Planon Printstik Portable Printer

                                

While the world is slowly moving away from the need for printed documents, it will still be some time before we can ditch our printers altogether. In fact I really only use mine for printing the occasional ticket or other travel documents, which is what the Printstik from Planon seems ideal for. At just 1″ x 10.75″ x 1.9″ it’s small enough to be stored in the bottom of your laptop bag for when those random ‘print emergencies’ come up while on the road.

It features a USB port for connecting to a laptop as well as Bluetooth for printing documents directly off of a smartphone or PDA. One thing I particularly like is that it uses replaceable thermal paper cartridges instead of ink. Each cartridge contains 20 pages, which means everything is self-contained in the Printstik. On a single charge you can expect to run off about 40 pages at 200DPI, and it has a print speed of about 3 pages per minute. The Printstik itself is available from the Planon website for $299.99, while a three-pack of replacement paper cartridges runs $24.99.

Video Friday: Internet Party 2 (The Intervention)

                                    

Back in January, we posted a video from Those Aren’t Muskets called Internet Party, exploring what would happen if you got a bunch of popular websites together in one room. It’s damn funny stuff, and now comes the second installment, in which MySpace’s friends tell him that enough is enough. The video is probably NSFW (language and some same-sex mackin’), and will autoplay after the jump

Steampunk Telectroscope Uses Secret Tunnel To See London From New York

Behold!

“Hardly anyone knows that a secret tunnel runs deep beneath the Atlantic Ocean. In May 2008, more than a century after it was begun, the tunnel will finally be completed. Immediately afterwards, an extraordinary optical device called a Telectroscope will be installed at both ends which will miraculously allow people to see right through the Earth from London to New York and vice versa.”

I hope I’m not bursting anyone’s bubble when I reveal that the Telectroscopes (designed by artist and inventor Paul St George) are connected not by a tunnel but by fiber optic cabling, and an HD camera and projector on either end provide live streaming video. But who really cares, you can still look in one end of this device in New York and see out the other in London. You’ll find one end next to the Brooklyn Bridge, and the other across the pond, next to Tower Bridge.

Interestingly, the concept for this device has been around for over a century. Read about its origins, and check out a picture from one of the apertures, after the jump.

 

 

This Week On BotJunkie

                           

This week on BotJunkie, we lounged around while watching a humanoid robot more or less successfully mow the lawn for us, heard about a nanobot soccer competition taking place on a tiny field with robots dwarfed by grains of salt, saw a new type of wall climbing bot that uses static electricity to stick to just about anything, watched a video of some robosoccer bots and learned why their skills are valuable in space, met a biorobotic grasshopper that’s a world champion jumper, were a little weirded out with some cyborg plants that produce their own light to grow by, saw a robot with a flame head do a very convincing human walk, and read parts of a very interesting article by David Calkins on the history and present meaning of the word “robot.” Think you know a robot when you see it? Are you sure? ‘Cause I’m not, and I see a lot of robots. So head on over and take a look.

Buy A Leather Envelope For Your MacBook Air

                           

I think we all remember when Steve Jobs pulled the MacBook Air out of a manila envelope. I don’t care if you were an Apple fan or not, you wanted one. Of course the lack of an optical drive or the high price probably swayed you against actually purchasing one. However, if you did snag one for your very own, you might have the desire to stun your friends by pulling it out of an envelope like Steve. Well here’s one envelope that might be worthy of your precious Air.

Rather than being made of paper, these envelopes from Bird Electron are made of leather, which is far more suitable for your $1800+ investment. No word yet on pricing or availability.

From The Road: Wii Fit On Tour

                           

For some reason my local mall also happens to be a major tourist attraction, so it’s unfortunately always crowded with out-of-towners who have apparently never seen things like an indoor fountain. On the plus side, the large volume of people traffic means there’s always some kind of over-the-top marketing promotion going on.

This week Nintendo was in town showing off their new Wii Fit peripheral. Now I’m a fan of the Wii, and there have been a few games that have really used the Wiimote controller in new and interesting ways, but I’m kind of undecided on Wii Fit. As a balance board that can be used with skateboard or skiing games it has promise, but at one point someone was using a demo kiosk to do pushups. Did we lose a war or something? How did pushups manage to squeeze their way onto my gaming console? I’m all for innovation, but there’s no high score or secret level that’s worth a round of pushups. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to spend the next 20 minutes struggling to get up off the couch.

Segways With Plasma Displays Allow TV Commercials To Follow You Around The City

                           

At home you can use your Tivo remote to fast forward through boring or annoying commercials, but if you happened to be walking through Columbus Circle in New York last week, you wouldn’t have been so lucky. A few Segways that had been retrofitted with large, vertically mounted plasma displays were being used to show advertisements for the new J.J. Abrams series, Fringe. The writers at Chip Chick managed to snap a few shots of the Segways which featured special mounts for the plasma display, a portable DVD player and a couple of large batteries to keep all the added electronics running. There’s no word on whether or not a-32 inch flat screen display will become an official option for the Segway, but I’m sure it would be a popular accessory.

Star Wars Themed Fishing Tackle – WWLS (What Won’t Lucas Sell)

                               

As much as I hate to see extra-crappy Star Wars merchandise, I have to admit I would have loved to own a lightsaber-style fishing rod when I was a kid. Ok, that’s not entirely true. If I had the opportunity to go fishing more than once a year, I would probably buy one today too. And in addition to the lightsaber fishing rod you’ll soon be able to buy a slightly less-clever tackle box adorned with various Star Wars graphics, and a Darth Vader Fun Net which doesn’t actually seem that much funner than a regular net. This is also apparently just the first wave of Star Wars themed fishing accessories, and in the future there will be more products that could even feature a Clone Wars theme, which makes sense given the upcoming animated film.

The Boy Genius Report Reviews The Nokia E71

                         

In my pre-iPhone days I went through a lot of cellphones, but the Nokia E61 probably holds the record for sticking around the longest. So even though I now mostly only use an iPhone, I’ve been keeping an eye on what Nokia has been doing with their e-series handsets. While the E61i was a marginal upgrade over the E61, it looks like the E71 is a considerably larger step, at least in terms of design. The Boy Genius Report recently got their hands on one and have posted a review of their findings.

Overall they really like the phone, particularly the chrome finish and its thin form factor. While they weren’t a huge fan of the smaller keyboard keys (when compared to the E61) they don’t feel it’s a deal breaker. In fact they go as far as to call the E71 the best phone Nokia has made to date, and it apparently puts the E61 to shame. Personally, I’m waiting to see what Google’s Android is like before I consider a new phone, but for those who prefer an actual keyboard (opposed to the iPhone’s virtual one) you might want to look into Nokia’s latest offering.

Contactbox – Display Your Gadgets With Pride, But Hide Those Unsightly Cords

                                    

Why be embarrassed by your bleeding edge smartphone or other electronics? Instead of hiding them in a drawer you should be proud of your expensive investments, and this wall-mounted Contactbox allows you to display them in plain sight. The front of the box features a series of elastic cords (it’s actually just one cord) that can securely hold your device, while the inside of the box can be used to hide and organize a power strip plus all of your various charging cables and adapters. Moral of the story? Electronics are cool, cords are for losers.

The Contactbox comes in a red, white, black or oak finish and is available from the Scandinavian Design Center for $88.36.