fans

The e-Harmony for Apple fanboys (and girls)

I have heard Apple described as a cult, though I fail to see the resemblance between Steve Jobs and David Koresh. I have heard those who are not part of the Apple fold rail (sometimes quite loudly) against its power, its beauty, its uncritical worship of style without, um, flash.

Now, some clever people, perhaps mining the more positive aspects of eugenics, have created a site where Apple fanboys and girls can meet, love, and perhaps even procreate, knowing they have something powerful that binds them together.

Can love for a brand lead to a wedding band? Cupidtino (and what a lovely name that is), wants to find out. It exists so that you, the Apple fanboy or girl, can meet one of your own kind.

Need I even mention that this forward-thinking enterprise has been created by those who adore everything Apple for those who adore everything Apple? Yes, it is to launch next month and be exclusively available through Safari and iPhone and iPad apps. Would you have imagined anything else?

Cupidtino's creators (two developers and a designer with backgrounds at Yahoo and--gasp--Google and Microsoft) are very clear about the gaping market gap they see before them. "Diehard Mac and Apple fans often have a lot in common--personalities, creative professions, a similar sense of style and aesthetics, taste, and of course a love for technology," says the Web site.

But of course they're referring to just any ordinary technology. The site claims, "We believe these are enough reasons for two people to meet and fall in love, and so we created the first Mac-inspired dating site to help you find other Machearts around you."… Read more

Nestle mess shows sticky side of Facebook pages

Uh-oh. We've got another social-media-meets-public-relations disaster on our hands, and this one doesn't even involve any airlines yet. Food giant Nestle, already under pressure from environmentalists, became the subject of a Facebook- and Twitter-based "twitstorm" when the operators of the corporation's Facebook page took a hostile approach to critics.

So here's how it appears to have started: Environmental activist group Greenpeace has long been putting the pressure on Nestle to stop using palm oil, the production of which has been documented as a source of deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions, and endangered species loss. A … Read more

Monitor your Mac

CheckUp is an easy-to-use multipurpose maintenance utility that can help you monitor and improve your Mac's performance. Its very visual interface uses colorful and dynamic icons, graphs, and dials to display performance and data over eight different categories: Profile (including uptime and a bandwidth tally), System (especially great for seeing which OS your Mac can handle), Processors (twin dials for dual processors, plus a temperature monitor), Memory (configuration, usage, and testing), Disks (all partitions, with an option for repairing permissions), Network (showing input and output in a customizable graph), Processes (a prettier, more flexible version of OS X's … Read more

A fan for the grill

It may still be winter, but that doesn't mean that we can't have grilling on the mind. It could be the memory of the succulent taste of grilled meat on our lips (with sauce or without), or maybe it is the thought of a lazy day spent in the sunshine that attracts us to these considerations. Or perhaps we recall (and look forward to) grilling season because of the scent in the air. One thing is for sure: one whiff of the taste of grilling meat, and most people literally start licking their chops.

The TurboQue Smoker from Charcoal Companion … Read more

Orangutan takes photos, shares them on Facebook

She's like the Ashton Kutcher of the ape world: an orangutan in the Vienna Zoo now has a Facebook fan page to showcase the photos she takes with a digital camera. The orangutan, named Nonja, uses a Samsung ST 1000 point-and-shoot that automatically uploads the photos.

When this post was published, Nonja had over 9,000 "fans" subscribed to her page.

But there's a catch: coverage of the camera-toting ape in the U.K.'s Daily Mail explains that the camera has been modified to dispense a raisin whenever the shutter button is pushed. So Nonja … Read more

FanSnap--another way to find cheap concert tickets

Tuesday's post on using Craigslist to buy secondhand concert tickets drew a response from a company called FanSnap, which uses live feeds to aggregate ticket listings from online marketplaces and broker sites (such as StubHub and TicketNetwork) and eBay auctions.

FanSnap would argue Craigslist is fine for price-sensitive fans who don't need to go to a particular show and who are willing to meet and negotiate with other individuals, pay cash where necessary, and run the risk of buying a fake ticket. (Although the only time I've ever seen a fake concert ticket was in 1989 on … Read more

Snow Leopard: Overheating and loud fans cause issues

Several users have experienced their systems running inordinately hot after upgrading to Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, causing their fans to work exceptionally loud. Users in this thread on the Apple Support Discussions forums focus the issue primarily on MacBook Pros, though some scattered entries from MacBook owners suggest the issues may be noticed in many of Apple's notebooks.… Read more

Gadgettes Podcast 158: The International and Fabulous Episode

In honor of our special guest, Micky Hoogendijk, we cover gadgets with an international flare. You might think that a show as classy as this one might not include any questionable content. You would be wrong.

Subscribe with iTunes (audio) Subscribe with iTunes (video) Subscribe with RSS (audio) Subscribe with RSS (video) EPISODE 158

Giorgio Armani extends designer touch to new mobile

Samsung Blue Earth sees light in Sweden

http://dvice.com/archives/2009/10/lgs-pop-touchsc.php

Dolce Gusto single-cup coffee maker is a beautiful thing

Dyson Fan

Speakers as thin as your TV… Read more

Dyson unveils blade-free fan

At first glance, James Dyson's latest invention looks like a powerful HD antenna or perhaps a small portal into another world. But in fact, the device, which carries the vaunting title of Dyson Air Multiplier, is something much more common: a fan.

What, a fan with no blades? Yes, that's exactly what you're looking at, and what makes the Air Multiplier so hard for people to classify at first. This fan uses some innovative airflow engineering to pull air up through an energy-efficient brushless motorbase and multiply it 15 times, expelling it through an airfoil-shaped ramp at a rate of 118 gallons a second, according to the press release.

Dyson, the company, says its fluid dynamics engineers spent four years "running hundreds of simulations to precisely measure and optimize the machine's aperture and airfoil-shaped ramp" and air fluctuations were mapped with something called a Laser Doppler Annometry. … Read more

The 404 426: Where we whisper sweet nothings

Nothing can compare to someone whispering sweet nothings in your ear...unless that person is Wilson Tang...in which case you should probably pick up the phone and quickly dial 911. The Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week is coming to a close in New York, but there's one more runway show that we don't think got the attention it deserved: the Snuggie! The blanket with sleeves somehow rose to ridiculous popularity and became an actual phenomenon, and the company is trying to continue its revenue stream by introducing a new "urban jungle" line of robes featuring zebra and leopard prints. I managed to get my hands on a a Snuggie of my own and we each take turns trying it on before brainstorming our own ideas for Snuggie customization.

We also lament the passing of 960 Blockbuster video rental stores, all sentenced to die by the end of 2010. The company obviously suffered at the hands of free, legit streaming-video sites like Hulu and even network homepages, but CNET's own Don Reisinger reports that over 18 percent of Blockbuster's stores aren't turning a profit, so the company is practically forced to cut back on locations. We can't say that we're surprised, especially since none of us has actually stepped foot in a Blockbuster in awhile, but there's still hope for the company in the form of small rental kiosks to be placed in stores throughout the country.

The final big news item today is the debut of Google's newest RSS reader ripoff, also known as Fast Flip. As Rafe Needleman reports, the service is essentially a digital version of the old microfilm readers in that the service presents screenshots of news articles in a horizontal landscape layout. Readers can preview the first page of news stories categorized by popularity, recent views, topics, etc... but the odd part is that none of the hyperlinks actually work. Instead, clicking anywhere on the page takes you to the original article landing page. Our initial reaction is wondering about this new relationship between Google Fast Flip and the actual Web publishers. We like the ability to read a quick snippet of news and quickly scroll through several news sites at once, but the horizontal scrolling is too limiting. Listen to the show to hear more complaints without solutions.

EPISODE 426 Subscribe in iTunes audio | Suscribe to iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more