Tag Archives | Gadgets

The World’s Wildest Wearable Gadgets

Posted by JR Raphael on July 27, 2009 at 10:44 pm

wearablesplashWelcome to the Future

When Marty McFly donned power-lacing shoes and a self-drying jacket in Back to the Future Part II, geeks everywhere gushed with excitement. Fast-forward 20 years to today, though, and that futuristic fashion is almost a reality. All right, so the auto-lacers aren’t here yet–but they weren’t supposed to debut till 2015. Plenty of other high-tech attire is actually available or under development right now, and you don’t even need a DeLorean to track it down.

Grab your hoverboard and get ready: We’re going on a journey to see the wildest wearable gadgets around. And–it probably goes without saying–where we’re going, we don’t need roads.

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A Place For Your Gdgts

Posted by Harry McCracken on July 1, 2009 at 12:01 pm

GDGT LogoWhat have Pete Rojas (founder of Gizmodo and Engadget) and Ryan Block (founding editor of Engadget) been working on for the past eleven months? They said they were launching a consumer-electronics site called Gdgt and started a popular podcast, but were pretty secretive otherwise. But GDGT went live today–and it’s a neat social-network site where folks can gather to review gadgets, discuss them, and generally help each other get more out technology products.

Unfortunately, Gdgt opened its doors and then was crushed by the onslaught of visitors, so it’s down at the moment. Ryan says they’re working to get it back up asap. But I got a sneak peek shortly before the launch, and liked what I saw. The site’s an extension of what Gizmodo and Engadget do. But it’s also a sort of anti-Gizmodo/anti-Engadget, since those sites rarely have much to say about products other than that they’ve been announced. Gdgt’s about the whole lifecycle of the product after that announcement, and the content is contributed by the community.

Pete and Ryan pronounce the site as “G-D-G-T,” by the way; that seems less harmonious than pronouncing it as…gadget. But I probably shouldn’t talk, since about 40 percent of the world trips up on the name “Technologizer.” I’m looking forward to using the site, and am already signed up as harrymccracken.

[UPDATE: The site seems to be up and running again.]

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Then and Now: A Fast-Forward Tour of Gadget History

Posted by Harry McCracken on February 24, 2009 at 12:59 am

Then and NowAstonishing breakthrough. Household object. Funny anachronism. Such is the journey that nearly every great gadget travels. (Sometimes it takes several generations; sometimes it takes just a few years.) And then it happens all over again with whatever hot new gizmo rendered the old one obsolete.

While rummaging through the endlessly fascinating Google Patents recently, I was moved to compare some significant devices of the past with their modern-day counterparts. In some cases, old and new are connected by seamless evolution (the cell phone, for instance). And in some cases, they’re separated by seismic technological shifts (like the one that replaced silver-halide film with tiny slivers of silicon).

After the jump, a dozen comparisons of past (in the form of patent drawings) and new.

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