Category: Geek

Colin bought himself a new Intel MacBook. He told his boss he would be able to boot into both the Mac OS and XP. He’d like to make good on that promise, so he’s started a contest to award prize money to the first person who can figure out how to dual-boot Windows XP and OS X on the new Intel Macs. He seeded the purse with $100 and asked others to chip in. As of this writing, the pot has US$7,115 in it. Gentlegeeks: Start your Logic Probes!

Okay, look, I love the Mac as much as the next Applehead, but this is just sad: Step by step pics on Flickr of the Duo Core Intel iMac being removed from its box. This might be even remotely interesting if the experience was in any way different than removing the pre-Intel iMacs from the box, but it isn’t. Do other people just have a lot more free time on their hands than I do?

[Via TUAW]

You may have heard about the ’94 Honda Civic at CES that was controled via a Sony PSP. Now you too can risk driving your car into your neighbor’s living room thanks to the release of the source code used to control the car. More info and links via PSPUpdate.

Street Tech cofounder Peter Sugarman’s wife, Linda, died of cancer one year ago today. Our condolences to him and to all who knew and loved Linda. Peter sent me this little piece via email and I thought it might resonate with others here who know the power of panel lines, word balloons and india ink.

The answer I give, if asked my political persuasion, is “Media American.” I’m all about the story, what it tells, how it’s told. I make mention of the Media Gods, because I actually believe that my Higher Power talks to me through the mass media: movies, TV, country music, and comic books.

Back in 2004, there was this one particular high-tone comic book called Identity Crisis. They brought in a novelist to write the thing. It dealt with some pretty mainline DC superheroes: Green Arrow, Flash, Atom. The Elongated Man (a.k.a. Ralph Dibney) was central to the tale, as he felt most keenly the cost and loss that drove the story. His darling wife, Sue, was murdered.

For those of us who read them, comic books are real. This was all that and more: the shock of her death, the crushing loss to her husband Ralph, the abrupt emptiness of his life. At the funeral, he was so broken down, he was not able to hold onto the cohesion of his face. His power, after all, is his ability to be pliable. Literally holding himself together was all that he could manage.

Still, Ralph is a hero. Not only that, a detective. He throws himself into the pursuit of the killer. But he is also a man bereft, stunned by grief. He’s not sure how to live, how to relate to the woman who chose him above all others, who shared his life, who is now gone and not coming back. Green Arrow, who had himself died and come back (something not all that uncommon in this particular universe), gives him counsel. “Talk to her. Listen to me — I know. Talk to her, Ralph. She can hear every word.”

The killer, unsuspected and one of their own, is found out. More cost, more loss. The hard choices, and the consequences of choices made, play out. The story comes to a close in the bedroom of Ralph Dibney, Adventurer, Detective, Widower. Ralph’s always been a bit of a joker, has a pretty good sense of humor. He’s telling (his dead wife) Sue a joke, a bad joke, but well told. He does not accept her silent protest, that she’s heard this one before. “How do I know? ‘Cause I’m your husband, that’s…” He pauses, listens, understands that she has to go, tells her not to worry. They’ll speak later. He tells her he’ll talk to her tomorrow. He tells her goodnight and elongates his arm to click off the lamp over on her bedside table. The next panel is black, the bedroom dark. There is a final word balloon, one that has no “tail,” so we’re not sure who said it. “I love you, too.” Is it Sue (gone on) or Ralph (left behind)?

I can tell you this. It does matter. It is true any way you look at it. It is true, and comforting, and sad, and it is why we tell stories. And THAT is why I am a Media American.

Sci-fi author and editor Lou Anders wrote a really nice blog piece about the online text release of Beyond Cyberpunk! that had escaped our notice, until now. Thanks, Lou. It’s always so gratifying to hear stories of how BCP! affected people.

Thanks, Peter!

C’mon, Street Techies, represent! Gizmodo is running a contest to find the biggest dork photo amongst their readership. We know you got the pictures to prove your pownage!

I wish I had the pic of my son Blake, at 3 or 4, sitting at a Unix dumb terminal at his grandmother’s “Deathstar village” home (one of the neighborhoods around Bell Labs in NJ, where she worked). He’s in one of those za-zen sitting chairs, holding onto a humongous 3-button mouse, working in a drawing program. He was destined to be a geek. Sorry to out you, son.

This apparently is not a joke. According to a piece on Phonedaily, a Taiwanese phone site (via Akihabara), it looks as though young phone users in Japan are trying to achieve that sexy phone lineman look by attaching landline phone handsets to their cellies and then dangling the sets from their belt loops. The site also shows the handsets being customized with paint, glitter, decals, and the like. Personally, we’re waiting for those gigantic first-gen cellphones to make a comeback.

Update: Mark blogged this on Boing Boing and a reader wrote:

Just the other day i came across a website that happens to sell these very items. They can be found at Fred Flare.” $20.

Not since the d20 dice tattoo have we been so tempted to fly our geek colors as with these 20-sided fuzzy dice for your car (or for hanging from the cube farm mirror you have on your monitor so that dweeb from sales can’t sneak up on you). These are definitely going in the Street Tech Holiday Gift Guide (coming soon). US$10, from ThinkGeek.

The next time you’re showing someone around your house and they ask you what that amazing organic-y LED read-out-like canvas is on your wall, you can tell ’em: “That’s my self-portrait; my long-chain polymer of nucleotides; my molecule of heredity; ya know: my DNA — it’s a portrait of my freakin’ DNA!” Such geeky portraiture is made possible by a company called DNA 11. To invert yourself for all the world to see your sequence, you simply spit into a small capsule the company sends after you’ve ordered your image and chosen from a number of display colors and canvas sizes. Prices range from US$390 to $940, depending on canvas size. The one shown here is a split-screen, showing two DNA “fingerprints.” “Honey, I don’t know how to put this, but yours looks disturbingly similar to mine. I think we should hold off on having kids until we have this looked at.”

[Via Mavromatic]

Street Tech pal Darick Chamberlin, artist and author of the amazing cyberpunk tortured-text Cigarette Boy, has done illustrations for a nifty line of Star Wars watches for Burger King.

The watches have Darick’s illustrations on both sides of the band, a “hologram” on the back of the watch, and they come in cool tin tubes with Darick’s art on them. And, they cost all of US$2, when you buy a value meal.

Congrats to Darick for getting such a high-profile gig and doing such a great job. More images after the jump, and check out the source images on Darick’s website (including a few images not used, such as a pissed-off-looking Yoda and a bearded Obi-Wan).