Starting on or about December ‘06, you will be able to download much if not most of Universal Music’s music for free…provided you agree to watch some ads first. Viewing about 90 seconds of Perry Ellis or Levi’s commercials may get you 1 song by Ludacris. The music download service will available at SpiralFrog, and [...]

Conspicuous consumption is becoming rare as it becomes more common. Few among us will ever see The Platinum, which is the world’s largest yacht, or the $10M Neiman Marcus Personal Zeppelin circa 2004, but thanks to Visualis, a European jewellery & bauble manufacturer, we stand a chance of viewing their latest interpretation of conspicuous [...]

Boston’s $14B Big Dig Project has had it’s share of problems, including cost overruns, water leaks, allegations of substandard materials and now, collapsing ceiling tiles. On July 10, 2006 some bolts in the Ted Williams Tunnel failed, causing some of those concrete ceiling tiles, weighing 3 tons each to fall, crushing a passing car.
Design [...]

Newsweek has an article that suggests that many if not most pin tumbler locks, ie those that can be opened via regular keys, are easily compromised by means of a new-ish technique called bumping. Apparently, bumping is so easy, that anyone can learn the technique in fifteen minutes - easier even than classic lock picking. [...]

High-Def Digest got their hands on Training Day, one of the 1st movies available in both high-definition formats, played it on their fancy reference monitor, examined the images, listened to the sound, and decided that they preferred the HD DVD version.
And apparently, it wasn’t even close - in the reviewers opinion, HD DVD provided not [...]

X-bit Labs has a comprehensive 14-page review of some dual-core processors including Intel’s new Core Duo processor, formerly known as Conroe.
Basically, they say that the hype surrounding the Core Duo is true, and conclude with the words: “They offer remarkable performance and hence take over the leadership in the high-end processor market”.
Contemporary [...]