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Inamo restaurant uses E-Table to offer a digital dining experience
Posted by Reza Malayeri Categories: Design, Misc. Tech, Videos,
Inamo is a futuristic restaurant in the Soho district of London. The fusion of technology, and Asian-inspired interior design makes Inamo a destination restaurant on the bleeding edge of innovation. Inamo’s interactive dining experience is like nothing you've ever seen or tasted before. The illustrated food and drink menus are powered by E-Table technology, and Canon projectors display mouthwatering menu options on the Corian tables. The tables include round preview screens shaped like plates, allowing customers to interact with any menu item before placing an order.
Allowing customers to preview menu options is not the only trick in Inamo’s digital dining bag. Customers can watch the kitchen webcam, change the table background, watch movie trailers from Paramount Pictures UK, browse information about the local community, play games, watch short films, and even call the “I drank too much" taxi, directly from their E-table.
Click to continue reading Inamo restaurant uses E-Table to offer a digital dining experience
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| Inamo via Dezeen.com
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Ubiquisys attocell will be a personal femtocell for the iPhone
Posted by Reza Malayeri Categories: Accessories, USB, Smartphones, Wireless / WiFi,
Today Ubiquisys announced a new smartphone accessory called attocell; a personal femtocell for the iPhone and other 3G mobile phones. "This remarkable device is a personal mobile phone signal, with a range so tiny it can be used anywhere that your laptop has an internet connection. It provides a great mobile service anywhere in the world, and calls are made and received as though on the home country network."
Depending on the local signal regulations, the device can operate in either the 5mm mode, or it can broadcast a signal within a room. This allows the attocell to intelligently scan the surrounding cellular networks and make sure that it does not have any negative impact on the local operators cell signal.
Travellers across the globe will soon be able to carry the attocell along on their trips, and avoid paying those hefty international roaming rates.
Read More | Ubiquisys Attocell
Verizon to charge $20 per month for iPhone personal hotspot
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Smartphones, Corporate News, Wireless / WiFi,
One of the features touted during the Verizon iPhone announcement was the inclusion of Personal Hotspot. This allows you to use the iPhone as a Wi-Fi router, which in turn lets you connect up to five other devices to your Verizon data connection. The one thing they left out, though, was price. Today, Verizon filled in that gap with the announcement that the iPhone personal hotspot feature will cost $20 per month. That's in addition to your calling and data plans. No bid surprise there though, as that's the same price they charge on all their other smartphones with the same feature. The nice thing about this, though, is that when compared to AT&T, Verizon gives you more value for the dollar. AT&T only allows Bluetooth and USB tethering, and only to one device at a time. Further, you don't get any additional data for your $20. With the Wi-Fi hotpsot, you get up to five devices at once, and you also get a dedicated 2 GB of data specifically for tethering. Each gigabyte over the limit will cost an additional $20.
Are you planning on picking up the Verizon iPhone?
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Google Voice now supports number porting
Posted by Patrick Lambert Categories: Smartphones, Google, Internet,
Google Voice, the wonderful service that can integrate all your calls to a single number, providing free services like voice mail, transcription and SMS messages, now supports number porting. This means that if you have a phone number which you want to keep, but you'd like to use it for Google Voice, now you can port it over. You may recall that the feature appeared in Google Voice last week, but was quickly pulled, with Google saying it was just a test. The video released by Google shows the process this takes, which seems pretty straight forward. This service has a one time cost of $20. Of course, Google Voice is still only available in the US, at least so far, and if you take advantage of the number porting, you may incur an ETF charge from your wireless provider.
Read More | Google Blog
Gmail favicon now shows unread message count
Posted by Patrick Lambert Categories: Google, Internet,
Ever since the advent of tabs, web sites with messaging or updating features have started providing unread message counts in the title, usually at the front, so that people can easily scan their opened tabs and see if any of them has unread stuff. Of course as tabs become more commonplace, heavy users have so many opened that often no part of the title is even visible anymore. Google introduced an innovative little feature today to fix that in Gmail. They call it the Unread Message Icon. It's a dynamic favicon that the server provides which updates the tab to show the number of unread messages in your inbox. Now, even in a crowded browser, you can easily see if you have new email. It's a simple improvement, but brilliant nonetheless, and I wouldn't be surprised to see other sites adopt the technique. To enable it, you have to go in your settings and click on the Labs options.
Read More | Gmail Blog
Cousin Corinne’s Reminder #2: Dean Haspiel & Tim Hamilton
Posted by Tom Mason Categories: Editorials, Independent,
USA Today reports on a new literary magazine that's straight out of Brooklyn.
It's Cousin Corinne's Reminder. Now why should you care?
Because it's got a full color comics section packed with contributions from Tim Hamilton, Joan Reilly, Michele Fiffe, Dean Haspiel and Jen Ferguson. My pal Tim calls Cousin Corinne's Reminder a "cool new lit mag," and who am I to argue as the second issue hits the stands.
According to the editors, "Cousin Corinne's Reminder is bi-annual journal published by BookCourt, which features writing, comix, photography, and art."
If you're in the Brooklyn area on Wednesday, January 26 from 7-10pm, drop in at Bookcourt (163 Court St.) for the official launch party for the second issue.
There will be an opening performance by George Emilio Sanchez. Readings by Priscilla Becker, Todd Colby, Stanley Crouch, Catherine Lacey, and Adam Wilson.
Click to continue reading Cousin Corinne’s Reminder #2: Dean Haspiel & Tim Hamilton
Why American students fail in science
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Editorial, Google, Microsoft, Science,
There is going to be a lot of debate over the fact that American students are again falling behind in their education. According to National Assessment of Educational Progress, American children are nothing less than pathetic when it comes to understanding science.
This whole mess will be blamed on all sorts of things, probably all valid. But who, besides me, is going to blame the computer? Has anyone noticed that ever since the computer was brought into the classroom, student test scores have been falling? Does anyone find this coincidence weird? After all, the computer is, in itself, a teaching machine, of sorts.
Over the years, I've seen a lot of quasi-teaching software and educational software companies come and go, but can you name one large or middle-sized software company that specializes in educational software for children in grade school now? Just try to name one.
The biggest software company in the world, Microsoft, used to have some educational software sold under its discontinued Home brand, but I have no idea what became of it. The company, along with the Gates Foundation, promotes the idea of computers in the classroom, but it seems more of a ploy to make kids comfortable using Windows than anything else.
For science education, the greatest thing a computer can do is to show scientific principals in a way no blackboard or discussion could ever do, with graphical representation and full motion animation. You'd think that with all the computers that have been installed in school that American kids would be wizards by now. But no.
Click to continue reading Why American students fail in science
Deal of the Day: $225 off HP Pavilion Elite HPE-400f
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Hot Deals, PC / Laptop,
HP has got a nice offer that we've made our Deal of the Day, for those of you looking for a new desktop! You get the HP Pavilion Elite HPE-400f AMD Phenom II 3 GHz quad-coredesktop PC with a monster 8 GB RAM and 1 TB hard drive, 512 MB ATI Radeon HD 5450 graphics card, and more. You save $225 off the regular price, saving you 26%. That is superb savings, and shipping is free:
Save $225 on HP Pavilion Elite HPE-400f
Don’t forget, if you’re looking for other deals, be sure to check out our Newegg Promo Code thread.
Verizon forcing $30 unlimited data plan on new smartphone customers
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Smartphones, Corporate News, Wireless / WiFi,
Verizon Wireless will cease offering its monthly 150MB data plan, which costs $15, and by default will require all new smartphone users to adopt its existing $30 unlimited data plan.
During Verizon's fourth quarter earnings call on Tuesday morning, chief operating officer Lowell McAdam said the company was scrapping its $15/month 150 MB data plan this month.
A Verizon Wireless spokesman declined to offer any more details but confirmed Verizon would continue its $30 unlimited MB plan.
The announcement deals a direct blow to the original Apple iPhone carrier, AT&T, which had to scrap its unlimited data plan last summer. AT&T's metered data plans begin at $15 a month for 200MB. At the time, AT&T argued that 98 percent of its smartphone users consumed less than 2GB per month, and 65 percent consumed less than 200MB per month.
Click to continue reading Verizon forcing $30 unlimited data plan on new smartphone customers
PSP2 to sport OLED display, 3G connectivity
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Hardware, Portable/Mobile, PSP, Rumors, Sony,
Japanese newspaper Nikkei revealed some major details concerning the PSP2, reporting that the portable system will include 3G connectivity to the NTT DoCoMo network. While this particular network is exclusive to the Far East, the included 3G connectivity means we can expect the same thing for the American launch of the PSP2. With 3G connection speeds, the PSP2 would be capable of downloading data over a phone network, instead of being limited to wi-fi connections.
Also, Nikkei broke news that the PSP2 sports an OLED touch-screen, and an all-new processor for delivering cutting edge handheld performance. All will be confirmed January 27th, when Sony officially unveils the PSP2 to the world.
