Bye Bye Blockbuser

There used to be a time when if you wanted to rent a movie you would go to Blockbuster. Now with other places such as Family Video, RedBox and most notably Netflix, Blockbuster has gone bankrupt along with the 1000s of other companies during this recession. Blockbuster has about $1 billion in debt which will be reduced to just $100 million. 

How did such a giant go bankrupt? I say that the number one cause is Netflix. Netflix allowed people to choose whatever movies they wanted with no late fees and the best part is that the movies would be delivered to your home. All you have to do is walk to your mailbox, get your movie, watch it, and send it back through the mail in pre-paid envelopes. Netflix will then send you your next movie automatically. 

After seeing their income plummet, because of Netflix, Blockbuster decided to get into the online movie delivery system too. They even offered video games and you could switch any movie you got through the mail at any Blockbuster store. Unfortunately, they were too late, the public had already chosen Netflix as their preferred movie provider; Blockbuster never stood a chance.

Read more »

Full Year of Algebra on iPad

It’s every students dream; have their entire semester’s worth of texts books on an eBook or tablet. Eliminate the bulk of textbooks, relieve stress of carry books for each class and reduce waste of resources. Simple right?


Well this isn’t going to happen until publishers start cramming entire curricula into apps. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's new Algebra 1 app, which has a full year's worth of material, is the first attempt.


HMH is launching the app in a year-long pilot program in California, allowing students to work through practice questions, take notes, watch video lessons and more on their iPads. The app is the first on HMH Fuse, a platform developed by the publisher for delivering interactive educational content to mobile and touchscreen devices.


One advantage of HMH's Algebra app, aside from drastically cutting down the heft of the learning materials, is that students can work through lessons at their own pace, spending time on concepts they're struggling with and moving past those they master. But there's still something lost in the digitization,

Let me give some insight on why a high school student would be absolutely in love with this. I have six classes which all require me to bring a textbook to class. Also, some classes require that I bring an additional textbook every now and then. This added on to the notebooks that I need to for each individual class can add up in weight: up to 30 pounds. I find that ridiculous. Now I found ways to maneuver past this obstacle like deciding which books I’ll definitely need but this is not the best way to do it.


As usual leave your agreement, disagreement, scorn and other types of feedback in the comments below!

Read more »

Will Giant Genetically Modified Antifreeze Salmon Be Next on the Menu?

This week the FDA is likely to decide that genetically modified salmon is safe for you to buy and eat. The new fish, called AquaBounty, is salmon whose DNA has been deliberately altered.

Genetically modified food, however, is nothing new in the world. Most likely you've eaten it recently, if not today. Almost all of the soybeans and corn grown in the US come from seeds that are modified to resist pesticides. Genetically modified food is in your cereal, your soda, and your stomach—but only if it's growing from the ground. However, the FDA's decision is set to change that as AquaBounty would be the first time genetically modified animals would be legal to sell for human consumption.

AquaBounty is modified by introducing two foreign genes from two other fish. For those of you who don’t know what genetically modified food is; it is basically finding desirable traits in one animal, and sticking them in the other for a hybridized genetic sequence. With AquaBounty, the first of two genes are a powerful growth hormone from the Chinook salmon, boosted by pairing it with a gene from the obscure ocean pout, which triggers constant biological antifreeze that keeps the salmon growing during the winter. The result is a super fish that never stops growing. They keep growing, reaching full, bulky maturity in 18 months instead of three years. Company officials say the fish are environmentally sustainable and that only females will be sold. They have three sets of chromosomes, making them sterile and thus preventing new families of mutant fish or interbreeding with native populations. Larger fish that grow faster means more money for farmers, and more food for fish fans. What could go wrong?

AquaBounty Salmon grow at twice the rate of their natural counterparts. These fish are the same age.

Well as always, there is opposition to the idea of genetically modified super-salmon. Scientists and food safety advocates are calling out the FDA on sloppy, biased science. Skeptics worry about Frankenfish-induced allergies and illnesses, because the fish have never been eaten before. Other critics fear that rampaging populations of fast-growing salmon, which grow at twice the rate of their normal brethren, might out-eat wild populations and starve them into extinction. And will we even know what we're exposing ourselves to? However the FDA has already ruled that GM salmon won't need to be labeled as such. In addition they have further concluded, that we have nothing to worry about health-wise, though critics characterize their testing methodology as laughable, using only a dozen or so sample fish to test check for potential medical complications in humans. Compare this to the European Union, where opposition to GM food is so intense that only a dozen or so have been approved in the past decade—a process requiring multinational consensus, not a small panel of experts.

If the FDA approves AquaBounty’s sale of the fish, it could be available in supermarkets within two years, AP reports.

I think that if either side is correct, the impact will still be the same. The first time for GM fish to be introduced onto our plates will be the most difficult to achieve, but once superfish are the norm, the rest of the animal kingdom won’t be far behind. As Gizmodo said:

“When fish that are named by trademarks instead of taxonomy are commonplace, it will have changed a fundamental part of eating. Companies and R&D labs, rather than oceans, may someday be the source of our food—a shift that companies like AquaBounty have fought hard for, spending $60 million and a decade to develop the salmon. On paper, the benefits of GM animals are clear. But, like anything else that ends up in our bodies, rigorous deliberation is necessary—maybe enough until both sides are quiet and content.”

What do you guys think? Do you support eating GM food because of the ease of “production” or will you avoid the Frakenfish in order to not grow a second arm? As usual let us know in the comments below. 

Read more »

Netflix PR blunder and HUGE amounts of new watch instantly content

Last week Netflix started their new, watch instantly only program in Canada. For 7.99 Canadian dollars a month you would be able to watch an unlimited amount of online content from Netflix.com but you wil not be able to get any physical disks. This plan allows you to watch the online content from a computer, PS3, Wii, Apple products and many other devices although there are a few devices excluded. For some reason the Xbox 360, Samsung TVs, VIZIO Blu-Ray players and Insignia Blu-Ray players will not be compatible until later this year. The country of Canada was quite excited about this already as this was netflix's first move into the country but apparently this was not enough for Netflix so they decided to make the release event a little bigger than it actually was.

What did they do? Well Netflix actually paid actors to come the release event and pretend like they were just normal people who happened to be walking on the streets and saw the event. If they just walked around and asked questions to the Netflix staff it wouldn’t have been so bad but the actors made a point to go talk to the press and say how excited they were about this release. Of course, with so many people in on this plan someone was bound to talk, and of course someone did. Netflix quickly issued an apology to the public but Netflix's Vice President of Corporate Communications said the he was "unaware" about the actors and that the whole situation was very "embarrassing to Netflix." I doubt that this will really deter many people coughing up the 8 bucks to enjoy the plethora of content on Netflix.com.

Netflix recently signed a contract with EPIX allowing Netflix subscribers to view all of EPIXs content 90 days after it is released to Pay per View and Video on Demand channels. For people who are unfamiliar with EPIX, it is a company that brings together the vast amount of content from Paramount, MGM and Lionsgate studios.  These are the studios that made the James Bond, Indiana Jones and Iron Man series plus movies like The Expendables, Star Trek, and Paranormal Activity. Most people would never be able to get through this amount of content but if you are not happy…there is even more online content coming your way!

Netflix recently signed a contract with NBC which allows Netflix subscribers to have access to an extremely large library of NBC content. The list of new content is bellow.

Episodes from every season of NBC's signature comedy franchise "Saturday Night Live," including day-after broadcast of the upcoming 2010, 2011 and 2012 seasons plus hundreds of episodes from the first 35 years of "SNL."
* Every episode from the last season of the multiple Emmy® Award-winning series "30 Rock," "The Office" and "Law & Order: SVU," as well as earlier seasons of those shows renewed for streaming from Netflix under the current deal.
* All prior seasons – and eventually next year's final season – of "Friday Night Lights," the small-town drama surrounding high-school football in Dillon, Tex.
* All prior seasons of USA Network hits "Psych," the comedy featuring James Roday as a fake psychic who solves crimes with his best friend, Dule Hill; the drama "In Plain Sight," starring Mary McCormack as a U.S. Marshal in New Mexico; as well as all seasons of "Monk," starring Emmy® Award and Golden Globe® Award winner Tony Shalhoub in the title role. Prior seasons of all three shows are available to watch instantly at Netflix for the first time.
* More than 75 prior season episodes of Syfy's mainstay "Battlestar Galactica," as well as prior seasons of the network's popular series' "Destination Truth" and "Eureka" – all streaming from Netflix for the first time.

As you can see, this is very exciting news because we are getting for some shows, episodes of the recent seasons and for others, every episode ever made.

Read more »

Apartment Heated By Underground Commuters

The heat generated by underground commuters in the Parisian metro will help heat a public housing project in the city center, the capital's largest owner of social housing.


The new system will use The calories emitted by passengers, around 100 watts per person, combined with the heat from trains moving along tracks and the underground location of the metro mean that corridor temperatures are 14-20 degrees Celsius all year around.


The project, which is based on geothermal technology, aims to draw heat from subterranean passages and move it to heat exchangers before supplying heating pipes. The system will complement district heating. The new system should slash carbon dioxide emissions by a third compared to using a boiler room connected to district heating,
However, Paris has no plans to implement the human-heating to all other metro stations. This particular project is one of opportunity – a stairwell that happens to connect the building to the Metro is serving as a conduit for the heat – and creating a means to pipe heat from other Metro stations to surrounding buildings is too expensive to be feasible.

"We were lucky to find a passageway that allows us to collect the heat directly from the metro, without having to pay to build one, otherwise it would have been impossible."

I'm personally all for new solutions to save energy and all but I feel just a little bit uncomfortable knowing the air around came from underground commuters. It just gives me the chills. What do you, the readers, think? Would you be okay knowing the air was heated by human bodies or do you condone this idea. Let us know in the comments below. 

Read more »

Finger Print Scanning Car

Some people just go a little overboard with security measures for their cars and this is a perfect example of one. The A8s come standard with a special laminated glass that was tested by the crazy and apparently rich guys over at WhatCar.com. They were only able to break the glass after 3 minutes and 28 seconds of continual beating the glass with a hammer.


On top of that you can, as another option, have 2 panes of glass which theoretically should last somewhere around 7minutes by which time someone would have called the cops. Apparently this is not enough for some people protecting their A8s. As with most luxury cars of its class, the Audi A8 has the option for a push button start with a keyless entry system in which as long as you have the key in your pocket, you can push the button and the engine will start. This insane customer, on the other hand, has a custom addition to this keyless start feature. A fingerprint scanner. So if a thief somehow manages to go unnoticed while he smashes at your window for 7 minutes and steal your key, he will not be able to steal your car because on the start button is a fingerprint scanner that only allows the car to start if it senses a familiar fingerprint. You may be thinking at this point, "wow this is absolutely ridiculous" but wait! This is no ordinary fingerprint scanner. The cheap scanners you can find on laptops can be easily fooled (as proven by The Myth busters") but this over the top scanner scans your finger with an extremely precise scanner AND it scans your DNA so it cannot be fooled. If you don’t believe me, watch the video below. Enjoy!

Read more »

Turn any HDTV into a touchscreen!

What happens when you put the HDMI out and 12 megapixel camera capabilities of the Nokia N8 smart-phone and your HDTV together? You get a giant touch screen. Nokia recently demoed an app that is still under development at called "Plug and Touch." All you have to do is connect the N8 to your TV through a HDMI cable and set the phone with the camera pointed at the TV about 5 feet away. The camera tracks your hand as you move it around the screen and turns your TV into a giant touchscreen. Actions that require greater precision such as typing on the onscreen keyboard understandably do not work very well but this technology is still a prototype and is not even scheduled for a release. I think that once Nokia decides to finally release this app it may not have much usefulness but it will be extremely cool nonetheless. Check out the video below and as usual please comment!

Read more »

Green Bulidings

Not only is Dubai home to the world's tallest building,  the world's only 7 Star hotel and one of the world's successful economies but now it is also home to the first bubble wrapped building. Well, that is not exactly true; it is actually a clear honeycomb screen around the outside of the building that gives the building its characteristic look. The screen was designed to cut cooling costs and make the building greener by keeping the sun's rays out. The hexagonal pattern was derived from an Islamic pattern that opens and closes in response to the suns path. This should cut cooling costs by up to 25%. In addition to the special screen on the outside of the building, the roof of the tower is covered in solar panels which should compensate for another 5% of the buildings energy consumption. This building, being 25 stories tall and having 2000 employees in it, is meant to be the headquarters for the Abu Dhabi Investment Council. I think it is good that Dubai is finally deciding to look toward building greener buildings rather than taller and more extravagant ones.

Looking to build a new, green home? Model it after this one built by Ralph Disch in Germany. Many builders nowadays are starting to think about how they can make their houses more green. Most decide to put solar panels on their roofs but the problem in doing that is the panels only are pointing toward the sun for a short amount of they day resulting on a little power being produced. This is one of the many problems solved by Disch's new house. His entire house is mounted on a large pole so that the house can rotate with the sun as the day goes along so that the solar panels can be used with maximum efficiency. He also has water pipes running through the top of his house so that he can use the power of the sun to heat his water. In addition to these power saving methods, Disch also uses rainwater and greywater (water that goes down your sink drains) to meet his water demands such as flushing toilets. All of this amounts to not only being able to only produce enough power to power all the need of his house but actually create FIVE times the amount of energy he needs. This means he can sell the excess power back to the grid and actually make money off of his house by doing absolutely nothing. I think that the rotating solar panels are a great idea but I do not want rain/grey water for my water needs just yet. Thanks for reading and please comment!

Read more »

Big Brother Recycling Bins

Cleveland’s City Council recently commissioned a $2.5 million ordinance to bring 25,000 recycling bins with built in *RFID tags. What’s the point? To track if people are bringing the bins to curb; and fine them if they don’t.

The chips will allow city workers to monitor how often residents roll carts to the curb for collection. If a chip show a recyclable cart hasn't been brought to the curb in weeks, a trash supervisor will sort through the trash for recyclables.

Trash carts containing more than 10 percent recyclable material could lead to a $100 fine, according to Waste Collection Commissioner Ronnie Owens.

                

This idea actually isn't that futuristic because Britain has been using a similar system for several years to weigh the garbage of their people. Citizens who throw out garbage over their limit are fined. 

I personally think that people should recycle but not to the point where their trashed is searched through at they are fined. If anything, the city could just use the data from the RFID tags for statistical  information. They could then use that data to encourage people to recycle, not force them with threats of fines. If not we might be one step to a society like this:

Interestingly enough the City of Cleveland has reason to gain from recyclables. Cleveland.com reports that for every ton of recyclables they collect, the city makes $26. In comparison, the city was paying $30 per ton to dump trash in a landfill. 

This does remind of another certain device that has is connected for the worse. So maybe, for now, it is best that the recycling bin is left unplugged. 

What do you think? Is this a good way to encourage recycling and maybe even result in more recyclers? Or is this the beginning of a society where government tracks everything you do? For all opinions in between comment below! 

*An RFID (Radio-frequency identification) is the use of an object (typically referred to as an RFID tag) applied to or incorporated into a product, animal, or person for the purpose of identification and tracking using radio waves.

Read more »

Militarized Skateboard

This seems more like a recruitment tool than a strategic military vehicle. Above is the DTV (Dual Tracked Vehicle) Shredder, a militarized skateboard with two caterpillar tracks. It can travel 30 mph, has enough power to tow an SUV, but is also versatile enough to do a 180 turn in four feet and climb slopes up to 40 degrees.  BPG Werks, the manufacturer, it can cross all types of terrain and it’s low center of gravity make it “ideal for reconnaissance, rescue/recovery, mobile surveillance, and medical evacuation operations". Even more the DTV Shredder can be remotely operated and armed to become a “robot attack platform.” The robot apocalypse has come sooner than we expected.

The DTV Shredder was created by Ben Gulak, the man who made the one-wheeled Uno bike (picture here). He presented it as a "first response modular platform for soldiers" at last August's Military Vehicles conference in Detroit. 

To me, I think that this is more suited as recreational vehicle (no not an RV) that a military. Now I can not professionally say anything from a military point of view but i don't see much of an advantage versus current fast vehicle platforms such as ATVs and motorcycles. Despite a likely heft price tag (down payments are $250) riding one of these thing would seems pretty fun.

What do you think? Would you want a cross between tank and skateboard? Tell us in the comments below!

Read more »

Flying Saddles

As if airplane seats weren’t already uncomfortable. Recently unveiled last week at the Aircraft Interiors Expo Americas conference, the new SkyRider is a saddle-like seat that allows airlines to sardine passengers into their already cramped planes.

The idea behind the SkyRider is that it is similar to riding horseback, “Cowboys ride eight hours on their horses during the day and still feel comfortable in the saddle,” says Dominique Menoud, director general of Aviointeriors Group, which will make the seats. If I’m not mistaken, I thought riding horseback was supposed to be the opposite of comfortable.

In addition to making passengers suffer, the SkyRider is made to save airlines money by eliminating seat-pitch to a mere 23 inches. Seat-pitch is the distance between the same point on two seats and the smallest seat-pitch in economy is about 31 inches. As seen above, some of passenger’s weight is transferred to the legs, and their legs are tucked under the seat ahead. However instead of reclining, these seats can raise up to accommodate for longer legs. This could possibly be comfortable than regular seats.

Don’t panic yet, the SkyRider won’t likely be in your next flight. Though, Aviointeriors, says several airlines, including some in the U.S., have expressed interest. "We feel extremely confident that this concept will ... have great appeal to airlines for economic purposes," says Menoud.

Personally I would do anything in my power to avoid sitting in the SkyRider. Hopefully airlines won’t force to use them. Most likely, airline would use them as their own class of seating, Menoud says. “Passengers would likely pay lower fares. But airlines could boost their profits because the narrowly spaced seats would allow them to squeeze more fliers on board”

What do you think? Would you rather walk to your destination, or is this the face of cheap air travel? Leave your comments below!

Read more »

Optical Speedbumps

So as some some of you already might know, speed bumps aren't really all that good at slowing down drivers. We've all seen it: some slow down at the last minute and gun it the minute they pass, others go around the speed bump all together. Recently however, the British Columbia Automobile Association Traffic Safety Foundation developed a new system; an illusion of child jumping in front of your car. 


The picture is painted in such a way, that if your viewing it at just the right angle, the girl will look three-dimensional. The idea behind it is that as a driver gets closer the image will come into view and focus. In addition, the faster the car is traveling, the faster the child will appear. This way it will cause to driver to stop quicker.


The system is currently being tested in West Vancouver, Canada starting September 7 and will be removed after a week of evaluation. 


I think there is definite room for backfire here. What if a driver was suddenly to slam on the brakes to avoid the hitting "the little girl". This could cause the car behind him to slam in him. In addition what if a driver was to swerve to avoid the illusion causing it to hit an object on the side of the road or even other pedestrians. I can see the headline now, “Driver Runs Down 11 Schoolchildren on Sidewalk After Swerving to Miss Optical Illusion.”


This illusion system does remind me of the those crazy chalk drawings of cliffs and stuff like that. 

Read more »

Internet connected toys, iPod watch, E-paper, and EPIC FAIL of the Day

Disney recently had a press release where they announced that that in the future their stuffed animals and other toys were going to be connected to the internet. Their reason? "Increased playability." I don't know about you guys but that does not sound like a good enough reason for me to give a 1 year old a stuffed animal which can connect to the internet. I think that kids are exposed to too much technology while they are young already and this will only make the problem worse. This is not the only problem that I see with this though. If a hacker managed to take control of a toy then younger children could easily be coerced into giving up sensitive information of their parents such as credit card numbers. "The Monarch", who commented on this article on engadet.com showed one such scenario:

Kids: "Wow you are great, e-Mickey! What else can you do?"

e-Mickey: "... I can also sing songs, starting with the #1 most requested song on Radio Disney right now."

Kids: "Wow!"

e-Mickey: "I can also book your parents a cheap vacation getaway, courtesy of Orbitz.com. Now go get Daddy's wallet and let's play!"

Kids: "Hooray!"

As you can see it would be quite easy to trick ignorant children into giving sensitive information out. 


Alright, on to the next topic of the iPod watch. I am sure most everyone has seen the newly released iPod nano. It is a small square shaped iPod that has only a touch-screen for its interface. When it goes into standby mode its screen changes to an analog clock and the back of the iPod has a clip built into it. It seems as if Apple wanted it to be used as a watch. So of course someone out there has made a strap made for it and they are on sale now for $17 (picture below). I just have a feeling that if you went running with it on your wrist and you were listening to music, the headphone cords would eiter get all tangled up with your arm or you will  accidently pull the headphones out of your ear which could become wuite a nuisance. Personally,I don’t like how it looks all that much, but if large, boxy, multifunctional watches are your thing then go for it! 

Next I'm going to talk about this very interesting paper I came across. Sony recently demonstrated a type of "E-paper" or Electronic paper. E-paper has the same flexibility as real paper but it can display anything you feed it. What does this mean? It means in the future we can expect to buy one newspaper and have it update itself by itself which not only reduces the amount of paper being used but it also is more convenient since you can check for new updates whenever you like.


Finally I would like to leave you guys with the random EPIC FAIL of the day. This is a video on how NOT to fire a watermelon out of a slingshot. Hope you guys enjoy and comment below! 

Read more »

About Us

Hello readers and welcome to Gizmo-teched!  I aim for this blog to feature some of the latest and greatest tech news along with stories that I find interesting. From time to time I’ll give my bit on and I’ll comment on posts just to share my opinion. 

I plan for posts to range from new "inventions", cool ideas, gadgets, and i guess  just what you come to expect from a technology blog. 

If you by chance are the few that have noticed, the title of my blog might sound a bit familiar. If you didn't it is a combination of Gizmodo, Techcrunch, and Wired; a few tech blogs that i like to read. I in no way intended this to copy any of those wonderful sites, I feel that I want to give my personal take on the stories in addition to informing as well.

Hope you enjoy. Happy reading.

Read more »

BEST TECH BLOG EVER (about us)

Hey guys this blog is going to be about all of the newest and most fancy technology that will affect our lives. I will be updating very regularly so you can expect the most up to date information. I will also add in any especially crazy/outrageous technology i come across. Also if anyone has heard about something  and want more information on it I will be happy to find more information on. I chose to have a blog about technology because i love reading about new gadgets during my free time and this is the perfect way to express my opinions on them.


Oh and if you are wondering, my display name, T-Tech, stands for Tyrannosaurus Tech


Thanks for Reading!

Read more »