chairs
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ICYMI: Channel your Wall-E future with self-driving tech
try{document.getElementById("aol-cms-player-1").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Nissan created smart chairs that autonomously move themselves while people are seated in them, modeled off of the car maker's ProPILOT driving system. The chairs are being used in Japan to keep people neatly in line outside of restaurants and when one chair has been vacated, it will move itself to the end of the row, while everyone else is bumped up.
ICYMI: Spacey HoloLens use, spy submarines and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-905675{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-905675, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-905675{width:570px;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-905675").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: DARPA is about to start testing an autonomous submarine called Sea Hunter, designed to find and trail larger submarines for weeks at a time.
Bill Gates weighs in on the new Microsoft, philanthropy and leaping over chairs
Bill Gates plays bridge, washes dishes each night and prefers In-N-Out to McDonald's and Burger King (as any sane person would). The Gates Foundation chairman offered up those tidbits and more in another Reddit AMA today, an hour-long dialogue that unearthed a few gems. Let's consider the Microsoft situation. We already knew Gates would play a more prominent role in the company now that Satya Nadella is running the show, and he confirmed that he's going to spend about one-third of his time on "product work" for the company. Pretty vague stuff, but he clarified just a bit: "I make sure we pick ambitious scenarios and that we have a strong architecture to deliver on them. I encourage good work (hopefully)."
Breakfast Topic: Where are the chairs?
Sometimes you receive a letter from a reader that makes you say, "Chairs? Hunh. I mean ... Hunh. Dude's got a point. Chairs." Here's the letter, in all its (ahem) upstanding passion: What do we want? CHAIRS! When do we want them? NOW! What will we eat if we don't get them? BRAINS! Take a walk through the classic capital cities of Warcraft, specifically the Horde cities. While you take this tour I have a challenge for you – count the number of chairs that you can find. This number might startle you. The specific cities of Thunderbluff, Orgimmar, and the Undercity are largely if not completely vacant of such fixtures save for two thrones. This also largely applies to the nearby cities and housing for those races. Visit the Cross Roads, visit Tarren Mill, and other smaller factional holdings and you will notice a trend of a lack of chairs. To its credit, Brill has -1- chair. In fact there is an overall lack of much in the way of viable living space for the classic races of the Horde. So what gives? More so why is this important and how might it be reflected in the coming content? Among the Horde players there is a growing concern that this lack of basic fixtures will be missing from the Horde's Garrisons if current content is any means to speculate. Since the garrisons will be Orcish in style, will the lack of basic fixtures also be reflected in the Garrison?
Chilly Chair uses static electricity to raise your arm hair, force an 'emotional reaction' (hands-on video)
Hiding in the back of the SIGGRAPH Emerging Technologies demo area -- exactly where such a project might belong -- is a dark wood chair that looks anything but innocent. Created by a team at the University of Electro-Communications in Toyko, Chilly Chair, as it's called, may be a reference to the chilling feeling the device is tasked with invoking. After signing a liability waiver, attendees are welcomed to pop a squat before resting their arms atop a cool, flat metal platform hidden beneath a curved sheath that looks like something you may expect to see in Dr. Frankenstein's lab, not a crowded corridor of the Los Angeles Convention Center. Once powered up, the ominous-looking contraption serves to "enrich" the experience as you consume different forms of media, be it watching a movie or listening to some tunes. It works by using a power source to pump 10 kV of juice to an electrode, which then polarizes a dielectric plate, causing it to attract your body hair. After signing our life away with the requisite waiver, we sat down and strapped in for the ride. Despite several minutes of build-up, the entire experience concluded in what seemed like only a few seconds. A projection screen in front of the chair lit up to present a warning just as we felt the hairs jet directly towards the sheath above. By the time we rose, there was no visual evidence of the previous state, though we have no doubt that the Chilly Chair succeeded in raising hair (note: the experience didn't come close to justifying the exaggerated reaction you may have noticed above). It's difficult to see how this could be implemented in future home theater setups, especially considering all the extra hardware currently required, but it could potentially add another layer of immersion to those novelty 4D attractions we can't seem to avoid during visits to the amusement park. You can witness our Chilly Chair experience in the hands-on video after the break.%Gallery-162116%
Inhabitat's Week in Green: Cities of the future, the Aqua Star, and 0-60 in 3.4 seconds... with a go-kart
Each week our friends at Inhabitat recap the week's most interesting green developments and clean tech news for us -- it's the Week in Green. What will the high-tech city of the future look like? This week Inhabitat brought you a sneak peek as we took an exclusive look inside Abu Dhabi's carbon-neutral Masdar City, which just opened for business. We also brought you brand new photos of the world's largest wooden structure, and we spotted several innovative solar-powered buildings - Sweden's rotating photovoltaic cog building and a self-sustaining pod home that can be perched on any roof. Green transportation also took off with a blast this week as the Linde E1 Electric Go-Kart set a Guinness World Record by traveling from 0-60 in 3.4 seconds and Synergy's folded-wing glider plane announced plans to compete in the CAFE Green Flight Challenge. We also saw greener vehicles gear up around the world as France announced plans to deploy a fleet of all-electric garbage trucks next week and Nissan unveiled the NV200 -- New York City's taxi of tomorrow. And for those looking for an underwater escape this summer, don't miss out on the Aqua Star - a submersible electric scooter capable of charting the ocean depths. In other news, this week we showcased several high-tech concept gadgets made from paper - an origami cell phone that folds into a flat piece of cardboard and the world's first interactive paper computer. We also brought you a sensor glove that could help stroke patients recover through gaming, and we covered a clutch of wired home furnishings that bring new meaning to the term geek chic -- from an interweb chaise made from 1,100 feet of coaxial cable to an analog cassette tape chair, to a modern computer mouse made from fine wool felt.
Disco Chair is way cooler than its name would lead you to believe
This is the Disco Chair, the brainchild of Kiwi&Pom, and though we're not fans of things with the word 'disco' in their names, this one is outstanding and beautiful. It's made with 200 meters of electroluminescent wire, and the lighting can flash on and off (hence the disco moniker). Hit up the source for a few more shots.
Brunswick Billiards gets its own Berkline home theater chairs
Nothing chases a good flick like a few games of pool, and that's exactly why Brunswick Billiards has teamed up with Berkline to introduce a few new offerings. The famed home theater seating company has agreed to create a fresh line of Brunswick-exclusive home theater chairs which will include two contemporary models and a single traditional model. Eight different types of leather will be available, and a few subtleties include a taller back, cup holders, lighted bases and power recline options. The luxurious seats will start at $1,249 apiece and should be ready to hit game rooms / HTs in "early summer."
