And you thought G-Shock watches were bulky — check out this Stanley LED torch (flashlights to us Yanks) watch. All told, it’s a rather lackluster digital watch, but with a twist: it’s got a small flashlight on it. We can’t imagine that it’s powerful enough to guide you through a dark forest, but if you need a quick spot while you’re working with tools, maybe you would get some mileage out of this thing.

At $58, it’s not necessarily expensive for a good flashlight or a watch, though it’s a bit too much for us to plunk down for a gadget that doesn’t replace either in a spectacular fashion.

Brando, via Coolest-Gadgets

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The idea of an asteroid colliding with the Earth is a scary thought indeed, though it’s an event that many astronauts and scientists claim never has to come to pass if we prepare for it. Anatoly Perminov, head of Russia’s space agency, is looking for one such plan, though it isn’t clear yet what shape it’ll take, save for “no nuclear explosions” (read: no fun) and that it’ll be grounded “on the basis of the laws of physics.”

Perminov appeared on Russia’s Golos Rossii radio station to discuss the issue, saying: “People’s lives are at stake. We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow us to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people.”

That’s a sentiment that we can agree with, though securing the kind of cash it’d take to fund such a project is obviously a problem. The other problem, though, is an asteroid known as Apophis. Apophis was discovered back in 2004, and made news when it was guessed that there was a one in 37 chance that the 1,150-foot-wide asteroid would collide with our planet. Five years later our chances have improved to a one in 250,000 chance that it’ll hit us in 2036, but the message is clear: there’s a chance that something is going to hit us sometime.

That’s why it’s a good thing that Russia is once again trying to kick off the effort to save us from asteroids. Besides, maybe we could turn our know-how when it comes to moving asteroids, to harvesting them. Wired’s Danger Room has an excellent writeup of Perminov’s proposal, as well as a response from NASA astronaut Rusty Schweickart.

Via Guardian.co.uk

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The British government’s Labour Party proposed the Digital Economy Bill in October, a get-tough policy against copyright infringers that threatens to take away an offender’s Internet connection after a third offense. The problem is, this bailout of movie and record producers might end up costing British taxpayers $1 billion USD.

But Labour Party leaders have a plan. They’re thinking digital piracy will be reduced so much that tax revenues from all those increased media sales will equal $2.72 billion, defraying part of the cost of the policing of such draconian measures. However, they still plan to pass along $1 billion of the cost to innocent taxpayers, equal to about $40 for each broadband connection in the country.

Funny how these clueless government types make the mistake of assuming that reduced piracy equals additional sales of records and movies. Meanwhile, the British media industry loves this bill, which is gaining traction in the British government.

Never mind that most of the people of Great Britain think it’s a horrible idea. We can only hope this twisted logic doesn’t find its way to U.S. shores.

Dvorak Uncensored, via DailyTech

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“I’m a doctor, not a gnarly surfer, Jim!” That doesn’t mean McCoy can’t boldly go into the coldest water with a Star Trek wetsuit, pattered after those worn in the original series and custom-fitted for the dear price of between $435 and $470.

Unless you have a death wish, don’t wear the red one, ’cause you know what happens to those guys.

Roddenberry.com, via Geekologie

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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) have discovered that restricting consumption of glucose, the most common dietary sugar, can extend the life of healthy human-lung cells and speed the death of precancerous human-lung cells, reducing cancer’s spread and growth rate.

The research has wide-ranging potential in age-related science, including ways in which calorie-intake restriction can benefit longevity and help prevent diseases like cancer that have been linked to aging, said principal investigator Trygve Tollefsbol, Ph.D., D.O., a professor in the Department of Biology.

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Fulton Innovation teased us earlier this year with its eCoupled wireless power tech, near-field inductive coupling to charge gadgets a few inches away as if by magic. Now they’ve spread things out, wirelessly powering a 12-watt light bulb from 3 feet away.

There’s a catch, though. Those two huge cylinders holding the primary and secondary coils are certainly obtrusive, and you lose a lot of power between them, using 120 watts to power that 12-watt bulb over the 35-inch distance (with dummy loads using up 40-60W of that power). That’s not too efficient. Yet. But we’ve seen resonance devices transmitting electricity with higher efficiency, up to 75%.

Sure, Nikola Tesla did something like this in 1891, but now it might be approaching practicality for real-world installations. After all the technology is perfected, the supreme challenge will be convincing people that their brains won’t be cooked if they stand between these two spooky gizmos.

We’re confident this is safe, but wait a second — notice in this video demo, the guy’s not putting his head between the transmitter and receiver:

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Nothing says “I’m rich!” like an unnecessarily fancy shower. And boy, are Arblu’s new showers unnecessarily fancy. Using a showerhead that rains water straight down on you either with a normal amount of pressure or a water massage. It’s painted up in a bright red, which is a power color, as I’m sure you know, and look like it would need to have a bathroom built around it rather than just installing in your current home. But hey, you’ve got enough scratch to make that not much of a hassle, right?

Archi Portale via BornRich

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If you are looking forward to lots of nice walks in the new year, then you simply must have a Higgins to go with you! This gorgeous, affectionate boy is going to make a lovely friend for his new family. It’s going to be some very lucky people who get to take him home……

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This wizard of a dog is Merlin, a typical Border Collie who loves his training and needs to find a family who will be happy to continue giving him the challenge and stimulation that he needs. He has all the makings of a perfect family pet, so please find out more about him – he will surely bring lots of magic into your life!

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USB hubs can be pretty handy. You know, if you need a couple of extra ports for your digital camera or an external hard drive, it’s nice to have them. But I’m not sure that anyone needs the whopping 24 extra ports that this insane hub offers up. The $70 accessory can basically handle every USB gadget ever made all at once. Personally, I’m fine with a four-port hub, but hey, maybe you just like to always have the option of more.

USB Fever via Gadget Lab

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I love a good fireplace, but I hate having to move away from it to make myself a sandwich or use the bathroom. That’s why I love this rolling fireplace: I can roll it around with me wherever I go.

Sure, if it tips over or goes down some stair accidentally you might just burn your house down, but come on. You’re not some sort of klutz. I think the possibility of imminent danger makes this thing even cooler, anyways.

Stylin Rooms via NotCot

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The Schwebebahn is a suspended monorail in Wuppertal, Germany. Designer Andrea Schoellgen proposed this upgrade concept, which has a number of features to make things more convenient for today’s commuters. The stroller spaces in the middle of cars and light-up handrails are great, but the feature we like the most is the interactive information panel. Train routes and times would be available to any passenger, presumably updated in real time with any delays or deviations.

Me likey, though in the wake of last week’s terrorism scare, transportation officials probably aren’t in a hurry to provide passengers with more information. But doing things like turning off in-cabin maps seems ridiculous to me, and having real-time info about your route and where the trains are on it would be incredibly useful to passengers in any subway system. Does keeping this info from the public really make us safer anyway? I say no, and I’d like to see interactive info panels in every station and subway car. But what do you think?

Coroflot, via Design Launches

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Tar and shingles are hardly environmentally friendly materials, so the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) hopes to soon help homeowners and businesses replace the roofs over their heads with something greener. To that end, the DOE awarded Weidlinger Associates , a New York City-based structural engineering firm, a $150,000 grant earlier this month (matched by a 10-percent commitment from the state) to develop durable hybrid solar roofing panels with integrated photovoltaic cells and thermoelectric materials that harvest the sun’s energy to produce both electricity and hot water for buildings. [More]

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Nearly 200 years after their invention, and decades after first being proposed as a method of harnessing solar energy, 60 sun-powered Stirling engines are about to begin generating electricity outside Phoenix, Ariz., for the first time. Such engines, which harness heat to expand a gas and drive pistons, are not used widely today other than in pacemakers and long-distance robotic spacecraft .

The 1.5 megawatt (MW) demonstration site, known as Maricopa Solar, is set to begin operations early January 2010, with units provided by the Arizona-based Stirling Energy Systems (SES). While 1.5 MW is only a fraction of the power that may be generated at sites SES has contracted to develop in California and Texas, spokesperson Janette Coates says this is a necessary first step in the technology’s commercialization. “It’s important for our industry to see–and our partners and investors–that we can take a small-scale plant and get it operational before we break ground on larger ones,” she says.

[More]

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Joe’s story is so sad but unfortunately so common. His devoted owner was taken into hospital and will never be able to care for Joe again. Joe misses him a lot and needs a loving forever home where he can once more become a much loved companion.

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While the world makes plans for New Year’s, tech enthusiasts look forward to the annual Consumer Electronics Show is just around the corner. Every year at the beginning of January pretty much the entire technology industry descends on Las Vegas to show off the latest gadgets and gear from all over the world.

But you don’t have to wait till 2010 to find out what those toys are going to be. DVICE has had its ear to the ground the past few months, listening for advance buzz about what the biggest CES stories will be. Here are the Top 5 CES trends that will set the agenda for the tech world in the New Year.

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Little Emily is blind and needs a very special loving home with a gentle resident dog who can help her. She’s only 7 and copes with her blindness very well but will need an owner who can commit to being with her for much of the time as understandably she gets nervous if she feels she’s alone. Please take time to read about her…..

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Early last October the Nobel Prize committee announced that it was awarding Barack Obama the Peace Prize for his “vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.” At the same time, in counterpoint to that news, it was reported that the director of India’s 1998 nuclear testing program had called for new tests. That move provoked fears of escalation, in case it motivated Pakistan and China to recommence testing and made it even harder for the U.S. to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Although some 150 countries have ratified the treaty, neither the U.S., China nor India has yet done so.

The chair of India’s Atomic Energy Commission has stated that his nation does not need to carry out any more tests; one can only hope that India’s policy makers agree and that by the time this essay appears, the world will not yet have taken one more step toward the brink.

[More]

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Twenty-five years ago international teams of scientists showed that a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union could produce a “nuclear winter.” The smoke from vast fires started by bombs dropped on cities and industrial areas would envelop the planet and absorb so much sunlight that the earth’s surface would get cold, dark and dry, killing plants worldwide and eliminating our food supply. Surface temperatures would reach winter values in the summer. International discussion about this prediction, fueled largely by astronomer Carl Sagan, forced the leaders of the two superpowers to confront the possibility that their arms race endangered not just themselves but the entire human race. Countries large and small demanded disarmament.

Nuclear winter became an important factor in ending the nuclear arms race. Looking back later, in 2000, former Soviet Union leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev observed, “Models made by Russian and American scientists showed that a nuclear war would result in a nuclear winter that would be extremely destructive to all life on earth; the knowledge of that was a great stimulus to us, to people of honor and morality, to act.”

[More]

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Little Bonnie just wants a loving forever home. She’s a 12 year old crossbreed and gets on well with other dogs. She likes to play and go for walks. She’d make a lovely addition to most households so please read about her.

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If you’ve never thought about having a pair of dogs, now is the time to consider it. Budd and Sara are long time companions and are hoping someone will offer them a home together. They’re fine with other dogs and would be happy to live in a family with older children.

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