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Play Tom Hanks on your own giant piano

Want to feel old? Next year will mark the 20th anniversary of Big, the movie that everyone remembers for the scene where pre-Forrest Gump Tom Hanks plays an unlikely duet with Robert Loggia on a giant piano. (We all know, of course, that anyone in real life would have been eight-sixed by security at FAO Schwarz before their feet hit the second note.)

Now you too can play Josh (he apparently had no last name in the movie) with the "World's Biggest Piano Mat," which measures almost 6.5 feet long and nearly 3 feet wide. Forget … Read more

The Pirate Bay sees buried treasure in streaming video

The Pirate Bay, a BitTorrent file tracking site based in Sweden, hinted in a blog post on Friday that it has begun navigating the high seas of streaming video. The site had been hyping up a "surprise" in recent weeks, and still won't give much detail, but it has confirmed that it is indeed a video project. "As a treat I can tell you--YES--we're going to do a video streaming site," the blog post wrote. "It's true. It's in the works being done right now and as usual we put a … Read more

No more rumors: Blizzard announces Starcraft 2

The wait is over. No more speculation and no more rumors. Just a few hours ago, Blizzard announced Starcraft 2 at the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational in Seoul. This will be the first sequel to one of the most popular PC strategy games ever. The Terrans, Protoss, and Zerg are all coming back, each with their own unique style of play. The game's trailer was already up on Youtube by midnight and got almost 27,000 views in just over four hours.

Starcraft 2's release date hasn't yet been announced, but it won't be alone when it … Read more

This motorbike is green if not mean

Don't get us wrong: We loved the Michael Dukakis-style ride on an electric scooter that fellow Craver Michael Kanellos took in his video adventure yesterday. But the little red bike won't do a whole lot for your Wild Hogs image, now will it?

If you want to hit the road in all black but also stay green, the "Stealth" motorcycle from Hybrid Technologies may be a more appropriate choice. TechEBlog says the bike only has a top speed of 50 miles per hour, but it looks a lot closer to a Harley than Michael's Maxi-Scooter. (… Read more

TV on the go, and nothing else

In this age of convergence and the uber-device, you'd think everyone was clamoring for the digital Swiss Army knife that has become such a cliche. But some of us are purists when it comes to electronic entertainment--especially when it comes to television. Not that we watch tons of TV, of course; we at Crave are strictly PBS types (cough).

For those who can't live without the same Seinfeld reruns they've already seen hundreds of times, Japan-based BlueDot has a mini-TV that's under 5 inches long and less than half an inch thick, with a 4-inch screen. … Read more

The world's first (only?) vinegar robot

Just because there are robots that clean pools, dispense tissues and make omelettes (badly), you may have thought that they've come up with one for pretty much everything. But we're willing to bet you hadn't thought of this: a bot that's an expert on vinegar.

That's right, in Japan--land of the future human-free society--the Tamanoi Vinegar Corporation has just hired a robot made by Buildup to make presentations about its namesake product. The inspiringly named Tamanoi Vinegar Robot "has a mouth that moves in sync with its voice, as well as a fiber-reinforced … Read more

Photos: Paging Dr. Robot

Who says all the good gadgets are in the big cities?

The sick bay in one small California town just got a lot more interesting. Healdsburg District Hospital, in Sonoma County, Calif., recently showed off a new addition to its staff, a remote-presence robot called RP-7.

RP-7 cruises around the hospital's hallways and, with its flat-screen TV for a head and two panning cameras for eyes, allows patients and doctors in one town to consult with other doctors or specialists hundreds of miles away. Sitting at a computer, a doctor can move the robot around a hospital in a … Read more

Panasonic Strada CN-NVD905U

Panasonic took a leap into the in-dash navigation market this month with the release of its catchy-named Strada CN-NVD905U. The touch screen device uses a 30GB hard drive to store mapping data, and can be used to play a variety of digital audio formats as well as DVD video. Check out our slide show.

Michael's scooter ride: You've seen the pics, now see the movie

On Wednesday Michael Kanellos did a Crave blog about his electric scooter ride in Austin, Texas, and he showed us the still images. But now Crave has this exclusive, never-before-seen video.

The scooters are being made by Vectrix, which has operations in Italy and the U.S., and are already on the streets in Europe. They'll be sold in the U.S. starting this summer.

Dell confirms rumors, will build tablet PC

Dell confirmed Friday that it will sell a tablet PC before the end of year.

Jeff Clarke, senior vice president and general manager of Dell's business product group, made the announcement in a short video posted to the company's Direct2Dell blog.

"I'm here to end much speculation in the industry about our plans in the tablet marketplace," says a casually attired Clarke, while holding the tablet. The device will be a Latitude tablet PC designed specifically for the education, health care and corporate markets, he said.

On the video, Clarke gives a brief demo and … Read more