Upstart toymaker Robonica has been making promises about its Robini-i programmable robot for a little while now, but it looks like it’s now not only managed to get the bot out the door, but land it on the cover of the new Hammacher Schlemmer holiday catalog as well. Headed up by a former Hasbro exec, the company is clearly taking aim at the likes of
WowWee, but hopes to one-up them by also letting its robot with a “serious attitude” become an avatar in an MMO of sorts when it’s not tormenting your pets. What’s more, the Robini-i can also apparently interact with other bots both online and in person, and the more adventuresome folks out there can also take advantage of some basic programming capabilities provided by the included software (Windows only, for the time being). Slightly less entry-level, however, is the $299.95 that Hammacher Schlemmer is charging for the kit, although it appears that could drop to $250 as it rolls out to other retailers.
Read – Hammacher Schlemmer
Read – Xconomy, “Robonica President, an Ex-Hasbro Exec, Hopes to Put Boston Back on Toy Industry Map with Rolling Robots”
[Via IEEE Spectrum, thanks Ken R.]
Filed under: Robots
Robonica Roboni-i rolling robot takes aim at WowWee, holiday shoppers originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Sep 2009 15:13:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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We hope by now you’ve seen the video of Microsoft’s Kudo Tsunoda demoing the latest software to undergo the Project Natal treatment — Beautiful Katamari and Space Invaders Extreme. If you haven’t, you really should, because there’s nothing quite like seeing a man gesticulate wildly for seemingly no reason. In that post, a commenter of ours — aardWolf — made the genius suggestion that people do their own “demo” videos of Project Natal. We think that’s a grand, grand idea… and we’re going one better. If you make those videos, we’ll put them together in a segment for The Engadget Show. Here’s what we want from you, the reader:
- Film yourself “playing” a game “with” Project Natal
- Upload the video to YouTube, Viddler, or the video site of your choice tagged with “engadget natal contest” (with quotes, at least on Viddler), and specify exactly what game you’re playing. Feel free to give details.
- Email us at engadgetshow [at] engadget [dot] com with “natal video” in the subject, as well as the link and any pertinent info you’d like to provide (or you can just leave a link in comments)
- Lather, rinse, repeat
Once we get some good entries, we’ll cut the whole shebang together in a segment for The Engadget Show (provided you guys aren’t super boring or something — though we don’t think that will be an issue). It goes without saying that by submitting a video you’re granting us the rights to use it on the Show and in any Show promotional materials we might produce. Don’t worry, we won’t sell you into slavery or anything. Probably. In case your memory is super bad, we’ve included the clip of Kudo after the break.
Continue reading Challenge: Make your own Natal demo video, get yourself on The Engadget Show
Filed under: Announcements
Challenge: Make your own Natal demo video, get yourself on The Engadget Show originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:42:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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LG’s BL20 Chocolate — the younger sibling of the insane BL40 Chocolate Touch — has recently been making a real splash around these parts. Ever since we got our hands on it, we’ve been wondering when we’d hear some official pricing and launch information, and the wait seems to be coming to an end. It looks like the slider is going to run in the neighborhood of about €269, according to LG’s own website, which has also thrown up a few never-before-seen shots of the handset. That’s about all the news for now, but hit the read link to check out a few more snaps of this beauty, and be sure to have a gander at our own hands-on gallery below.
Filed under: Cellphones
LG’s BL20 Chocolate gets official with €269 price tag originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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In this episode we announce the winners of the Network Forensics Puzzle, do a technical segment on using encryption and good passwords together, and discuss the stories of the week! Full Show Notes Direct Audio Download Hosts: Larry “HaxorTheMatrix” Pesce,…
We’ve never thought the Kindle DX was ideal for serious studying, and it sounds like the students and teachers in Princeton’s pilot program agree with us — after two weeks of use in three classes, the Daily Princetonian reports many are “dissatisfied and uncomfortable” with their e-readers, with one student calling it “a poor excuse of an academic tool.” Most of the criticisms center around the Kindle’s weak annotation features, which make things like highlighting and margin notes almost impossible to use, but even a simple thing like the lack of true page numbers has caused problems, since allowing students to cite the Kindle’s location numbers in their papers is “meaningless for anyone working from analog books.” That’s all led to word that Princeton won’t be bringing the Kindle back to school next year, but we’ll see if Amazon — or anyone else — can address all these complaints before that decision is made final.
[Thanks, Tom]
Filed under: Handhelds
Kindle DX called “poor excuse of an academic tool” in Princeton pilot program originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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