Read more: www.computeractive.co.uk Man once dreamed of taking to the skies, of flying freely through the air… Now there’s an app for that. The Helo TC Assault is a remote-controlled helicopter that works with smartphones and tablets. Remote-controlled helicopters are nothing new; it is the use of an app to control the helicopter that makes this gadget stand out. The Helo TC Assault is compatible with the iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and selected Android tablets and smartphones. Video Rating: 0 / 5
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The plot thickens! Dr. Steve Mann, the human cyborg made famous by an incident in a Parisian McDonald’s, just released a new picture (above) of his altercation with a McD’s staffer. The picture clearly shows a McDonald’s employee touching Dr. Mann’s permanently installed augmented reality eye piece. This invalidates McDonald’s statement, which claims “interaction with Dr. Mann was polite and did not involve a physical altercation.”
Dr. Mann stated the man struck the EyeTap, but like a side-swipe, grabbing motion rather than a direct punch to the face. Apparently, the man touching (or striking) the eye piece is the same person who eventually pushed Dr. Mann on to the street. The person in the background of the new picture later tears up (below) the letter from Mann’s doctor, explaining the device’s need and removal process.
Again, like I stated yesterday, without a video of the incident, it’s hard to say which party is in the wrong but Dr. Mann’s still images tell a chilling story all by themselves.
McDonald’s released a statement yesterday regarding the incident,
“We share the concern regarding Dr. Mann’s account of his July 1 visit to a McDonald’s in Paris. McDonald’s France was made aware of Dr. Mann’s complaints on July 16, and immediately launched a thorough investigation. The McDonald’s France team has contacted Dr. Mann and is awaiting further information from him.
In addition, several staff members involved have been interviewed individually, and all independently and consistently expressed that their interaction with Dr. Mann was polite and did not involve a physical altercation. Our crew members and restaurant security staff have informed us that they did not damage any of Mr. Mann’s personal possessions.
While we continue to learn more about the situation, we are hearing from customers who have questions about what happened. We urge everyone not to speculate or jump to conclusions before all the facts are known. Our goal is to provide a welcoming environment and stellar service to McDonald’s customers around the world.”
- McDonald’s
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a chainsaw bayonet on a rifle, but it is the first time we’ve seen a commercially available one specifically for zombie slaying. Introducing the DoubleStar Zombie-X AK-47. It means business. Me? I mean pleasure.
The DoubleStar Zombie-X AK-47 is a weapon specially customized to battle zombie hordes by attaching a battery-charged chainsaw to the end of the barrel, as well as a EOTech Zombie Stopper XPS2-Z Holographic Sight which puts a biohazard symbol on your target instead of the classic red dot. DoubleStar hasn’t announced when or if this will go on sale, but its less fancy DSC Zombie Slayer predecessor sells for $ 1,249.99, so the Zombie-X is likely to be a bit pricier.
So I’ve been thinking about it, and I’ve decided I don’t really want to live through a zombie apocalypse. It would be a long, hard, fight — and for what? Hoping that after it’s all over you can repopulate the planet with the one chick that survived? What if she’s ugly? What if no chicks survive and it’s just you and a buddy? Would you be willing to take one for the team and repopulate the planet with him? “How is that even possible?” Well they’re not gonna kill all the storks!
Hit the jump for a brief demo of the I’m tired of fighting, I’m just gonna throw myself into a volcano.
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It’s not just a big stetson that Griffin’s rocking up with at CES, it’s also packing some brand new gear for the warm climes of Nevada. First up is the wonderfully childish update to last summer’s Helo TC Assault RC Helicopter that’ll provide you hours of fun (misery for your children / co-workers) thanks to its ability to fire missiles. An infra-red flight deck plugs into your iDevice’s headphone jack and will let you control it using its touch interface or using your internal gyroscope. We know it’ll cost $ 60, just ten dollars more for the ability to conduct bombing runs on any animals who stray past your path and there’s more information in the press release we’ve got for you after the break.
Continue reading Griffin’s Helo TC Assault chopper lets you act out your Airwolf fantasies on the cat
Griffin’s Helo TC Assault chopper lets you act out your Airwolf fantasies on the cat originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 Jan 2012 10:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Picture related: same color sabers.
33-year old (young?) David Allen Canterbury was arrested Wednesday night after somebody called 911 because he was swinging two blue lightsabers at customers in an Oregon Toys R Us. Wait…you can get arrested for that? Been there, done that, thought the worst that could happen would be getting asked to leave, amirite?!
Officers tried to arrest Canterbury, but he kept swinging the lightsabers at them, Simpson said. One officer tried to use his Taser but the device didn’t work.
Another officer used his Taser, but Canterbury knocked one of the wires away with a lightsaber.
Whoa whoa whoa — two attempted taserings and they both failed? I never thought I’d say it, but this goofy f***er might have actually been wielding the Force!
Hillsboro man held after alleged ‘Star Wars’ light saber assault at Portland Toys R Us [oregonlive]
Thanks to DragonKatt and Evil Ares, who have never attacked patrons at a toy store before but have ridden bikes up and down the aisles. Ha, I still do that.
Related Posts:An Apple TV update is rolling out today. But this device update isn’t the news. Sure, streaming purchased TV shows to the device is a welcomed, but not really novel idea. Now, post update, users will have the choice to either buy or rent a TV show and stream it to their Apple TV. Great. But this update turns Apple’s little hobby into a full-fledged money-making machine.
The Apple TV is a sort of Trojan Horse. At only $ 99, Apple diehards and general consumers alike have been buying up the streamer in mass since it debuted. But it’s always felt, well, like Apple said, a hobby device or rather a side-project with an incomplete feature set and gimped media offering. Up until AirPlay, the Apple TV felt a bit like a sucker’s device, a high-margin product designed to draw out a few more dollars from Apple buyers.
Not any more. The Apple TV is now the living room division of what’s sure to be a huge offensive by Apple. TV episodes bought on any device now are now accessible on other Apple devices and vice versa. Spend $ 2.99 to buy an episode of Community and it’s available on your iPhone, iPad, Mac and now Apple TV. Don’t underestimate Apple’s reach now. TV shows are likely only the beginning. This cloud streaming storage method will likely work with movies as well — as long as the movie studios play ball.
Apple has long relied on iTunes for local content delivery. Plug in your iPod and your media library was synced to the the device. But this requires local storage, which is slow, expensive and not very flexible. Once Apple puts video content in the cloud, a device’s local storage is left to just handle the trivial task of storing music and photos.
The update seems to be only for the US market right now. Other markets are likely on tap for the coming days and/or weeks.
The Apple TV is no longer a hobby, for Steve & Co.. It’s now a made man of the iTunes cartel. Apple has always made it easy for its users to spend money. Forget renting a TV show, Apple wants users to spend three times as much, but have access to it forever on all of their Apple devices. Sounds like a fair deal to me.
Spotify is finally here in the US. It offers on-demand music for a relatively low price — just like Rdio. There’s several service levels including mobile listening and offline support — just like Rdio. There’s even support for third-party hardware and platforms — just like Rdio.
Rdio has a head start in this race but it might not matter. Rdio left private beta last August and has since gained a good deal of traction here in the States. It’s our hometown hero, if you will. Even though it wasn’t available until today, Spotify’s hype built the service up to near legandary status. The two services are remarkably similar on the outside, but when you dive in, there are some distinct and fun differences.
Quick specs:Spotify
- Free account, limited playback, ad-supported
- $ 5 for desktop streaming
- $ 10 desktop, mobile and offline support
- Launched in the US on July 14, 2011
- Features the catalog of the 4 major record companies
- “Over 15 million tracks”
- Bitrate Quality: 160 kbps with some tracks at 320 kbps for premium users
Rdio
- $ 5 for desktop streaming
- $ 10 desktop, mobile and offline support
- Launched in the US on August 3, 2010
- Features the catalog of the 4 major record companies
- “Over 8 million songs”
- Bitrate Quality: 256kbps
Both companies take a different approach to their desktop application. Spotify’s desktop app is designed to be a catch-all, a one stop solution for all your media needs. It allows users to steam music and playback local media. It can sync songs with connected media players (including iPods) and cache streaming songs for offline playback. It’s truly meant to be the only media player you need on your computer.
That’s not the case with Rdio, whose desktop app is really just a portal to its web service. Nearly everything is the same, including the navigation paths and user interface. Rdio’s app lacks any local media playback functions, which may be just fine for some users. The desktop app does play friendly with keyboard media functions (like the pause/play key you may have) where Rdio’s web service does not.
The different approaches result in a slightly different feel. Both services are designed around music discovery, but Rdio’s desktop application, since it’s really just a skinned web app, outclasses Spotify in this area. Nearly everything is a hyperlink to more content. The album cover, the song, the artist, every user element has a link that takes you to music. Spotify goes about it in a traditional desktop way by have simple navigation paths, but they’re not as easily identifiable.
Still, Spotify’s desktop app is far more versatile than Rdio’s. It seamlessly mixes online and offline content with social sharing tools. The music discovery paths could use some work but the other functions combine to beat Rdio’s.
Winner: Spotify
Web apps
Spotify doesn’t have a web app. This is a key difference between the two services. Rdio will work in nearly any browser on any computer and maintain user settings. At work? Just log in and all your music, friends and listening history is there. This isn’t available on Spotify.
In fact, Rdio was originally just a web service. The OS X desktop app came a few months after the service launched, and the Windows flavor just dropped a few weeks back. The whole service is designed to operate from within a browser and does so wonderfully.
I’ve found that Rdio’s web app allows it to work on web-connected devices such as the Boxee Box or Google TV. Rdio doesn’t have a dedicated app on either of these Internet appliances but the device’s web browser allows you to use the service anyway. You can’t do that with Spotify although the service is available on several hardware platforms (more on this farther down.)
Winner: Rdio (by default)
Mobile apps
Neither of these services would be as popular if they didn’t support mobile listening. Both Rdio and Spotify have functional mobile apps that ports most of the service’s functions to your smartphone. Once again, on the surface, the two sound very similar and feature the same functions including offline modes.
The two apps are very similar and there really isn’t a standout. It’s more a personal preference. Rdio’s UI is a bit more simple, but still maintains a lot of the elements found in the web app. Spotify’s on the other hand is sort of busy, but nicely integrates the socal media sharing functions. Both play music and that’s the most important function anyway.
One standout in this area is MOG’s app. Not only does it flow better than Spotify’s or Rdio’s, MOG’s smartphone app is simply beautiful. It feels like a smartphone media app rather than a web app crammed into a smartphone.
Winner: MOG
Social features
Everything has to be social now and so both media services are built tightly around this thought. Both make it easy enough to share playlists, albums and songs through Facebook and Twitter. However, Spotify takes it one step farther and gives users the ability to quickly share songs and albums through a sort of internal mail system. Glee bombing is quickly becoming a favorite pastime of mine.
However, while I’m of the opinion that none of this sharing nonsense is necessary, Spotify does, once again, outperform Rdio mainly as it allows subscribers to share songs with anyone; all that’s required to listen is a free Spotify account. Rdio allows for embedding of songs, but you have to a paying subscriber pay to listen.
Winner: Spotify
Music discovery
It has never been easier to discover new music and trends. Rdio and Spotify, along with several other streaming sites like MOG, Grooveshark, and Rhapsody, built their service around this core idea. With the exception of Grooveshark, these services tend to take the album approach by presenting users with a grid of album covers. Spotify uses the What’s New section as its homescreen where Rdio’s Heavy Rotation section (the service’s most popular music) is the first page displayed.
This is where Rdio tops Spotify. Nearly everything on Rdio, either on the web app or desktop app, guides you to music. The designers placed a hyperlink where ever someone might want to click. Best of all, following the rabbit down the hole of music discovery doesn’t interrupt the music playback — even on the website. A sidebar is off to the right on nearly every page with relative songs, artists, and info. Want to hear music of the same sort? Each page has a Play Radio Station button that cues up similar songs and artists.
Both services have similar sections in new releases, most popular, and top charts. Rdio also features a recommendations section that displays new artists based on your listening habits. This section alone allows Rdio to topple Spotify in the music discovery category.
Winner: Rdio
In the end, though, I doubt these differences will really matter. Rdio is an amazing tool to discovery new music and Spotify is the media player from the future. There’s more than enough space in this huge market for several major players. Spotify might quickly outpace Rdio simply because of advertising and its slightly more recognizable brand. But the real winner are us consumers. As Louis C.K. wisely put, “The shittiest cell phone in the world is a miracle.” This also applies to streaming music services.
CTA may be best known for its endless array of kid-friendly Wii accessories, but it’s not forgetting about the grown-up gamers out there — or, at least, grown-ups who enjoy shooting plastic guns in their living rooms. Its latest product is the $65 Assault Rifle for the PlayStation 3, which promises to add a whole new degree of “realism and excitement” to games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 — oh, and it also makes sound effects even when you’re not playing a game. Head on past the break for the video.
Continue reading CTA announces PS3 Assault Rifle, dignity sold separately
CTA announces PS3 Assault Rifle, dignity sold separately originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Props to Engadget
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