… → Read More
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1735797252 There’s a reason the “wearable vehicle” concept has only taken off in games and insane stunts. It’s probably that part where there’s heavy machinery attached to your body and if you take a turn wrong, it’ll tear your limbs off. Let’s hear what the creator has to say about the death machine pictured… → Read More
Conceptual products are fun. There’s no denying that. Everybody wants to see a car that looks like a jet, spaceship or rocket. Just the problem is, more often than not, the concept car does not exist in real life. A recent article by Kontra alleges that concept products are actually bad for the company, citing the success of Apple as evidence. Apple internalizes all of its concepts, even going… → Read More
I’m not crazy about touchscreen keyboards — BUT! – I could probably make an exception for the Plica, if it ever comes out in real life. It’s a folding Nintendo DS-style device that can be used in landscape or portrait mode with one or both screens. It’s brainchild of industrial designer James Piatt, who’s thoughtfully made the hinges of the device into a USB port and a headphone… → Read More
That watch is weird – I’m Brian Fellow! The TX54 took runner up in the Timex 2154 Future of Time competition. It’s a concept piece billed as “a disposable timepiece that is worn on the user’s thumbnail. While its translucency makes it blend seamlessly with the hand, a selection of text color options and a glow feature that activates on command make it easy to read.” It appears that you… → Read More
Here’s a pencil-tiny cell phone (currently just a concept) for people with small pockets. From the looks of the device, there doesn’t appear to be much in the way of gobbledygook to confuse the older segment of society — except that they’d have to either squint or do that thing where they lift up their glasses and pull the thing WAY away from their face to see what’s… → Read More
Am I crazy to admit that I actually enjoy the look of the design of this remote, called sPult? I don’t know how well it’d work—some of Yanko’s commenters have eviscerated it—but compared to some of the horrendous remotes I’ve used, it looks great. → Read More
I’m not one to get excited over clocks (I like corkscrews!), but this is pretty interesting. It takes the concept of the sundial to a mechanized future. Three lamps on concentric rings circle the peg in the middle, giving a shadow to represent hours, minutes, and seconds. It’s quite charming, even though it’s just a concept now. If this goes into production, I’m getting… → Read More
I’m all for future conjecture, but this kind of stuff just clouds the issue. Will we have e-paper phones? Sure. Will we use nanotech? Sure. But will we have them soon and will we be using them in the same candybar form factor as this strange video suggests? Probably not. Stuff will get weird in a few years, I don’t doubt it, but I don’t think we’ll be waving apples at our… → Read More
[photopress:draft_3727_big.gif.jpg,full,left]The Polaroid brand refuses to die. Though you can’t get film for your camera anymore, Polaroid is all about using retro design and nostalgia to keep the name alive, and this clever mini digital photo frame is a great example. It’s a concept, but one that could enter production soon, if they can come up with a cheap enough way to run it. → Read More
[photopress:gravia_w_person_cutout_bw_400.jpg,full,center] You can take your solar power and scrub it. Solar power is great if you live in, I dunno, daylightistan (aka Los Angeles), but for those of us up here in the Northwest, it’s not practical. But we have gravity, and this lovely gravity-powered lamp will work just fine. Invented by student Clay Moulton, the lamp is primed, then slowly… → Read More
http://progressive.playstream.com/playstream/progressive/flashplayers/FLVPlayer.swf Another concept device using a very cool system of see-through rollerballs and a back button to do just about anything. They had a few mock-ups and it really makes sense once you see how smoothly everything works with just a ball. Maybe the next iPod can get a scroll-ball? → Read More
We like Steampunk. For those not familiar with the term, it’s the name given to a modding movement that aims to recapture the warmth and style of the H.G. Wells and Jules Verne era, but with modern electronics. Computers and cellphones and other personal gadgets have all been modded with wood and iron and gears and valves to attain a Victorian-era look, while retaining all of their… → Read More
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