Shareable Ink is hoping to popularize a camera-in-a-pen that wirelessly transfers text written on paper to a remote database to better track such data as glucose levels.
(Credit: Shareable Ink)It all started when anesthesiologist Vernon Huang wanted to figure out a better way to streamline his billing. How could he bridge the gap between what's written on paper and what must be entered into an electronic database?
Huang, who's clocked in time as a senior manager for health care markets at Apple, designed the application for a digital pen whose tiny camera embedded right next to the ink cartridge captures every stroke of the written word on film and whose images are uploaded wirelessly and automatically to a remote database.
He knew such an invention has a range of applications well beyond billing, and founded Shareable Ink (headquartered in Newton, Mass., with a branch in San Mateo, Calif.). Medgadget caught up with Huang at TedMed and posted a shaky but informative demonstration:
There is, of course, competition. ... Read more
Sometimes, but not often, The 404 Podcast wades into foreign territory and needs help getting out. Luckily, we have Natali Del Conte on hand to dish out some much needed advice about how to approach someone on public transit. Is it taboo to introduce yourself? Should you offer a business card? Is there some kind of unspoken agreement not to talk to anyone else on the New York Subway?
Natali answers all these questions and more in the first half of the show and even gives us homework to read, and although none of this really applies to Jeff "Palm Prenup" Bakalar, Wilson and I hope today's show helps you as much as it helped us.
Speaking of reading, Barnes & Noble yesterday released its own e-reader called the Nook. The $259 device has an e-ink display, built-in Wi-Fi, 3G over AT&T, and 2GB of internal storage. CNET Editor-at-Large David Carnoy was at yesterday's launch, so check out his take.
If you're not completely sold on the Nook (or even the name), check out the Entourage Edge, a gadget to come that combines a Netbook, notepad, and media player into one folding tablet-size machine. The Nook's e-ink screen and the ability to share books with friends for free whets Wilson's whistle, and he claims that this might be the one reader to rule them all, but let's face it: until Steve Jobs comes to the CNET NY office and hands him a piece of plastic with an Apple on it, Wilson probably won't be getting an e-reader.
Of course, Apple also made its own announcement yesterday, debuting a couple new iMacs, a new MacBook for fall, and a Magic Mouse with touch capability. Be sure to check out that video up there to the left for my initial impressions, but the short story is that its thin, nonsculpted design and touch features will require a long learning curve, especially if you're used to contoured, ergonomic mice like the Logitech Performance Mouse MX, my own daily workhorse and an Editors' Choice.
Finally, Natali tell us about a new Gucci iPhone app that offers new music, information on the latest fashion shows, and news about Gucci products. Although none of us actually own any Gucci (NDC's Fucci from Canal St. doesn't count), we can still appreciate this free app for its gaudiness and uselessness. Besides, our idea for an Ed Hardy app sounds much more appealing.
Big thanks to Natali (check her out on Loaded) for doling out solid advice and sticking around through the break. Have a great Wednesday everyone!
EPISODE 450
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Video coming soon, check back later today!
... Read more
I'm very impressed by the Nook, Barnes & Noble's new e-book reader. It's clear B&N has studied Sony's Reader and Amazon's Kindle very carefully.
The Nook has almost all of the major features of both product lines, plus a few more, with few competitive disadvantages. B&N has also followed Amazon's lead on support services. The Nook has a very good online e-book store as well as applications to support e-book reading on Macs, Windows machines, and smartphones.
(Credit:
Barnes & Noble)
The Nook doesn't ship until the end of November, but here's what I found most significant from the announcement and the pages at nook.com:
Industrial design
I think the Nook is attractive and well-designed. It looks better than the Kindle 2, but not as good as Sony's Reader Touch Edition, which offers a larger screen in a smaller form factor. Also, Sony's forthcoming Reader Daily Edition is only slightly larger than the Nook, but offers a much larger screen.
Secondary color display
This feature surprised me. It seems expensive and insufficiently functional for what must be a significant added cost. The low resolution of this display (480 x 144, according to a CNET blog post) means it won't be useful for much beyond the basic user-interface features B&N has already described: book covers, menus, and a keyboard for note-taking. (Although I should note for the record that while B&N says "Its full-color touchscreen encourages you to bookmark, add notes, and highlight passages," I haven't found a photo on the company Web site depicting the virtual keyboard shown in some of the pre-release images. Perhaps that's one of the features still under development.)
By comparison, the secondary color screen built into the Alex e-book reader from Spring Design, shown in another recent CNET story, is large enough to be useful. Unfortunately, it's also large enough to be very much in the way, leading to an awkward device. Spring Design and B&N need to make up their minds-- are they making e-book readers or something else?
... Read more
The free Ecofont typeface promises to consume up to 20 percent less ink.
(Credit: Ecofont)There are lots of ways to save money on pricey printer consumables.
You can configure your print driver to output two pages on a single sheet of paper. You can enable "draft" mode to use less ink. And, of course, you can bypass printing altogether and generate PDFs.
Then there's Ecofont, a free typeface that promises to consume up to 20 percent less ink.
Available for Windows, Mac, and Linux systems, Ecofont closely resembles your basic Arial, but with one key difference: holes. Each letter has loads of little holes punched out of it, meaning it requires less ink to print.
But as you can see in the example, Ecofont is still plenty readable. So why not use it for all your everyday print jobs?
I know, I know, there are lots of outline-style fonts that would accomplish more or less the same thing. But not many of them look just like Arial--or have the environmentally conscious "Eco" prefix. That's how you know it's "green."
Anyway, it's been about a million years since I installed a new font. If you need a refresher course like I did, you can find help on the Ecofont download page.
"My workplace goes through ink cartridges like water, and I couldn't bear to keep tossing them out," says the creator of the lamps.
(Credit: Etsy.com/boxlightbox)Recently, I replaced an ink tank in a printer and unthinkingly tossed the empty cartridge into the trash bin. Looking at the ink cartridge lamps from crafts site Etsy.com, I now feel a tad guilty.
An Epson cartridge gets reborn.
(Credit: Etsy.com/boxlightbox)Who would have thought an expanded printer cartridge could be converted into such an interesting home decor item? Not only does it make a great conversation piece when guests swing by, it's also an innovative way to go eco-friendly.
It's just a shame there aren't any DIY instructions on how to make the ink cartridge lamp yourself. Instead, you'll have to drop between $35 and $200 for one of these unique handmade pieces.
(Source: Crave Asia via Dvice)
There's been some buzz this week around Pixel Qi's 3qi display technology, which integrates e-paper attributes with LCD to create a versatile and potentially very energy-efficient screen. The idea is that with a flip of a button you can go from a traditional high-resolution color LCD experience to a low-power black and white mode to an even more energy-efficient e-paper mode that allows you to easily view text in bright sunlight.
This week the technology was demonstrated at Computex in Taiwan, and it seems very impressive. If these types of displays can be produced cost-efficiently, they may revolutionize the notebook and e-reader market. We're probably at least a year away from seeing devices with Pixel Qi's 3qi displays, but at least the company has some promising prototypes to show off and John Ryan, Pixel Qi's COO and vice president of sales of marketing, claims the technology is more mature than you'd think.
Check out the video and feel free to comment on how revolutionary you think this is--or isn't.
Additional reading: PixelQi puts three displays in one
(Source: Techvideoblog.com via Engadget)
Fujitsu's FLEPia offers color, but it costs $1,000.
(Credit: Fujitsu)Those of you holding out for a color version of the Kindle may be disappointed to learn that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is telling the world it won't be arriving anytime soon. In fact, a color-screened Kindle is "multiple years" away, he said Thursday, adding: "I've seen the color displays in the laboratory, and I can assure you they're not ready for prime time."
We weren't expecting a color-screened Kindle in the near future, particularly one that anyone can afford (Fujitsu has just launched the FLEPia color e-book reader in Japan, but it costs $1,000). That said, I strongly suspect we'll see color-screened e-book readers very soon that don't use E-ink technology. Manufacturers could simply go with an advanced touch-screen LCD. Apple's rumored netbook/jumbo iTouch would fall into this camp. And we suspect cheaper, sub-$300 versions will turn up if the whole e-book trend remains hot.
Whether they'll be any good is another story. The downside to backlit LCDs is that cause eyestrain and arguably aren't ideal for reading (and they tend to get washed out in direct sunlight). But by the same token, a lot of people spend much of the day staring at an LCD monitor, so a model that was easier on the eyes would probably be tolerated for the right price, especially if you consider an LCD has no problem displaying video and Flash animations. (E-ink currently can't do moving images).
What do you guys think? Will color e-book readers of the future use E-ink or shift to another technology?
GreenPrint World scans print jobs before they hit the page to make them as tree-friendly as possible. It creates a print filter, intercepting your print jobs before they reach the spooler and checking them against a list of preset but adjustable criteria. You can have it grab by the number of lines on a page, for example.
In this First Look video, we'll show you how the program can help you prevent wasteful print jobs--and how it could be even better.
(Credit:
Fujitsu)
We've had a lot of CNET readers tell us they're waiting for a little color before they jump onto the e-book reader bandwagon. Well, as one might expect, a little color is going to cost you a lot of dough, as Fujitsu gets set to release its Flepia color e-book reader in Japan with a $1,000 price tag.
In the works for several years, the Flepia has a bigger display than does Amazon's Kindle 2--it has an 8-inch 1,024x768-pixel XGA touch screen that can display 260,000 colors (Fujitsu refers to its e-ink technology as "color e-paper").
The unit also has built-in wireless Bluetooth and Wi-Fi options, an SD card slot capable of holding up to 4GB of storage, and a battery that, according to Fujitsu, is rated at 40 hours of continuous use (we assume that using Wi-Fi would drain it quicker, however). The Flepia runs on Windows CE 5.0.
A lot of e-book reader manufacturers are looking to Bluetooth connectivity as a way to counter the Kindle's built-in cell service (and Amazon is perhaps looking at a Bluetooth-equipped version of the Kindle for Europe to avoid country-to-country roaming-charge issues). You link your cell phone to the e-book via Bluetooth to access an online e-book store and a Web browser.
While the Google translation of the original post on Engadget Japanese is pretty garbled, the Flepia appears to have these features.
No word on when Fujitsu's color e-book reader might hit North America or Europe, but it's available for preorder now in Japan and is scheduled to ship on April 20. From the pictures, it appears that you'll get the choice of a black or white finish.
Anybody excited about this?
Link: English news release
(Source: Engadget Japanese via Gizmodo)
(Credit:
Dell)
Sure, Polaroid might be 6 feet under (or is it?), but casual photo enthusiasts can still enjoy instant gratification with Dell's Dell Wasabi PZ310 Mobile Printer, just announced today.
The Wasabi uses Zero-Ink (ZINK) technology that replaces cumbersome print cartridges with dye crystals embedded right into the proprietary ZINK paper. The crystals are heated as the paper passes through the printer, rendering clear, sharp images in less than a minute for each 2-inch by 3-inch photo.
ZINK also licenses its technology to other companies for their own unique products. For example, look for cameras and ZINK printers to converge in the Polaroid Pogo, to be released in the spring.
The printer uses Bluetooth to connect wirelessly to a variety of devices, and there's also a PictBridge port on the side for wired printing. The Wasabi comes in three iridescent colors, available now for $99. Each printer ships with stick-back photo paper, perfect for displaying your pictures on any hard surface.
