price point

The Apple I went on sale in July 1976 and was priced at $666.66.

While You Were Out: Apple's Years With and Without Steve Jobs, in today's New York Times.

Steve Wozniak on how they arrived at the price point:

I simply like triple digit numbers with all the things I'm involved with, the cost of making the Apple 1 was around $540 or there abouts and we agreed on the best markup, retail price above the cost of building it, which worked out to $666.

Jobs then tacked on the 66 cents to make it an eye-catcher price for the ads with the sale and promotion publications of it to the public.

isolated in a web of one

international business machines

Brilliant short on important tech history by the commercial and documentary filmmaker Errol Morris. The piece was commissioned by IBM for their 100th anniversary.

(Betcha can't clear the Mandelbrot scene without choking up.)

via @frydave

something called a mouse

What is this? Look at this, Keith. This is incredible! My God! I drew a circle!

Andy Warhol to Keith Haring at a 9-year old's birthday party in 1985. The two were playing with the Macintosh computer that Steve Jobs had just given the birthday boy. From the Playboy Interview with Steve Jobs that same year »

tempt one

Illus: Build an Eyewriter

I haven't drawn anything since 2003, this feels like breathing again after being held underwater for 5 minutes.

Graffitti artist Tony Quan, aka Tempt One, on how the open source Eyewriter helped him tag again after being laid low by ALS.

The Eyewriter from Evan Roth on Vimeo.

For $50 you can have one too -- EyeWriter DIY here »

google's equivalent of the cotton gin

The basic technique it uses involves two infrared cameras which determine how flat or curved each page to be scanned is and then adjusting the optical character recognition software it uses to read the text accordingly.

In other words, the infrared cameras help figure out a book’s three-dimensional shape and then back out any resulting distortions. This results in much faster book scanning since each page doesn’t need to be flattened by glass plates and spines don’t need to be broken.

The TechCrunch synopsis of the book scanning technique for which Google received patent no. 7,508,978 on 24 March of this year. The improved method, it's reasonably assumed, will improve the efficiency of preparing publications for the Google Book Project.

I share therefore I am.

We’re very good at creating personal narratives but its the shared narratives that make us a culture.

Renny Gleeson on the Culture of Availability and Obligation at TED

p.s. TED toned down their opening title track. Better.

coffee stains

Ivan Vakarelski at the Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences in Singapore was inspired by the rings left behind by spilled coffee to create a new way to make ultrathin coatings for LCD and plasma flat-screens.

In LCDs, transparent conductive coatings are used to form an electrode on the surface of the screen, while in plasma TVs they provide a shield that prevents electromagnetic fields from straying.

Traditionally to make such coatings it’s necessary to sputter a fine layer of highly conductive and transparent indium tin oxide onto the surface. This takes place in cost-intensive clean rooms and vacuum chambers.

Vakearelsk noted that when coffee is spilled, the evaporating liquid drives coffee particles to the edges of the spill -- which ultimately produces the circular stain. The coffee granules are being "assembled" by the varying evaporation and convection rates in the fluid.

Vakarelski and his colleagues figured that if they could mimic the process in a controlled fashion, they could create a pattern of granules of other materials to form a nanoscale conductive coating.

Instead of coffee they used a suspension of gold particles »

Shamelessly plagiarized and paraphrased from Anil Ananthaswamy’s Future TV screens seen in coffee stains in the 1 March issue of NewScientist.

in loco parentis

Limited top speed of 80 mph

Traction control system, that limits tire spin, cannot be deactivated

Limited audio volume to 44 percent of total volume

A speed alert chime at 45, 55 or 65 mph

Earlier low-fuel warning. Rather than a warning at 50 miles to empty, MyKey provides a warning at 75 miles to empty

MyKey System settings in Ford Automobiles that will be triggered by the use of a special key designed for teenagers. Anticipated release date: 2010.

via BoingBoing