Acquire a transhuman Compass Sense with a kit-built anklet

The North Paw is a kit for an anklet that subtly vibrates your on the side of your ankle that faces north, so that you attain a kind of subliminal “Compass Sense” like those possessed by certain birds. What makes it way more awesome than a regular compass? Persistence. With a regular compass the owner only knows the direction when he or she checks it. With this compass, the information enters the wearer’s brain at a subconscious level, giving the wearer a true feeling of absolute direction, rather than an intellectual knowledge as with a regular compass. Because of the plasticity of the brain, it has been shown that most wearers gain a new sense of absolute direction, giving them a superhuman ability to navigate their surroundings. The original idea for North Paw comes from research done at University of Osnabrück in Germany. In this study, rather than an anklet, the researchers used a belt. They wore the belt non-stop for six weeks, and reported successive stages of integration. North Paw ( Thanks, Lucas )

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Acquire a transhuman Compass Sense with a kit-built anklet

Bunnie Huang is building a laptop

Virtuoso hardware hacker Bunnie Huang is building an open hardware laptop. Want. We started the design in June, and last week I got my first prototype motherboards, hot off the SMT line. It’s booting linux, and I’m currently grinding through the validation of all the sub-components. I thought I’d share the design progress with my readers. Of course, a feature of a build-it-yourself laptop is that all the design documentation is open, so others of sufficient skill and resources can also build it. The hardware and its sub-components are picked so as to make this the most practically open hardware laptop I could create using state of the art technology. You can download, without NDA, the datasheets for all the components, and key peripheral options are available so it’s possible to build a complete firmware from source with no opaque blobs. Building my Own Laptop

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Bunnie Huang is building a laptop

Major Brooklyn Gang Taken Down by Cops on Facebook and Also by Extreme Stupidity

In the second season of the nerdiest adaptation of The Wire to date, New York City police have busted up a violent 41-member gang in Brooklyn using—you guessed it—Facebook and Twitter. Again. More »

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Major Brooklyn Gang Taken Down by Cops on Facebook and Also by Extreme Stupidity

Tablets Go Head-to-Head on Battery Life, iPad Comes Out On Top

Consumer weblog “Which?” tested the most popular 7- and 10-inch tablets to compare battery life, and found quite a bit of variation. If you’re looking for a new tablet, here are some things to watch out for. More »

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Tablets Go Head-to-Head on Battery Life, iPad Comes Out On Top

This Tiny Flash Drive Broadcasts Its Contents Over Wi-Fi

Besides greater capacities, faster transfer speeds, and novel designs, there hasn’t been much recent innovation with USB flash drives. Which is why the Paketta from King Jim is such a welcome break. With built-in Wi-Fi B, G, N hardware it can wirelessly broadcast its contents to PCs and mobile devices. More »

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This Tiny Flash Drive Broadcasts Its Contents Over Wi-Fi

Gigapixel images of Charles Babbage’s Difference Engine #2

Greg sez, “This project is using a number of computational photography techniques to document Charles Babbage’s ‘Difference Engine No 2’ for the Computer History Museum in Mountain View. There are interactive gigapixel images for the four cardinal views of the device available to view.” Babbage Difference Engine in Gigapixel ( Thanks, Greg ! )

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Gigapixel images of Charles Babbage’s Difference Engine #2

Covert assassin weapons from North Korea

CNN reports on the arsenal discovered on the North Korean assassin arrested in Seoul last year: a poison-dart pen, a pen-pistol, a flashlight-gun, and more. Disguised to look like a Parker ballpoint pen, it contains a poison needle and is practically impossible to identify as a weapon. The second pen shoots a poison-filled bullet which penetrates the skin and releases the toxin and the third weapon is a flashlight, loaded with up to three bullets. They all look completely innocuous but all three will kill… … That target was anti-North Korea activist, Park Sang-hak, who has since been given round-the-clock police protection by South Korean authorities. We showed Park the footage of the weapons intended for him. He was shocked. ‘Poison’ pen mightier than sword for would-be North Korean assassin ( Thanks, polymorf! )

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Covert assassin weapons from North Korea

Review: 3M Streaming Projector is good, but not perfect

What happens when you combine a 4.3 x 4.2 x 2 inch projector with a wealth of streaming content services? You get the handheld, portable Streaming Projector by 3M and Roku. The two companies have teamed up to offer the best of each of their worlds in one compact package. While overall it’s a useful device, it does have a couple of kinks that need to be worked out. The 3M Streaming Projector is a neat idea, especially in a world overrun by set-top boxes. Pocket projectors have been around for a while now, so this isn’t an entirely new concept. But rather than having to connect the projector to an external device—like a smartphone or computer, the included Roku streaming stick provides the content. The projector also features dual-band Wi-Fi, so it has the same functionality as a Roku box, though its output is blown up all over the wall. Design The projector is rated at 60 lumens. The 3M Streaming Projector is easy to cart around. It’s small enough stick in a laptop bag or a purse to bring over to a friend’s house. The device features two volume buttons, as well as buttons to power on the device, sift through settings, and check on things like battery power and brightness. On one side of the projector, there’s a plug for the power supply, as well as an audio out to plug in headphones or an external speaker system. On the other side, there’s a wheel to adjust the focus of the picture to ensure that movies and slide shows aren’t blurry. The Streaming Projector can be mounted on a tripod via a ventral screw-hole, should there be a lack of tables high enough to properly display the picture on a blank wall. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Review: 3M Streaming Projector is good, but not perfect

The Taliban Mistakenly Outed Every Single Person on Its Mailing List

If you didn’t already know that the Taliban had a mailing list, your mind is already blown. But here’s a solid one-upper: the Taliban spokesperson accidentally CC’d everyone on that list in an otherwise pedestrian email, outing some people who likely didn’t want the world to know they were subscribers. More »

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The Taliban Mistakenly Outed Every Single Person on Its Mailing List

Thieves Grab 3,600 iPad Minis Worth $1.5M In JFK Airport Heist

Apple’s iPad mini seems to be a success , and that has attracted the criminal element’s attention. According to the New York Post , a shipment of Apple’s iPad mini, numbering 3,600 devices and with a total value of $1.5 million, was taken from JFK airport from the same location that a group stole $5 million in cash and $900,000 in jewelry in 1978. The thieves apparently only got a fraction of their total target, since they had to leave three pallets behind when an airport worker returned from dinner and questioned their actions. Before that, however, they had already managed to grab two full pallets, which still adds up to $1.5 million in goods as mentioned above. Police suspect an inside job, but no suspects have been apprehended as of yet. The iPad minis had just reached the U.S. from Apple’s assembly partners in China, and were destined for delivery across the U.S. Apple is known to be shipping out its first batch of LTE iPad minis this week, so it’s possible this shipment was part of that rollout. If so, it’s possible that means 3,600 expectant Apple fans are going to be disappointed, but Apple could also very theoretically redirect stock destined for store shelves to make up the difference. The whole job was reportedly pulled off by just two guys. Fencing the stolen goods might be difficult, since posting an ad on Craigslist for 3,600 iPads might look a little suspicious, but it’s still a remarkable take for a couple of guys who apparently just drove a truck to the airport.

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Thieves Grab 3,600 iPad Minis Worth $1.5M In JFK Airport Heist