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When I saw this “lucky Dragon” phone. I about dropped my jaw. First three words that came out were: “Are you serious?”
In hindsight, I probably should have gone with “Are you silly-us?” but all jokes aside, this mobile phone was just too outrageous. And anyone that bought this phone based on the fact that it did have anything to do with feng shui would have another thing coming.
The problem I had with this device, is that the designer was trying to tie a Chinese practice, with a technological device and throw in some Chinese cultural items (like the “8″ charm) in there to boot just to make it look fantastic. Except the fact that I don’t see how a bling dragon was actually going to make the phone sit flat, and how it would exactly “activate good chi every time you make or receive a phone call.” Maybe I was on vacation the day the industry was taught how to activate good chi through a cellular device.
In any case, the red phone itself seemed pretty basic, but I’ll take Crave’s word for it since I haven’t actually touched one. Perhaps it’s not a bad idea that it’s only being released as an exclusive item in Malaysia. Maybe it’s just me, but all this red wouldn’t really make me smell any green.
Photo Credit: (Crave Asia)
6 Comments | Posted in: Lifestyles, Technology, WTF
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Taito, creator of “Space Invaders”, has teamed up with Yahoo Japan and incorporated the game into the website where space invaders destroy the Yahoo homepage. It was a part of a April Fools joke but its still active. GO BEFORE THEY TAKE IT DOWN!!!!
1 Comment | Posted in: Entertainment, Observations, Technology, Video Games, WTF
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Greetings from Austin, Texas! There’s a huge movie, music and interactive festival taking place here this week, and as I’m a big geek, I’m here for the SXSW Interactive Festival, a tech convention which is a combination of bloggers, Web 2.0 folks, CEOs and artists. Among the hundreds of panelists this year, I had the opportunity to hang out (and sing drunken karaoke with) two of the remarkably down-to-earth guys behind the LOLcat phenomenon, Eric Nakagawa and Ben Huh of icanhascheezburger.com.
Never heard of LOLcats? Oh, yes you have, especially if you spend any time on a blog, bulletin board or gotten any e-mail forwards from a kitten loving aunt. (It also explains this somewhat bizarre image.) Eric created the website as an inside joke with his girlfriend at the time; when the website started receiving exponential growth, he quit is day job as a computer programmer to work on the site full-time. Now he’s in Seattle running a website that has 2.5 million monthly users. There have been discussions about LOLcat vernacular. A book deal is in the works.
Damn, they’re doing something they love, they’re getting paid, and they’re genuinely nice guys to boot. I’m pretty jealous.
(Flickr photo credit: Min Jung Kim)
2 Comments | Posted in: Entertainment, Technology
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This past weekend I had the pleasure of meeting David Liu, the founder of Good OS. You might have heard of them when they partnered with Everex to offer a sub $200 desktop called the gPC. The gPC runs on a stripped down Linux-based operating system customized to leverage online applications accessed through the web browser – genius. When I took a look at their interface, I instantly noticed icons for Facebook, Meebo, Gmail, YouTube, and Firefox, all of which are applications I use on a daily basis.
“I remember when I was really young, maybe 12 years old, reading an article where (Netscape founder) Marc Andreessen said he was part of a generation where 90% of their activity happened on the Web,”
I think what Marc said is very true and the shift towards cloud computing is happening as we speak. In an interview at Fsckin, David Liu talked about how he came up with the idea of the gOS:
“I got interested in Google applications, especially docs and spreadsheets, presentations; and originally, I wanted to create my idea of what a Google OS would look like.. if there were such a mythical OS. As I started looking around at all the Google applications out there, I realized that all of our “computing” could eventually be done in the Google cloud. We just needed an OS that looked really good and pointed people to Google in a really friendly, intelligent way. After seeing this, I got excited because I saw it was also commercially viable for the mainstream end user.”
Sure, you can’t play World of Warcraft, but hey, for the mainstream consumer who uses the computer to access web applications, the gOS looks like a great economical alternative. What do you guys think?
1 Comment | Posted in: Technology
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For a long time, it was hard for me. [Cue violin music] All the sunglasses I’d buy in the stores were so big and round. Not a good fit for my chinky eyes. But now Oakley has answered my prayers! [Cue happy jazzy music]
My dilemma with sunglasses is finally over! Thanks to these Asian Fit sunglasses from Oakley!
(heh heh heh)
But in all seriousness… This is an interesting way to address a very real niche. There are very real physical differences between major ethnicities. Heck, just look at any cosmetics store and you’ll find entire lines dedicated to different ethnicities. It was only a matter of time before someone did the same with other physical differences.
Oakley describes this fit as one that will feel comfortable if “sunglasses tend to sit too low on your face or slide down your nose, touch at your temples or cheeks, or feel narrow at the sides of your head.” I’m guessing they got such information from market research and listening to their customers complain about fit issues.
And they’re not the only ones. Smith Phenom also has a pair of Asian Fit Goggles designed “for those flatter faces without a pronouced (sic) nose bridge.”
Even the military has similar products, such as Eye Safety System’s Asian-Fit Goggle Series, which was “made with molded face foam and a flatter lens curve and frame design.” They are now standard issue for the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF).
I’ll admit, when I first heard about these “Asian Fit” sunglasses, I raised an eyebrow. But upon deeper reflection, it sounds like a really cool idea. The reaction from the blogosphere seems to be the same as mine too. Josh @ hyku had a similar initial reaction: “At first glance the term ‘Asian Fit’ seemed a bit direct for me?” Larry @ The Nut Bar concluded: “So I guess Oakley has found a way to address an overlook niche. You can’t really argue against it since it helps out a large group of people and I’m sure it isn’t hurting their bottom line.” And Alex @ Lost in Colonisation actually purchased a pair: “I have to say it fits very well, much better than I expected.”
Have you ever tried Oakley’s Asian Fit sunglasses? How do they fit?
5 Comments | Posted in: Technology
5 Comments
This research article, Whose Space? Differences Among Users and Non-Users of Social Network Sites, reports on a research study by Eszter Hargittai in Communication Studies and Sociology at Northwestern University. It finds connections between use of social network sites and a person’s gender, race and ethnicity, and parental educational background.
One difference between this research and previous studies, which allowed them to reveal these patterns, is that it disaggregated users by site. Instead of lumping all social network users together, they separated them into Facebook, Myspace, Xanga, and Friendster. They found striking differences among the sites. For example, Asians and Asian Americans are much more likely to use Xanga and Friendster than Myspace or even Facebook. Sixty-five percent of Asian American social network users are on Xanga, and 94% are on Friendster, versus 31% on Facebook and 21% on Myspace.
Another difference between this study and previous ones is that it surveyed younger people- mainly 18- and 19-year-old college students. So instead of looking at the education level of the users, they look at the education level of their parents. They found that users of Xanga, Facebook and Friendster have more highly educated parents than users of Myspace.
I think there are more interesting facts to be found here, but I’m not sure what they are. I would be curious to know if the answers to the following questions can be found in this article or elsewhere:
What percent of social network users are Asian American?
What percent of people use social networks?
What percent of Asian Americans use Xanga?
What percent of Xanga users are Asian American?
etc.
The most surprising result of this survey to me is that only 30% of Asian-American social network users are on Facebook. I would have thought it would be a lot more.
(Image credit: Crave @ CNET UK)
5 Comments | Posted in: Lifestyles, Observations, Technology
6 Comments
File this one under AWESOME. Researchers at the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology unveiled a robot suit designed to assist farmers reduce the effort of their backbreaking work.
Researchers hope to have the technology in use in 2 years and develop it into a product and begin selling it in four years.
The suit, which is secured with belts, consists of a resin framework with eight motors to assist the movements of the knees, elbows, lower back and shoulders, making farm work easier.
When pulling out a Japanese radish, for example, about 20 kilograms [44 lbs.] of instantaneous pressure is exerted on the knees and lower back, but when using the robot suit, only about half the force is used.
This is one ingenious way to deal with the issue of farm labor. While we in America engage in a heated, racially charged dialogue about illegal immigration, the Japanese just create robots (or at least suits) that do the work for us.
6 Comments | Posted in: Technology
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With gas prices on the rise, even with the car manufacturing boom in China, most people still cannot afford to own a automobile. Thus, they’re moving to the next best thing. Electric bicycles.
Truthfully, anyone that has ever ridden in a taxi in China’s major cities should know that the roads are almost too crowded as it is. The fact that there’s a rule if I’m not mistaken where even numbered license plates for taxis get to be in the city on certain days, and the odd number plates are allowed the other days, should be proof enough that cars aren’t really for the masses yet.
Seeing how most people get around on two wheels, and while the price tag is a little higher than most would like, it’s still definitely great to see that transportation advances moving forward for the majority of the Chinese.
Photo Credit: (avixyz)
No Comments | Posted in: Technology
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