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ICYMI: Getting ethanol from more than just corn
try{document.getElementById("aol-cms-player-1").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Researchers at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory created ethanol out of carbon dioxide in a way that they believe would be easy to scale up. Most importantly, the conversion happens at room temperature so it could be done nearly anywhere in the world. We are also tickled by this stop-motion music video for a new song by Dan Sultan, and enjoy the dress designer who wants to put alcohol in clothes. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
Marks and Spencer adds Passbook support
One of the UK's biggest retailers has updated its iOS app, adding support for Apple's still-fledgling Passbook system. The latest M&S app from Marks and Spencer adds several new features, including one-click purchasing, filter search, product recommendations and a voice reader for customers who are visually impaired. But the biggest change is that M&S now supports Passbook, which was first introduced in iOS 6 and has since been slow to catch on outside of the US. With version 2.3 of the M&S app, shoppers can access a "My Offers" feature, which offers personalized, in-store and online deals that can be added to Passbook. This is good news for both Apple and users. While users have an easier way to collect and organize deals from M&S, Apple benefits by having another real-world use case for its Passbook service. There are over 700 M&S stores in the UK selling everything from clothing, to food, to home furnishings. Now with Passbook support, M&S is the latest major UK retailer to support the feature, following in the footsteps of Subway and easyJet earlier this year.
Alibaba spins out Aliyun team with $200 million investment, pep talk
You can imagine that the team building Alibaba's Aliyun mobile OS must have hurt feelings following Google's accusations that Aliyun is just a corruption of Android. Alibaba chief Jack Ma is keen to restore some of that wounded pride, at least on the surface. The CEO has used a since-confirmed staff memo to spin out Aliyun as a separate entity that will "safeguard the healthy growth" of the platform and Alibaba's mobile strategy. It's not solely an instance of tough love, either: Alibaba is putting $200 million into the new firm and will use executive Wang Jian as a link between the two sides, having him serve as the CTO for both companies. With that in mind, Ma's ultimate intentions aren't clear. While the separation may be a sign of a tighter focus on software, it also reduces the impact for Alibaba if anything drags Aliyun down -- and either motivation would be helpful for a company devoted to the web before anything else.
Project Hexapod: eyes-on with Gimpy, the (half-scale) giant robot leg
Admittedly, this is one of our shorter editors on staff. But he is, believe it or not, an adult male that stands five foot, eight inches tall. Which puts that giant chunk of metal next to him at about five feet. Turns out, that slab of black steel is a prototype robot leg -- and one that's only half scale. It's the work of a bunch of hobbyists, engineers and hackers at the Artisan's Asylum in Somerville, MA where its the big dog amongst a pile of other amazing projects. This is simply an early stage in the building of what will ultimately be one of the largest six-legged robots in the world, dubbed Stompy. All told some 19 different people are hard at work on the bot as part of an intensive class taught by Gui Cavalcanti, James Whong and Dan Cody at the hacker space that covers everything from metal work, to hydraulics, and, of course, robotics. When it started in April, the goal was to build a fully functional and rideable hexapod in four months time, by breaking down the project into much simpler to tackle tasks. Now the class is gearing up to enter the final stages, namely, building the full scale mechanical monster. %Gallery-158274%
Solar Sinter solar-powered 3D printer turns sand into glass, renews our faith in higher education (video)
Where would we be without the world's graduate art projects? In the case of Markus Kayser's Solar Sinter, we might never have seen the day when a solar-powered 3D printer would turn Saharan sand into a perfectly suitable glass bowl. Well, lucky for us (we suppose) we live in a world overflowing with MA students, and awash in their often confusing, sometimes inspiring projects. Solar Sinter, now on display at the Royal College of Art, falls into the latter category, taking the Earth's natural elements, and turning them into functioning pieces of a burgeoning technology. Solar Sinter uses the sun's rays in place of a laser and sand in place of resin, in a process that is perhaps more visually stunning than the results. See for yourself in the video after the break.
A Mild-Mannered Reporter: Architect overload
If there's one thing that constantly amazes me, it's how many great ideas exist that I would never have come up with on my own. Playing through Mission Architect in City of Heroes just drives that point home -- as a longtime fan of superheroes in general and the game in particular, it's not as if I don't have ideas of my own. And then I have a stack of arcs sitting on my desk (metaphorically) that don't even use any of the same conceptual space but are filled with even better ideas. That's inspiring. After several sources of delay -- including fatigue, patch releases, internet problems, chupacabra, and continuity resets -- I've finally had enough time to dive into some of the arcs that I've had submitted to me and really give them the attention they deserve. What follows are my sometimes-disconnected thoughts on the various arcs, some tips and opinions, and how I'm going to handle the mountain of arcs I still have left to play through. Plus future arcs, since I can't leave well enough alone.
HP kicks out new touchscreen cameras and camcorders
HP just dropped five new cameras and three new camcorders at PMA, including a few with touchscreen controls and revamped UIs. The $109 CW450t (pictured above) and $149 CW460t cameras have 2.7- and 3-inch touchscreen, respectively, and 4x optical zoom, while the $169 V5061u and $199 V5560u camcorders have 3-inch touchscreens shoot full 1080p -- the V5560u adds in a 5x optical zoom. That's not all for HP's low-end imaging assault: there's also the $99 CW450 and $129 SW450 cams with 4x zooms, the $149 PW550z with a 5x zoom, and the $109 V1020h camcorder that shoots 720p. Yes, it's a confusing mish-mash of letters, numbers, and bargain-basement prices -- isn't the low-end point-and-shoot market just delightful?
