feein’ old, or feelin’ groovy?
The sad thing is, I get all the jokes. Radarange! ::snort::
What’s for Dinner
Morse Unplugged
Worth1000.com’s Vintage/Modern photoshop contest
In this contest your challenge is to take modern products and display them in a vintage light, through advertisements, packaging or even the product itself. You can also reverse the challenge and take vintage products and display them in a modern way (i.e. make gas-lamp headlights for your Porsche(or a cellular telegraph).
The rules of this game are thus: Take modern products and display them in a vintage way, or take vintage products and display them in a modern way. As always, quality is a must.
A surprising (or, perhaps not) number of entries explore grammophones-playing-CDs or manual-typewrite-meets-computer. But ain’t none of ‘em a patch on the real thing.
Boomboxes on Parade
The Birth of Boomboxes: 1976-1981
Despite common opinion, boomboxes can be traced back to a humble start in the mid-70s, when the idea of a “personal” stereo experience was a bit of a novelty. Panasonic, Sony, Marantz and GE were quick to debut this hybrid stereo–not quite a home stere console, but more than a portable combination radio-cassette. The models were small, heavy and black–sound quality and AM/FM tuning was quite good. The pinnacle in functionality was an array of input and output jacks, so the stereo could be integrated with other audio equipment, like microphones and turntables. Obviously, these systems filled a niche, and when the ’80s arrived, other companies entered the portable stereo arena, while the trendsetters released more models. And so began the “boombox boom.”
iPod’s are so small; they make us sad.
via the gentlemen and ladies at BoingBoing.
Intel 8080
Lockergnome: What was the original primary function of the Intel 8080 microprocessor?
Posted by Marc Erickson 04.21.2004 @ 07:29 PM PT “There are several viable candidates for the title of “world’s first personal computer,” and—as usual—it all comes down to how you define the term….Perhaps a better title to award is the world’s first commercially successful personal computer. The winner is almost certainly the MITS Altair 8800, which first appeared in the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics.
Based on the Intel 8080 microprocessor (the successor to the Intel 8008), the Altair sold as a kit for roughly $400, and it ran a licensed version of Bill Gates’ and Paul Allen’s BASIC programming language. The key to profitability, however, was a discount on the PC’s Intel 8080s, which MITS managed to obtain by purchasing bulk quantities of cosmetically flawed but fully functional processors.”
It’s Hard to Find a Place to Park
Wired News: Detroit Parking Meters Go Online
DETROIT — Credit cards, cell phones and even old-fashioned cash can be used to operate the high-tech parking meters going up around town but some drivers find them a bit intimidating.
“You need a master’s degree or something,” said Robert Blackwell as he tried to figure out how to use one of the new meters. “All I’m trying to do is not get a parking ticket.”
The meters are part of a 90-day experiment with battery- and solar-powered, online-operated parking meters.
For those of you without a master’s degree–or just old-fashioned or behind-the-times (perish the thought)–we offer you the Parking Meter Page (quirky, some photos), and the Oklahoma Historical Society’s history of the parking meter (dull, no photos). And a chance to buy one.
digital MUSE
Hal Layer’s brief taste of the Triadex Muse, jolted me a bit. Because I have one. A non-working model, that I have been assured needs only a bit of cleaning to, ah, make it work.It was donated by synthesist Charles Cohen.
The Muse: a music composer machine or digital
synthesizer and melody composer, involving early
logic modules in a unique circuit that allows the
possibility of 14 trillion musical note combinations.
Mr. Layer’s link is broken, but more informaion, including a preliminary simulator, can be found at Paul Geffen’s Triadex Muse Simulator Page.
Mind Machine Museum
Hal Layer’s virtual museum and gallery of vintage computers
Calculators, Computer, typewriters, video-games, and a few things that escape classification, along with photos & a good selection of links. Frustratingly (& defiantly!) short on info at times, but spans quite a few categories.
This TRS-80, Model PT-210 Portable Data Terminal w/built-in printer and acoustic modem, f’r instance, makes me drool.
Our birthday, you know, is next week….
Oldest Movies Ev-ar
Good post by Cory Doctorow over on BoingBoing on reanimating old sequential drawings and photographs, including Galileo’s sunspot drawings (1613) and an 1882 transit of Venus. Mr. Doctorow–an author of scientifiction romances (termed by some “speculative fiction”)–muses on the possibilities of future use of today’s plethora of imagery.
Museum of Unworkable Devices
The Museum of Unworkable Devices
This museum is a celebration of fascinating devices that don’t work. It houses diverse examples of the perverse genius of inventors who refused to let their thinking be intimidated by the laws of nature, remaining optimistic in the face of repeated failures. Watch and be amazed as we bring to life eccentric and even intricate perpetual motion machines that have remained steadfastly unmoving since their inception. Marvel at the ingenuity of the human mind, as it reinvents the square wheel in all of its possible variations. Exercise your mind to puzzle out exactly why they don’t work as the inventors intended.
Good section on .
ref=”http://www.boingboing.net”>BoingBoing.