NASA Spacecraft Streams Back Surprises From Mercury

The recent flyby of Mercury by NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft has given scientists an entirely new look at a planet once thought to have characteristics similar to those of Earth's moon.
Click here for a movie of the Mercury approach.
Click here for a departure video. For this video, Messenger acquired one image every four minutes over a 19 hour period. In total, 288 images were snapped during this time and were compiled sequentially to produce this movie.
The spacecraft also discovered a unique feature that scientists dubbed "The Spider." Near the center of the basin, an area unseen by Mariner 10, this remarkable feature pictured– nicknamed “the spider” by the science team – was revealed. A set of troughs radiates outward in a geometry unlike anything seen by Mariner 10. The radial troughs are interpreted to be the result of extension (breaking apart) of the floor materials that filled the Caloris basin after its formation.

read more | digg story

Sports Car Turns Into Boat

If this doesn't qualify as a cool tidbit I don't know what does. Like something directly out of a Bond movie, the Rinspeed Splash is a high-speed amphibious sports car that can swim, hover above water and can reach 125mph on the road and accelerates to 60mph in 5.9 seconds.

read more | digg story

Mass Confusion Over Digital TV Switchover

In a study released today by Consumer Reports, mass confusion still abounds regarding the upcoming switchover to digital TV broadcasting. The most shocking result was this one: 36% of TV households are entirely unaware of the digital switchover. Wow. Just about every day I see a public service announcement about it on TV or hear one on the radio.
48% believe only digital TVs will work after 2009 and 24% believe they will need to throw away their current analog TV sets. Neither is true. Existing TVs will still work when connected to cable, satellite, or a broadcast converter box.
33% of consumers unaffected by the switchover still plan to purchase a converter box or new digital TV. Amazing.
73% of those polled were unaware of the government coupon program available to offset consumer cost for purchasing a converter box.
If you're reading a technology blog, you are probably aware of the facts. On February 17, 2009, broadcasters will end analog signals and begin all digital broadcasting. This will affect about 15% of the population who currently view free over the air TV programming. Older analog TVs will then need to be connected to a digital converter box or receive cable or satellite signals to continue to be used.
Since you are aware of the impending date, check with your grandparents and the old lady who lives down the street to make sure they know the facts and aren't planning to unnecessarily buy converter boxes or new HDTVs.

read more | digg story

Using Kites to Pull Cargo Ships Across the Seas

Here's a story about a cargo ship using a wind sail strung up like a kite to reduce fuel consumption. The MS Beluga is a 140 meter long cargo ship. It uses a 160 square meter sky-sail which is set to fly at a height between 100 and 300 meters above the ocean. The kite is able to reduce fuel consumption by about 10% to 35% depending on wind conditions. If the tests are successful, the company expects to deploy this system on other cargo ships.

read more | digg story

Where Are Those Million iPhones? Everywhere, Says NYT

If you listened to TwiT this week you heard Leo and the gang talk about the one million missing iPhones. You see, Apple states over 3.7 million iPhones were sold in 2007; yet AT&T's figures are "just at or sightly under two million." So the question was, are there really 1.7 million unsold iPhones sitting in retail stores? While people could have purchased iPhones over the holidays and have yet to activate them with AT&T, that still leaves a lot of iPhones unaccounted for. New York Times today says they've found them; all over the world iPhones are being sold legitimately or not.

read more | digg story

Hyperfast Star Proven To Be Alien

A young star is speeding away from the Milky Way so fast that astronomers have been puzzled by where it came from; based on its young age it has traveled too far to have come from our galaxy. Now by analyzing its velocity, light intensity, and for the first time its tell-tale elemental composition, Carnegie astronomers Alceste Bonanos and Mercedes López-Morales, and collaborators Ian Hunter and Robert Ryans from Queen's University Belfast have determined that it came from our neighboring galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The result suggests that it was ejected from that galaxy by a yet-to-be-observed massive black hole.

read more | digg story

Palm Closing Stores, Settling Lawsuit

Yesterday Palm announced it would be closing it's 34 retail locations by the end of the current quarter. "We continue to focus our company around core business initiatives and are consolidating more resources behind fewer programs in order to compete most effectively and build world-class, category-defining mobile solutions. We have therefore made the decision to close our retail stores," the company said in a statement regarding the retail move.
This news comes just a day after announcing they were settling a lawsuit over the company's Treo 600/650 smartphones. Treo 600 and 650 owners who have had their units replaced or repaired at least twice are eligible for cash rebates on new Palm smartphones, as part of a settlement of a class-action suit filed in 2005. The company will also repair any Treo 600 or 650 that hasn't failed twice, but is outside of the original warranty.
Things don't look too hot for Palm right now, last year after months of product development and hype about the Foleo, scrapped the product entirely before bringing it to market. Palm is facing heated competition from Apple and Blackberry as many users complain the Palm OS is simply outdated compared to newer touch interfaces like the iPhone and impressive newcomers like the HTC Touch and Verizon's Voyager. Palm's current efforts seem to be on the lower priced entry level smartphone market. Palm's new Centro is reportedly a hit, priced at $99 for new customers.


read more | digg story