See self-assembly and 4D printing in action

Reblogged from TED Blog:

http://vimeo.com/59918368

A part on the outside of a spaceship that morphs, rather than requiring an astronaut to perform a risky maneuver. Plumbing pipes able to bend and flex based on the needs of the water flowing through them. Furniture that assembles itself, no screwdriver required. Buildings with the ability to repair themselves when something goes awry.

These are just some potential applications of research being done at TED Fellow Skylar Tibbits’ Self Assembly Lab at MIT.

Read more… 324 more words, 9 more videos

Mind blown!

IE Sucks!

Brilliant marketing piece by a company that gets it. (Pinch me! Did I just say that?)

(hat tip to Brad Frost on twitter)

Business as Usual

So you wanted to know what it’s like living under fire from Gaza?

Yesterday evening, straight from Netivot (speakers on)

Related articles

• Grad Missile Hits Netivot Home (israelnationalnews.com)
• Grad rocket slams into Netivot home; several treated for shock (timesofisrael.com)
• IDF launches three Gaza strikes in response to rocket fire (haaretz.com)

Northern Lights

We’re now going through that odd 2 to 3-week season called autumn here. Both spring and autumn in Israel tend to be short-lived, only denoted by frequent temperature spikes and drops on a near daily basis. Unlike my home state of Minnesota, there’s no real Theater of Seasons here and obviously we don’t have the extremes of weather that come along with it. What makes me know that autumn is in the air is that we are experiencing a wonderfully cool early morning, cool enough that when I wake up I find I’ve covered my shoulders with a light blanket.

Another herald of cooler weather way, way up north are the tweets by@AuroraMAX that the Aurora Borealis is on display in the Yellowknife, NWT area.

AURORAMAX ALERT • An aurora is now visible above Yellowknife, Northwest Territories! Check it out at asc-csa.gc.ca/eng/astronomy/…—
  (@AuroraMAX) September 19, 2012

The music  in the first video is OK, but the otherworldly sounds made by the aurora itself and the wind can be just as beautiful. And while there’s too much talking in the second video, you can hear the hisses, whistles, crackles and pops that the aurora broadcasts over radio frequencies.

Anyone want to book a flight to Finland with me?

Related:

Northern Lights, Earth’s Auroras, Causes and Facts

Related articles

• Spectacular Northern Lights Photos: September 2012 (space.com)
• Spectacular aurora borealis lights up north (stuff.co.nz)
• Northern Lights Soundtrack: 230 Feet Above Ground, Aurora Borealis Pops and Claps – Slate Magazine (blog) (slate.com)

SuperBetter-The Game With Amazing Real Life Rewards

Not-to-be-missed TED Talk by game developer Jane McGonigal.

SuperBetter website.

(If the video doesn’t load, you can view it on the TED Talks site.)

And another perspective:

“Games are useful. Games are fun. Yet, somehow, gamification itself has become the butt of almost every internet joke I’ve heard recently.

It isn’t because games aren’t useful. They are and they can change the world. It’s because gamification is being wasted on the most useless, time wasting crap I’ve ever seen.”

via Julien Smith’s blog, We need Dungeon Masters for the real world.

Written much earlier than McGonigal’s TED Talk, there’s little here that I don’t agree with. And thanks to the first commenter, I’ve discovered Jane McGonigal’s blog, here on WordPress.com. Sadly, no updates since the beginning of the 2010, but what’s there in the archives makes up for it 10x.