Stacked house begs you to climb them like stairs.

Cool architecture. What else would you call this? I for one would love to call this my next home. Though I’m 98% 99% sure I couldn’t even come close to affording the bill for such grand display of modern art. Just in case you’re curious, the Step House was built by Herzog & de Meuron for the Vitra Campus in Weil am Rhein, Germany. Another bonus — I want to visit Germany. (Anyone care to join me?) Looks like I could kill two birds with one stone here, huh? *Gazes on in awe…”some day”*

Digital outcast? The Hidden Antenna picture frame calls out your name.

The big draw to HDTV or even digital TV in general is the eye candy over standard antenna based TV. While it is now all digital in the US (and many other countries around the world), it’s design and basic technologies used cause vast amounts of interference and less than stellar picture quality. To some, they’ll take a bit of noise and sparse channel selection for a much lighter deduction in monthly bills. Besides, with the internet being as amazing as it is these days, who watches TV on an actual TV anymore anyway?

For you, oh normal cable/satellite hating antenna loving TV watcher, I bring you the Hidden Antenna Picture Frame. This is at the very basic level of picture frames — no digital junk here. Just plain ‘ol film paper support. Even better however is the hidden TV antenna that’s tucked behind. From now on, wow your friends and clean up your living space by concealing the stuff that no one ever really cares to see.

As far as antennas go, it’s pretty feature packed with support for DVB-T, ATSC, and DAB, and — Gasps! — even analog! Though good luck finding one of those those channels anywhere around these parts.

If you hate visible cables and antenna’s that much and still cling to the classic way of TV life, is $40 really too much to ask? Oh yeah, don’t forget your can display (1) whole picture too. Now how about it?

Dvice > CrunchGear

Sound the bell: Blockbuster is on the way out.

Of all the industries that have been hit hard by the digital revolution, the music/video industries are some of the hardest hit. With both formats relying heavily on physical media for income, now that many are pushing away from such formats, the companies involved are feeling the pinch. On the video front, Blockbuster is taking a beating. Just look at their recent 4th quarter results in which they lost over $400 million — $400 million!. Even more telling however is that this staggering loss comes at a time when Blockbuster has in years past done very well. Simply put, it’s a failure to adapt.

Adapt to the changing times, to the move to smaller and more efficient media, or just to digital altogether. Recent trials of SD movie rentals may have seemed pretty decent on paper, but in truth it’s a terrible idea. Who is going to drive into town to pick up a digital file when it’s exponentially easier and more convenient to just download it? That fact alone coupled with Blockbuster not really having any viable digital rental/purchase options are literally killing the company.

Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes knows this, stating that though his “company’s future is bright, the next 12 to 18 months will remain challenging.” Looking at it from the outside, it’s going to be very challenging. Does anyone feel or think Blockbuster can right their sinking ship or is it too far gone to save?

Cnet

The result of AT&T’s network upgrades and recent PC World victory…

So AT&T has been riding pretty high the last couple of days after PC World’s latest tests pegged AT&T as the nation’s real, fastest 3G network. Coverage however is a completely different story. And while AT&T may in fact be fastest in 13 of the biggest cities in the country, there are plenty of others where they fall flat. Perhaps BerryReview writer Ronen Halevy happens to fall in one of those “lesser areas”.

To be fair, it’s very possible that it was a RIM network issue with BIS at the time of the “congestion” mesage. While a few years ago, such a thing would be unheard of, the recent surge in BlackBerry popularity has caused RIM’s servers to stumble on several occasions because of the increased load. So who’s fault is it this time?

BerryReview

For when a simple car key just won’t do: The Aston Marton Watch Key thing

$34k burning a hole in your pocket? Ya, thought not. For some however, that lump of cash can cause quite a bit of pain after a little while. Poor them. After dropping $200k+ on an Aston Martin Raptide (the greatest car on the planet I might add), that spare $34k could be seen not only as a pocket weight, but a burden as well. Luckily, the wealthy never have a shortage of options.

If you are one person lucky enough to own one of the finer vehicles on this planet, perhaps it’s time to consider upgrading — your key. Sure Aston Martin as well as countless other luxury car manufacturers turn out some pretty impressive sliced metal, but truth of the matter is — you need more. That’s precisely where the Car Watch Key comes in handy.

The AMVOX2 Rapide Transponder heralds the second generation of the revolutionary creation that sealed the ties between the Grande Maison from the Vallée de Joux and the legendary British luxury sports car manufacturer.

Released several months ago, it is the first mechanical watch developed with the ability to control access into a luxury sports car by means of a built-in micro transmitter system serves to lock and unlock the Aston Martin DBS car, while maintaining the key functions of the famous vertical-trigger mechanism equipping the pushpiece-free chronograph.

This nifty piece of gadgetry will unlock your Aston Martin thanks to a built in transceiver in the watch itself. An added bonus of course being that lump of cash in your pocket is no more. Sign me up. Now if only I could find a spare $34k and a neglected Aston Martin Rapide. Anyone willing to donate…?

As much as I joke and as simple of tech as this is, it’s still might cool. I want it.

Geekologie > UberReview

Palm Pre/Pixi users now wooed with 2,000 apps and counting.

We (the media) may always highlight the iPhone platform’s robust and impressive 100,000+ app figure (and to a lesser degree, Android’s 20,000+) but there are other people out there yearning for such numbers and knowledge that don’t reside on the most popular platforms. WebOS users on the Pre and Pixi don’t get access to nearly as many apps as the big boys, though I’d argue that at the very least, they look a lot nicer when they finally reach market. Functionally speaking, the success has been hit or miss.

So just how many apps does webOS now have available? 2,272. Though not necessarily a straight 2,272 across the board. The break down is as follows (calculated by “Dieter at PreCentral):

Here’s how it breaks down: as of this writing, the official on-device App Catalog has 1623 apps (counting all apps in all regions), Web Distribution has 145 apps, Beta distribution has 61 apps, and the homebrew gallery has 443. Using my trusty calculator, I come to 2,272 available applications after adding those four numbers together.

So there you have it. More or less 2,000+ webOS apps. It’s been a long, long trip. And if Palm’s recent week earnings reports are any indicator, the near future looks to be just as slow. Even still, the gadget aficionados that we are won’t give up on what is a truly amazing OS that so far has simply failed to catch on because of poor hardware. Any webOS users care to chime in?

IntoMobile

[Image Source]

The most expensive “Fancy Mirror/OLED wall” you’ll ever want to buy.

Wanting to stand out from the crowd is nothing to be ashamed of. Far from it actually. It is that striving for individuality that makes us unique. “Unique” is what it would take to rationalize a wall made out of hundreds of OLED screens that detect motion, and then shoot the image back to you. The concept sounds pretty cool with the only “gee, I think I’ll hold off for now” moment coming when you see the $16,000/sq. meter this setup commands. IF I had $16,000, it wouldn’t be going to a wall of OLED’s. There are plenty of other gadgets I’d add to my stable.

In case you were interested, Phillips is offering up this little OLED wonder for €10k – 12k/sq. meter (roughly $13.5k – $16k) or renting out to those who want to give it a test drive first. The test drive mind you, isn’t cheap either, clocking in at a still expensive €10,000 (again, €15k-ish). At that price you may as well just purchase a panel outright, no?

Oh well. When you do sell your soul, organs, or first born child for a few panels of this motion detecting OLED wall, you can at least bask in the ego-filled glory that no one else in your neighborhood country has such a toy. Bask away.

Gizmodo