Images: Engadget
The list of features is enough to make your eyes cross: waterproof, twice as thin as an iPhone, semi-flexible 8.5" by 11" touchscreen, wireless induction charging, and energy consumption under one watt. And it will cost a mere $75. At least this is what is being claimed of the XO-3, the third generation One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) designed by
Yves Behar.
MIT's Nicholas Negroponte sparked the
OLPC non-profit venture in 2005 to bring affordable ($100), web-connected computers to school kids the world over. Things haven't gone exactly to plan (the computers still cost well over $100 and poor nations aren't quite clamoring for them as anticipated), but the project rolls onward, recently unveiling the conceptual design and hard-to-fathom specs of XO-3, due out in 2012....
Image via DesignBoom
This wall clock is fantastic - it tells time by showing the life of a grandmother (the hour hand), a grandchild (the minute hand) and a dog (second hand). The figures move around the clock in daily life scenes, such as out walking among trees or in a house, and show the time. The design is unique and engaging, but we think there are a couple other really cool ways time could be represented on the clock that could have a big impact to those glancing up to see the hour. ...
Photo via Better Living Through Design
Better than a little flashlight on your keychain, this tiny light fits inside a wallet. The same size as a credit card, only thicker, the bulb portion flips up for instant light on its own little stand.
...
School Lunch Trays. Via back garage
Samsung is growing its greener side, and at the same time helping San Francisco Bay Area schools. The company is
expanding a free electronics recycling program to ten K-12 schools in the San Francisco Unified School District, hoping that the programs will not only bring awareness about the importance of proper e-cycling to the students, but also to their families and the broader community. But it doesn't stop with electronics. The program will also put healthy food on kids' lunch trays....
You're on your computer right now (or maybe your phone); either way, reading TreeHugger is using hard-won electricity, and your device of choice will someday (probably soon) be scrapped or traded in for a better one. And who could blame you?
But as computers become more and more our BFFs (singularity, anyone?), we need greener ones: less toxic, more efficient, and easier to upgrade and recycle. Hailing from Korea, this interesting specimen is custom and hand-built, made by a company called
Design Hara. It also looks like a Danish-modern space heater, if there are such things (which in my book is a good thing)....
Image via Engadget
Last week we discussed how magazine publishers are teaming up to take magazines digital. In that discussion, we took a look at
one possible magazine e-reader device. But of course, now that magazines are sure to go digital - and since e-readers will also be
used in school more often - devices that are easy to navigate and interactive will be in demand. The designs are just getting started. But the Mag+ offers a look at what direction magazine e-readers will likely take.
...
Photos via Sony
As part of their
GreenHeart effort to release mobile phones that lean on the eco-friendly side, Sony Ericsson has released two options - the Elm and the Hazel - both of which seem to have green features that set them above other similar devices on the market, including using recycled materials and eliminating toxic materials. The new phones
do more than just ditching the paper manuals. Right down to the packaging, we're excited about these two new releases. ...
Image credit:
EnglishRussia
For decades I've seen periodic reports linking cell phone use and brain cancer for US citizens. The causal link was always weak; but, I kept hearing about ongoing Nordic studies which left a sense of unease. According to a just-published article in Journal of the National Cancer Institute,
No Change in Brain Tumor Incidence During a Time When Cell Phone Usage Increased, based on a huge body of data from several national cancer registries in northern Europe, there's no significant association to be found between cell phone use and brain tumor incidence...yet (see caveat below). On the other hand, driving while using the cell phone is clearly dangerous. Looking for some data to back that up? Read on....
Image via Hammacher Schlemmer
One would think a houseplant would be good enough for purifying the air in a room. But leave it to humans to try and improve upon the process by putting said plant into a machine. Check out the Botanical Air Purifier....
Photo via TheCreativePenn
On Black Friday and Cyber Monday, we leaned instead towards
Buy Nothing Day as a way to get through the mad consumerism of the holiday season. However, there are some relatively greener gadgets out there that, if people were going to rush out and get the latest and greatest devices, we're glad they were on the list instead of un-green options. The Kindle, it appears, topped that list. According to Amazon, the device had the best sales so far, outselling everything else on Amazon. ...
Photo via Jaymi Heimbuch
Spotted at San Francisco's Green Festival were these coasters made of reclaimed motherboards. Turns out, these are just the tip of the iceberg of things made at
Motherboard Gifts & More, an online shop that transforms reclaimed motherboards into a surprising number of knickknacks. ...
Readers' favorite green gadgets. Credit: John Stevens
From
HYminis with built in wind turbines that power iPhones to bicycles that provide transport to work, readers sent in photos of the one green object they just can't live without! Click through for photos of green objects galore, and if you missed last week's
Readers' Photosit's not too late to feel good about our
Readers' Fall Garden Photos slideshow.
...
For most people, empty ink cartridges unfortunately head to the trash bin, or if we're lucky, to the reclcying bin or back to the store for recycling. But few people
refill cartridges, which is one of the most efficient, green uses.
Silo Ink isn't a bottomless ink cartridge, but it's about as close as we can get. The giant cartridges not only reduce waste and are refillable, but will save you 80% on the cost of ink. ...
Lead ingots via Wikipedia
Lead is unfortunately an important component in electronics, especially when it comes to piezoelectronics. We're mostly familiar with
piezoelectricity when it comes to concept devices - things that can generate a charge based on pressure being applied to them. But it is used in a lot of common gadgets, such as phones with touch screens. But the best compounds for piezoelectricity are lead-based, and lead is something we all want to see phased out of electronics. Researchers are now working on how to get lead out of gadgets, and have found one promising replacement for the dangerous metal. ...
Image: Garmin
Knowledge is Power
Most of us probably don't realize that over the past few years our cars have turned into computers on wheels. There are tons of sensors everywhere, but most of that information isn't available to the driver. That's a shame, because if it was parsed through a user-intuitive interface, it could provide very useful feedback that could help people drive more efficiently (the Prius LCD effect). Well, this is exactly what Garmin is trying to do with a new add-on cable that can plug into your car's diagnostics communication port and feed that real-time data to your GPS device....
Image via Vers
It's no secret we like gadgets covered in wood - something about the feeling of permanence. Plus, wood makes for a solid protective cover for something like an iPhone. While not all wood cases are sustainable - like the
un-TreeHugger zebra wood case we saw awhile back -
Vers is a company that is working to make this wood iPhone case one of the most sustainable on the market. They've joined up with The Arbor Day Foundation to create an offer tough for any iPhone-toting greenie to refuse. ...
Printers can be big, clunky machines that spit out more pages than you intended to print. So what if you had a tiny hand-held printer that only put down ink where you waved your hand? For a society going increasingly paperless, a little printer that can handle the rare print job like concert tickets or boarding passes, or a quick document in a notebook sounds ideal. The PrintBrush claims to be just such a solution. ...
Yesterday the exhibition
Bits 'n Pieces launched at
Material Connexion in New York,
a dialogue between the analog and the digital technologies within design in a post-digital era. What grabbed our attention in the busy space during the opening, were the insects doing graphic design! A sophisticated machine transformed the movements of a few bugs into beautiful patterns and logos and printed them out as fast as the insects performed. ...
Photo via Jaymi Heimbuch
For years, New York City has been
working to toughen up electronics recycling laws, and for years the electronics industry has been less than thrilled. The city has gone forward with a plan that requires electronics manufacturers to offer free door-to-door pick-up service of used devices. However, electronics companies say this too expensive, too labor intensive, and too annoying -
so they sued. Now, government officials from across the nation are asking the electronics industry to drop the suit, saying that it's not about a troublesome e-cycling regulation, it's about trying to take power away from the states to regulate e-waste....
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on 02. 4.10
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