By now, you know precisely what the Palm Pre is capable of. You know the ins and outs of the user experience, and you've probably got a solid idea of whether or not you'll be lined up come June 6th to claim one as your own. But here's a side you probably haven't heard: the voice of the design team. At long last, the masterminds behind Palm's comeback phone have finally sat down to talk about the build process and what drove them to create both the Pre and webOS. Not surprisingly, most of it came from the desire to truly revolutionize the mobile experience, one that's been generally poor for far too long. In separate (but equally awesome) interviews, Michelle Koh and a gaggle of design engineers (including Matias Duarte, Mike Bell, Peter Skillman and Michael Abbott) have opened up to spill their soul on rejuvenating the company with a single product. We won't issue any spoilers here, but we'd argue that the read links below are required reading if you're even remotely interested in this handset.

Read - Michelle Koh interview
Read - Design team interview

Michael Arrington's little experiment with consumer electronics is about to get real. The image above is the "near-final industrial design" of the man's CrunchPad with "first working prototypes" expected in another few weeks. Changes include a display now flush with the bezel and an 18-mm overall thickness thanks to the switch from plastic to aluminum. Inside we've got a Linux-based OS that boots direct to a Webkit-based browser. Michael says that the next public appearance will be at a special press event in July. However, as a man (in)famous for leaking other people's details ahead of official announcements, we wouldn't be surprised to see his vision of the ultimate couch computer make its way to the Internets before the big unveiling.

There are horologes, and then there's La Machine à Ecrire le Temps, known less formally as "The Machine that Writes the Time" -- which is exactly, literally what it does. This stunning masterpiece was recently unveiled at Baselworld 2009, and while only those obsessed with time will really appreciate the 1,200 components needed to make this thing tick, anyone into whiz-bang gadgetry will find themselves impressed by the vid of just past the break. Oh, and if you're looking to buy one to dress up your new sitting room, you should be fully prepared to liquidate nearly $350,000 of whatever you have left to squeeze.

[Via OhGizmo]

Bland, black and white QR codes got you down? Well leave it to artist Takashi Murakami to shake things up. Creative agency SET has laced the psychedelic-anime expert's playful, colorful imagery into versions of the machine-readable code for Louis Vuitton that -- amazingly -- still work. The company has also done similar work for Coca-Cola, though nothing quite as luxuriously squeezable as this multi-colored panda. Now, if someone could just dress up those drab bar codes...

[Via DVICE]

Ah, now this is the spirit. Rather than concocting yet another handheld tablet that's good for nothing more than checking email and wowing onlookers, designers Soonkyu Jang, Chung Lee and Yonghuk Yim have come together to put linguists on the front burner once again. This here touchscreen concept is a calligraphy board that enables you to practice your stroke without ruining reams of paper and blasting through countless bottles of ink. Initially, at least, the board would only come loaded with teaching tools for the Korean language, but you know Leapfrog could hook this thing up with Lithuanian, Maltese and Slovak should it ever get involved.

It's every child's dream to one day walk through a trio of space robot legs as entering Silicon Valley, and if a proposed art project goes through, said dream will become a reality for budding tech superstars who land in Mineta San Jose International Airport. The $300,000 initiative would see a so-called Space Observer built and showcased prominently in the venue, allowing patrons to walk underneath its two-story-tall body and emit all sorts of "oohs" and "ahhs." The monolithic space robot would sport three legs and propeller-tipped kinetic camera arms, the latter of which would collect live video to be displayed on embedded monitors within its body. San Jose Public Art Director Barbara Goldstein has already stated that "it won't follow you anywhere," but it's not like she really has the power to control what this obviously sentient creature does / doesn't do.

The technology's already here, we just need a venture capital firm and a determined entrepreneur to make it happen. A foursome of designers -- Seon-Keun Park, Byung-Min Woo, Sun-Hye Woo and Jin-Sun Park -- have banded together to create the above pictured concept, an e-reader for those with limited or no vision. Their Braille E-Book concept theoretically relies on electroactive polymers in order to change the surface's shape as pages are turned, and while we fully expect the battery life to suffer due to all the necessary commotion, it's definitely a start that needs to happen.

Genius. Pure genius. In order to save us all from smashing buttons on our digital alarm clocks or stripping the gears in our analog ones, designer Denis Guidone has dreamed up this masterpiece. The Ora ilLegale clock boasts no numbers and is obviously missing a significant portion of its base; these two factoids enable it to become the easiest clock to adjust to changes in daylight savings... well, ever. The best part? We're told that it'll actually hit production soon, though there's no indiciation of just how pricey it'll be. Not like it matters -- you're totally buying one, and you know it.

[Via Coolest-Gadgets]

C'mon, don't even front here -- you can't deny the frisson in taking one look at the masterpiece above. We know, there's a never-ending stream of NES-related doodads flowing from every possible direction, but it's not everyday that you get the opportunity to actually purchase one of these amazingly beautiful creations. Designer inhope has clearly and definitively one-upped that other NES purse with the Nintendo Controller Purse, and you can be the proud owner of one for just $39.99. An irrefutable bargain, we say.

[Via technabob]

When we came across this post at Brand New, it was pretty clear from the outset that it was fake (the "April Fools" in the headline didn't hurt). Still, it got all the editors at Engadget thinking, and talking, about how badly Verizon does need some kind of makeover. Across the board, it seems that the reaction to the big V's logo and branding is like-minded: it stinks. That cheap looking italicized Helvetica, the gaudy gradient on the check... the check itself. The whole thing looks like it was done by a first-year art student with a cracked copy of CorelDRAW. Meanwhile, in a few hours, the cats at BN managed to mock something up that not only looks clever and inviting, but almost totally washes away the bad taste the current logo leaves in our mouths.

Look, we're not saying you should go the cloud direction here -- it might not be the right fit -- but maybe it's time to reconsider your drab, staid design, and start to paint yourself in a different light. There's one more pic after the break -- a device with the "new" logo... just imagine it.

Think the world is your oyster? Think you've got it all figured out? Think again, bub. ENESS' appropriately named Humble Telescope is an interactive installation that presents a 3D simulation of our entire known universe to anyone who dares peer in. Viewers simply point the "telescope" in any direction, and instantaneously they're presented with what exists in that specific area of space. The sheer magnitude of it coupled with the views from beyond seek to remind us of just how small we are in the grand scheme of things, and quite honestly, we're tearing up just thinking about it. Grab a tissue and head past the break for a life-changing video.

[Via OhGizmo]

We won't say precisely which Engadget staffer can speak from experience, but suffice to say, having the Vertigo whilst out and about in the New Mexico mountains would've made the epic Philmont adventure a much, much more delectable trek. Dreamed up by Nicolas Bernal, this self-heating container is theoretically constructed from Polybutylene Terephthalate (PBT) and features a high performance dynamo that heats up food within minutes. Naturally, there's a LED on board that lights up when the contents are ready for consumption, but sadly, we highly doubt this will land in your local R.E.I. / Camping World within the next few years.

[Via Engadget German]

Look, we love taking off through the snow-covered trails of Grand Teton National Park as much as anyone, but we can't say with a straight face that we'd rather take a snowmobile through there than one of these critters. Designed by Anders Gloslie, the TH!NK FROST is an electric vehicle crafted specifically to operate in arctic environments. Based on current drawings, the all-wheel drive contraption can lug two Eskimos around at a time, though there's no mention of a hybrid version for those looking to take long range excursions. Commercialization, please?

[Via DVICE]

We're suckers for power-strip designs. As gadget nerds, we're constantly faced with overloaded circuits and blocked ports. For the latter, there's this design by Jeff Carter that neatly overcomes the limitations presented by the ubiquitous (and ridiculous) side-by-side strip design. Regarding our excessive power issues, that's easy: more interns to shovel the coal and kittens.