Klingg! That’s the sound of a grown man still unable to sever the maternal ties forged early in his life by a smothering mother. Just kidding. It is in fact the sound of my artisanal iPhone ringtones, recorded from the prayer bells of real Tibetan monks. Kidding again! Klingg is actually an iPhone accessory designed by the fictional Star Trek race… [Enough! -Ed].
Klingg is — truly this time — an earbud holder that clamps onto your clothes using magnets.
If Allan Quatermain had owned an iPad, and if he had been a living person instead of a fictional construct, he would have used the Pad&Quill’s new Aria case for his Mini. It’s a beautiful, leather-bound book cover for the little tablet, and it doubles as a stand. Perfect for any skilled hunter trying to spread civilization to the “Dark Continent.”
Sometimes an inventor comes up with something so mold-breaking, so truly original and – in hindsight – obvious that the world changes just a little bit. Today we bring news of such an Earth-shaking discovery. It’s called the iSpoon, and considering that it’s made for cooking, there’s a delicious irony in the fact that it mixes together two ingredients to make the perfect blend. It’s a synergistic, spoon-shaped supper, if you will.
Nikon has announced the Coolpix A, a compact camera with a big SLR sensor in it. Like many of Nikon’s cameras of late, it doesn’t actually sound that exciting on paper, but as it seems designed to work more like a stripped-down SLR rather than a gussied up compact, I have a feeling that it might be pretty damn good.
Did you ever try on a pair of your mother’s clip-on earrings? Or maybe you own a pair yourself. If so, you’ll be familair with the way they use a small and cleverly designed clamp to clip the gaudy bauble to your ear.
Now, the Budsnaps are just like this, only instead of a dangling decoration, they secure your iPhone earbuds.
Path on is a super-slick new app for writing on your photographs. The gimmick, and the feature which sets it apart from all the other writing-on-photos apps in the store, is that you can put your scrawlings onto an arbitrary path. Hence the name, I guess.
In my wallet, I have a little “secret” compartment which contains a few international micro SIMs, an Apple-made SIM ejection tool (aka a fancy paperclip), and a guitar pick.
Or at least I usually do. The other day, when I actually needed it, the ejector tool had somehow found its way out of the wallet and into my bag. The problem was that it was not the bag I had with me.
But if I’d had the SIMPL case on my iPhone, I’d have been golden.
You know those cool old waxed canvas bags which used to keep things dry before miners discovered nylon in a cave in Papua New Guinea1? Now you can make your own! Well, technically you could always make your own. But now Photojojo has provided a guide for you. Spoiler: it’s dead easy.
Do any of these sound familiar?
Now, I know what you’re thinking, because I’m thinking the exact same dirty thoughts; but no: they’re not fun “adult poses” to enjoy with another human or similarly-sized biped. They are in fact some of the new postures that chair-maker Steelcase has noticed in hours of actually watching how we slump in our seats.
Evernote just released an update for its Mac app, and if you got it from the App Store you mightn’t notice anything new other than being forced to change your password because Evernote got hacked. But if you got the update from outside the MAS, then you can enjoy the fancy new clipper that sits in the menu bar.
Wacom is readying a pressure-sensitive tablet of its own. The source of this “rumor”? Wacom itself, via its Facebook page. And being from Wacom, it’ll have a pressure-sensitive pen, plus multi touch and some more mystery features.
The promise of the Wahoo RFLKT is of a tiny, ultralight box with an LCD readout which displays information from an iPhone cycling app on the handlebars of your bike. You get the advantage of using your favorite tracking app, and also of having an easy to read and control HUD, instead of having to buy an expensive GPS-enabled bike computer.
The reality comes somewhat short.
Throughout the churn of ever-changing priorities and products at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, or at any trade show for that matter, there is one constant: slogans. To be more specific: big banners printed with meaningless corporate gibberish.
This is where the world’s surplus of words like “enabling,” “future,” “innovating,” and “together” go to die, like orange-skinned retirees to Florida.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – This year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona was pretty disappointing from a gadget-lovers point of view. Samsung was there, but didn’t announce anything new. Microsoft didn’t even have a stand, and even the once-great App Planet section is little but a business-service wasteland (albeit with the best tea, coffee and beer in the show).
Still, even a pile of crap has variations in its texture, and so we bring you the “Best” of Mobile World Congress 2013.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – Bluetooth speakers are great in the kitchen. But the the Josiah from Kwamecorp is possibly the best kitchen speaker ever. Not only does its beautifully minimal styling fit right into any kitchen, but it’s fashioned from ceramic, and can even act as a snack tray.
Remember the Socialmatic concept camera? It was an Instagram icon made flesh, and it worked just like a Polaroid, spitting out a printed version of your filtered and light-leaked image.
Now, after extensive boardroom wrangling no doubt, the camera will actually become a real shipping product, and it’ll carry the Polaroid brand.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – I’m willing to bet that you have – at some point – been frustrated by the App Store. More specifically, you have been driven crazy trying to find apps via search. Even apps which you know are there, which you have used before, and about which you know almost everything but their names.
Quixey is a search engine for Apps, and it will ease your App Store pain.
It had to happen eventually: Photoshop for your phone. As of today you can buy Photoshop Touch for the iPhone and Android, and it pretty much does everything you can do on the iPad version.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – It’s not all announcements of exciting new Android handsets with fractionally faster processors here at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Oh no. You’ll also find rose-tinted spectacles. Yes, Elecom – maker of some of the most accessorial iAccessories ever – now makes some specs that will stop your eyes from being ruined – ruined! – by blue light.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – Excito is an AppleTV-a-like puck which hooks up to your home network and lets you stream TV, music and movies to any stereo or screen in the house.
So what, right? The Apple TV already does that? The difference is that the Excito only uses your phone as a remote, and streams the content either direct from the internet, or from your own local media server. Oh, and it costs around half the price if the already-cheap Apple TV.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – You’re stuck in the dessert. You are thirsty, hot, and – worst of all – your cellphone is dead. You discover that you have a teaspoonful of water that you had previously overlooked. Do you a) Drink it? or b) use it to recharge your phone.
What?
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS – Here’s something I wish would come to a future iPhone, or — even better — an iPad: e-ink. Imagine being able to switch to an e-ink version of the tablet and read in bright sunlight. Or turn off the various radios and enjoy a battery life measured in months, not hours.
That’s what the e-ink phone can do.
BARCELONA, MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS –
RadBlocker might sound like some lame anti-skateboarding device from the 1980s, but it is in fact an Israeli company dedicated to keeping your brains unscrambled. And nestled amongst its RF-denying belt holsters (for Dad!) and laptop trays is this amazing pair of headphones: Echo Tubez.