It looks like any other USB Flash Drive– but it’s really a Linux PC on a stick. It has its own complete onboard operating system, can be booted from any PC with an x86 processor, whether its running Linux or Windows, and even includes the OpenOffice Productivity Suite and many commonly used desktop and Internet …
MUSA is a Japanese kendo fighting “companion”–a robot that can use kendo moves to help train human fighters. Made by the Manufacturing & Mechatronics Lab of Seoul National University, it can fight at different levels of experience. And it looks, frankly, terrifying. (Via Technovelgy.com.)
Maybe! And if they’re there, we may soon know about it.
Volunteers are working to uncover what may be a never-before seen species of sauropod in Montana. I’d say, “Cool!”, but it’s actually probably very, very hot work.
A rap version of The Canterbury Tales sounds interesting, but for my money the greatest rap song ever has to be Moxie Fruvous‘s rap version of Green Eggs and Ham: “Hey kids, listen up if you wanna be sick, ’cause your dinner looks like something from a Cronenberg flick…” it begins, and it only gets …
The House of Representatives in the U.S. has endorsed NASA’s new mandate for Moon and Mars missions. Doesn’t mean they’ll actually give NASA all the money it says it needs, of course, but the support is nice.
If they hold up, the conclusions from this story bode ill for the discovery of existing life on Mars. But that’s a big “if.”
Here’s a fascinating article about the true story that inspired the tragic tale of Madame Butterfly, made famous by Puccini’s opera of the same name. It turns out the real-life story was also tragic, but in a very different way.
A team of British and Russian scientists have discovered a family of materials only one atom thick, exhibiting properties previously thought impossible, that could be used in everything from clothing to computers. We’re talking “ultra-fast transistors, micromechanical devices and nano-sensors” within just a few years; completely unimagined technological advances beyond that. Best thing about this …
Thanks for asking!
…or at least his ashes are.
“Bones” is gone, and now “Scotty”. But they live on in re-runs. The one thing I learned about James Doohan in today’s obituaries I didn’t know before was that he was missing the middle finger of his right hand. As someone on the SF Canada listserver commented today, that must have been a real handicap …
