A time-lapse video shows the multitude of quakes off Japan before and since the massive 9.0 quake of March 11.
Steve Jobs Is The Biological Brother Of Homer Simpson’s Mother [Fun Facts]
Here’s a weird fun fact for you on a slow news Tuesday: there’s a very real familial link between Apple CEO Steve Jobs and TV’s Homer Simpson. Here’s how.
As some of you may know, Steve Jobs was put up for adoption as an infant. What you may not know is that Steve Jobs’ birth parents are Joanne Carole Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali, who put him up for adoption because they weren’t married at the time.
Later, when they married, they had another child: Mona Jandali. However, Jandali abandoned both Mona and her mother when Mona was five. Joanne eventually remarried, at which point Mona decided to take her stepfather’s name and became Mona Simpson.
In the 80s, Mona’s career as a novelist flourished, and she published several successful novels. During this time, she also married television writer and producer Richard Appel, who worked on The Simpsons and appropriated his wife’s name for that of Homer Simpson’s biological mother in the episode “Mother Simpson”.
To summarize: Steve Jobs is the biological brother of the real-life inspiration for Homer Simpson’s mother. Or, put a more fanciful way, Apple’s CEO is Homer Simpson’s spiritual uncle.
The more you know, eh?
11 The Beautiful Game is to foosball tables as Vertu is to basic Nokias (video)
Foosball, it’s the game of champions too afraid to step outside and get their boots muddy. If that’s a sentiment you can relate to, you’ll have no trouble understanding why a team of Dutch designers has put together this here foosball table deluxe, which they’ve called 11 The Beautiful Game. In development since way back in 2008, the 11 has just made its way into limited production with a pre-order available via GRO Design’s website. We had a little looksie inside the company’s portfolio of past works and, as it turns out, it’s already responsible for designing the Nokia 6500 and 6500 Slide, meaning it should be well versed in the art of massaging metal into beauty. Each unit ordered takes 12 weeks of meticulous handcrafting to build, but if you haven’t got that long to wait, the video’s just after the break right now.
[Thanks, Martin]
Continue reading 11 The Beautiful Game is to foosball tables as Vertu is to basic Nokias (video)
11 The Beautiful Game is to foosball tables as Vertu is to basic Nokias (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Mar 2011 10:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
iPod touch showing freaky graphical glitches after iOS 4.3 update? (video)
Another issue appears to be plaguing those who’ve upgraded to iOS 4.3, though thankfully this one won’t make them late for work. We’re seeing dozens of reports online of iPod touch users, particularly those with fourth generation models, who are seeing odd graphical glitches since updating to 4.3. These are most noticeable on the lock screen, as you can see above and in the focus-challenged video below, but people are reporting other issues as well, like overlapping icons and other pixel oddities. If you’re seeing similar weirdness make sure you chime in down at the support forums linked below — oh, and feel free to click in the poll as well.
[Thanks, Jesse]
Continue reading iPod touch showing freaky graphical glitches after iOS 4.3 update? (video)
iPod touch showing freaky graphical glitches after iOS 4.3 update? (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Mar 2011 10:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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iPhones Having Trouble with Daylight Savings Time…Again [Daylight Saving Time]
Last time daylight savings time rolled around, iPhone users got a pretty big surprise when recurring alarms started going off at the wrong time. This time around, users are still having issues, though they seem to be a bit less common, a bit more varied, and much more anecdotal. Some are reporting their phones aren’t jumping forward at all, while others are reporting their phone did then jumped back, or other similar problems. Our recommendation? Don’t rely too much on your iPhone’s clock for the next few days, and hopefully we’ll find a solution soon. Hit the link to read more. [Engadget] More »
Japanese Radiation Victims Offered Worthless Treatment
An alternative medicine group is advising Japanese radiation victims to use unproven and worthless treatments.
Open New Tabs by Dragging Links and Text to Chrome’s Tab Bar [Tabbed Browsing]
Many of us probably right-click on links to open them in new tabs or search for text on Google. Reader hackbreaker shows us another quick way: just drag links or text to the tab bar. More »
World’s most expensive dog sells for almost £1 million
Naveen:
Tibetan Mastiffs are known to be the world’s most expensive dogs, and now, a Red Tibetan Mastiff puppy has grabbed the title of the world’s most expensive dog after being sold for about £1 million ($1.6 million). The Tibetan Mastiff, also known as Do-khyi, is an ancient breed and type of domestic dog originating with nomadic cultures of Central Asia. According to the puppy’s breeder Lu Liang, Big Splash (or “Hong Dong” in Chinese) is 11 months old, stands nearly 3 ft. high and weighs over 180lbs. The Mastiff was given a diet of chicken and beef, done with exotic Chinese delicacies like sea cucumber and abalone. Lu runs the Tibetan Mastiff Garden in Laoshan, near the eastern Chinese city of Qingdao. He said…
He is a perfect specimen. He has excellent genes and will be a good breeding dog. When I started in this business, ten years ago, I never thought we would see such a price.
Although, the sale details haven’t been revealed, Mr. Lu has said that the buyer, a multi-millionaire coal baron from the north of China, paid 10 million Yuan (£945,000) for the Red Tibetan Mastiff puppy. He further said…
I could see he loved the puppy, or I would not have sold him. The buyer told me he thought he was a good investment. As a male dog, he can be hired out to other breeders for as much as 100,000 yuan a shot. He could recoup his money in just a couple of years.
Back in 2009, Chinese millionaire Ms. Wang bought a Tibetan Mastiff named Yangtze River Number Two for $582,000. This lucky dog (world’s second most expensive now) was escorted to his new home by a motorcade of 30 black limousines.
Via: Telegraph
Google adds WebM support to Internet Explorer 9
Those of you who eagerly downloaded the final version of Internet Explorer 9 earlier today and raced off to play some royalty-free WebM video would have been disappointed – until now.
In a tongue-in-cheek post spotted by Google Operating System earlier today, the search engine giant announced a free WebM plug-in…
In lasers we trust: NASA researches 5kW galactic trash disposal system
Space junk is a growing problem — 200,000 pieces and counting — and as the amount of earth’s orbital debris increases, so does the chance some satellite will be involved in a cosmic collision. As this would cause much gnashing of teeth and woe for the affected terrestrial parties, some researchers from NASA’s Ames Research Center have pitched the idea of removing said junk with a laser — once again proving that everything’s better with lasers. The idea is to use a 5kW ray, like the one we’ve got at the Starfire Optical Range, to slow our galactic garbage enough to burn it up in earth’s atmosphere. Current estimates say such a laser could eliminate ten pieces of junk a day, promising us a future of neat and tidy skies.
In lasers we trust: NASA researches 5kW galactic trash disposal system originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Mar 2011 01:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Internet Explorer 9 Officially Released [Downloads]
Internet Explorer 9 represents Microsoft’s big push to get back into the browser game, featuring support for many new HTML5 specs (and standards in general), a new interface, and significant performance improvements. More »
OCZ buys Indilinx, probably has designs on building its own SSD controllers
Indilinx, the company responsible for designing the Barefoot SSD controller, has today agreed to hand its future over to the capable lads and ladies of OCZ Technology in exchange for $32 million in common OCZ stock. The companies have announced a definitive agreement for the chipmaker’s acquisition, which OCZ is performing in order to gobble up a set of 20 yummy patents and patent applications while also expanding its presence in embedded, hybrid storage and industrial markets. Indilinx will continue its current operations, including providing controllers and firmware to other OEMs, and OCZ too will continue to use others’ wares, namedropping its long-term partner SandForce as among the outside companies that will be supplying it with SSD goodies. So it’s business as usual unless and until this partnership spawns some lightning-fast combination of software and hardware that forces us to hear that cursed “exclusive” word again. Ah well, best of luck of luck to them.
Continue reading OCZ buys Indilinx, probably has designs on building its own SSD controllers
OCZ buys Indilinx, probably has designs on building its own SSD controllers originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Mar 2011 23:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
What If the Kinect Was Hacked to Be Self-Aware Like Terminator? [Watch This]
Click to viewPeople have done some awesome things with Microsoft’s Kinect but this guy went above and beyond. He turned the Kinect self-aware and watched it destroy the Earth. Oopsies! [College Humor] More »
Anna Torv’s greatest acting challenge yet, on last Friday’s Fringe [Video]
Here's the scene where Anna Torv really proves what a versatile actor she is — first she registers a ton of different emotions as Peter shows her his secret. And then she turns into a whole new person. More »
Feedly for Android [App Of The Day]
RSS! Incredibly useful but mostly ugly. Or super pretty but hard to read. With Feedly for Android, you get a great looking and easy to read feed reader. Works for your Android phone and Honeycomb Tablet too. More »
HP TouchPad coming June, webOS for PC beta by year’s end
We may have to wait until summer to purchase a webOS slate, but it won’t be summer’s end — PreCentral reports that the company has confirmed a June release date for the HP TouchPad. At the enterprise-oriented HP Summit in San Francisco, CEO Leo Apotheker finally offered the month of release, and also reportedly said that the company’s full-force webOS on PC initiative will begin in a humble way — the beta will run in a web browser, and we’ll see it by the end of the year.
HP TouchPad coming June, webOS for PC beta by year’s end originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Mar 2011 17:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Turn Chrome’s Popup Windows Into Tabbed Windows [Chrome]
Often, when you “pop out” a window from Chrome (like a Google Talk chat), it loses its ability to be grouped with other tabs. Here’s how to turn a popped out window into a tabbed window so you can de-clutter your desktop. More »
Microsoft reportedly kills off Zune hardware, will focus on software instead
Details are still emerging on this one, but it looks like Microsoft has finally killed off the Zune — or the hardware side of things, anyway. According to Bloomberg, a “person familiar with the decision” has confirmed that Microsoft won’t be producing any new Zune media players, and that the company will instead focus solely on the Zune software that already has a foothold on the Xbox 360 and Windows Phone devices (it’s not clear if the name will stick around). Microsoft will apparently continue to sell its existing Zunes as long as it has stock of them. More as we get it.
Microsoft reportedly kills off Zune hardware, will focus on software instead originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Mar 2011 16:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Japan Nuclear Danger Is No Chernobyl
The 1986 Chernobyl accident was the worst nuclear accident in history. The situation at the nuclear power plant in Japan isn’t nearly as severe.
Picnik is better with friends
Posted by Thomas Kang, Software Engineer
Picasa Web Albums has expanded the collaborative albums feature to support collaborative editing using Picnik. Now you can invite friends and family to contribute to an album either by uploading photos of their own or by editing any existing photos in that album.
Your original always stays safe and sound as your collaborators make edits to add funny speech bubbles, give you pointers on editing techniques, or pitch in to help you touch up your hundreds of vacation photos. If they edit one of your photos in Picnik and save the changes, it will save back to your album as a new image, and their name will show in the sidebar to give them credit for the new version.
To enable collaborative editing, simply share an album with your friends, and be sure to click on the checkbox to let the people you share with contribute to your album. Soon you’ll start seeing all the cool new images they create from your photos.
We’re sure that there are many fun uses for this new feature, so if you discover something that was helpful to you, we’d love to hear about it. Happy editing!
