Absolutely fascinating. The University of Washington is developing a vocally controled mouse interface. We’ve seen vocal control of the computer before, but it is usally responding to specific commands and words to carry out tasks such as opening files.  This system uses different vowels and sounds to create cursor motion.  You can see the same system used in the video above to control a robot arm as well. [via BotJunkie]        Less

And so the second half of the third season begins, properly, after much gnashing and biting and flickering of flames and poor renderings that had to be unrendered. For those who might just be joining us, Kranium is a mad scientist who owns Jigsaw Labs. Times are hard, and so he has instructed Milton (his robot) and Lump (his… well, the… he's just Lump) to get jobs. What this has to do with Anton Chekhov is anybody's guess. If you want to know more, follow us back to jigsawfanclub.com. There's a blog and everything. Less

[Andrey Mikhalchuk] Has posted some great instructions on how to build an inexpensive router based robot. Starting with a Linksys WRT54GL, he takes us through the process of disassembling and modifying it to directly control servos.  He has put together a custom version of OpenWRT Linux that you can download from his site.  After testing to make sure everything is functional, he goes through a quick and dirty chassis build.  As you can see from the picture above, there are lot of household items thrown in there such as rubber bands and zip ties.  After adding a camera mounted on two servos for x y movement, he fine tunes it and lets it go. This project looks fairly simple, cheap, and fun.  It may look familiar as it is very similar to our Wifi Robot post from August. [thanks Matt]        Less

Teenar pulls all the right strings, Teenar, Girl Guitar - Fashion Preview, Political candidate punches TV host, 2, Chuwit Kamolvisit, PeriPeri, Endless PeriPeri toy simulates the feel of opening cardboard boxes,  Magnetic Movie, Exemption from excise tax for certain wooden arrows designed for use by children [pdf], Bailout Bill Gives Tax Break to Wooden Arrow Manufacturers While Small Business Get the Shaft, U.S. to Fund Pro-American Publicity in Iraqi Media, RoboVox. Your Voice, $4,700 Sink Has Built In Aquarium, Magibon Less

Robotics, Defense, Contracts Wade Roush wrote: Bedford, MA-based iRobot (NASDAQ: IRBT) said today that the U.S. Army’s Tank-Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC) will pay the company $3.75 million to build and deliver two “Warrior 700″ robots (pictured here.) The Warrior, which has been under development for more than two years, is designed to serve as the big brother of iRobot’s popular Packbot device, which is already widely used for bomb-sniffing and other hazardous situations in Iraq and Afghanistan. With a longer chassis and a much greater payload capacity, the Warrior will be capable of explosives disposal, firefighting, clearing buildings, and even extracting casualties from the battlefield, the company says. Special “payload positioning” software allows the robot to rotate its four treads and change its center of gravity to carry loads across difficult terrain. “We are confident that the iRobot Warrior will secure a strong foothold within infantry, first responders and combat engineers,” Joe Dyer, president of iRobot’s government and industrial robots division, said in a statement. The company plans to start selling production units of the Warrior in 2009. TARDEC, at the Detroit Arsenal in Warren, MI, is the Army’s laboratory for advanced military automotive technology. It develops manned and unmanned ground systems for combat support. Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

Download audio file (11-Rhea-Drysdale-interview.mp3) Rhea Drysdale was willing to spend some time with me even during her busy week with her big announcement that you will hear or read about within the interview. Rhea has had a ton of experience in the SEO industry in such a short amount of time and is very willing to [...] Less

Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS Feed The WowWee Rovio is more than just a remote-control vehicle. It can actually broadcast a signal out to the Web, using both audio and video. It’s even good-quality video, too! How cool would it be to be able to act like you’re innocently playing with your favorite toy, when you are in fact spying on your little sister? Have you every wondered exactly what your cat or dog gets up to when you’re not home? Rovio allows you to interact with its environment, surveying the home or office remotely through streaming video and audio transmitted via the Internet to your cell phone, PC or video game console. Video is captured through a built-in camera and NorthStar smart navigation boosts the units ability to act autonomously. Working like a micro-GPS system, the NorthStar navigation and positioning system enables the Rovio robot to know where it is, locate the position of other objects, and accurately navigate through its environment under its own control. Users can direct the movement of the robot, which travels via its three omni-directional wheels, in addition to controlling the neck mounted camera and audio. Internet controls include an option to store way points, so that with one click Rovio will move to that designated point without having to be guided there manually. By the press of a button on your web browser, wherever you are, you can send Rovio back to base to recharge recharge and get ready for the next house exploration mission. Rovio is not only a cool novelty, it offers a cost-effective addition to your home security or a moving web conferencing unit. I gotta tell ya. I’ve played with a lot of wireless webcams before. This, by far, is processing the best and fastest wireless webcam signal so far. In order to use this on your wireless network, you have to be using Windows somewhere on the network, and you have to lower your encryption to WEP. Other than those two points, I am in love with the Rovio. My dogs… not so much. DoublingStocks - Stock Trading Robot. IPhone Explosion - Brand New - Pays 75% Of $49.95! Forex Mt4 Ea ( Expert Advisor ) Robot 96% Accurate. Want to embed this video on your own site, blog, or forum? Use this code or download the video: <object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/XQF7i5dg2NI"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/XQF7i5dg2NI" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/">Chris</a> | <a href="http://live.pirillo.com/">Live Tech Support</a> | <a href="http://media.pirillo.com/">Video Help</a> | <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">Add to iTunes</a> Is Having Sex with a Robot Hooker Cheating? Remote Control Robot: Dalek from Doctor Who i-Sobot Robot Toy Review Join the Geeks Community Can a Wireless Webcam Roam well with Rovio? Less

http://geeks.pirillo.com - http://live.pirillo.com - The WoWee Rovio is more than just a remote-control vehicle. It can actually broadcast a signal out to the Web, using both audio and video. It's even good-quality video, too! How cool would it be to be able to act like you're innocently playing with your favorite toy, when you are in fact spying on your little sister? http://chris.pirillo.com Less

The Trossen Robotics Blog has announced the winners of the “Crabfu challenge”. The challenge, issued by [Crabfu] was to make a robot that was full of character. It didn’t have to have a purpose or be autonomous, it just had to be full of character. The first place winner, pictured above, won us over when he “blinked” a few moments into his video. Strange how something so simple can add so much life. [via BotJunkie]        Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK and TECH cocktail has a new friend named Kyle, an artificial intelligent robot dinosaur pet called PLEO. Frank shows off what the PLEO can do as it may be a great pet for anyone looking for a low maintenance pal. Distributed by Tubemogul. Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK, must-read tech-talk, offers in the field video interviews with startup founders, authors and other social media and web technology related experts. Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK and TECH cocktail has a new friend named Kyle, an artificial intelligent robot dinosaur pet called PLEO. Frank shows off what the PLEO can do as it may be a great pet for anyone looking for a low maintenance pal. Distributed by Tubemogul. Less

[Aaron Shephard] at mini-itx.com just finished a backup DVD burning robot based on an EPIA M10000 Mini-ITX motherboard and scavenged parts. A Perl script interacts with stepper motors, LEDs, and sensors through the parallel port on the motherboard. The robot inserts DVDs for burning, flips them for labeling, and stacks completed discs in a pile. Coasters are rejected to a ‘penalty box’ for easy disposal. We’ve also covered some other optical disc duplicators in the past. [thanks maxthereal]        Less

» Amitabh Bachchan apologises » Aishwarya and Rajnikant in Peru » Salman Khan to dance for a cause » Tabu to play naughty lawyer » Madhuri Magic on PIA » Aamir Khan may join Shahrukh Khan’s Temptation » The Last Lear, 1920, Rubaru - Films that released this week Listen Now: Tune in for more on Hindi Cinema next week… Plugin to Podmasti.com for more on INDIA Less

» Amitabh Bachchan apologises » Aishwarya and Rajnikant in Peru » Salman Khan to dance for a cause » Tabu to play naughty lawyer » Madhuri Magic on PIA » Aamir Khan may join Shahrukh Khan’s Temptation » The Last Lear, 1920, Rubaru - Films that released this week Listen Now: Tune in for more on Hindi Cinema next week… Plugin to Podmasti.com for more on INDIA Less

We had a lot of entries for our Fail contest; there can only be one winner though. We liked [Gordon LaPlante]’s entry pictured above most of all. It’s big, it’s broken, and it’s black and white; that certainly sounds like us. [Gordon] wins $100 worth of No Starch Press merchandise. There were plenty of other honorable entries. You can view them in the Hack a Day Flickr photo pool. We saw a couple themes emerge during the contest and have highlighted some of them after the break. Hamsters This caught us off guard. Our downtime message said, “we’re adding more hamsters to our server power plant” and people just ran away with it. [hohan] This one by [jetblackscreems] looks like it has lots of mascot potential, spelling be damned. Fail Whales These were natural given our Twitter inspiration. [oneamericankid] [Bjonnh] [reenigneesrever] [macetech] made probably the most Hack a Day appropriate rendition of the Twitter image. Error screens [jonathanrice78] [AdamsGrizzly] [dibbqwaz] made a fine ASCII 503 that should probably be in the previous category. [adamsih300u] Angry robots We’re sad this didn’t gain more traction. [enrique jimenez] [einsofayin] This was a really fun contest to hold and we’ll be having many more in the future. Check out our Hack a Day T-Shirt design contest, which ends this weekend. Less

While we were away, we missed the story about the giant mechanical spider in Liverpool.  That spider has come to life, and you can watch the video courtesy of the BBC. Named La Princesse, she an art project designed to build tourism and boost the economy.  Developed by french company La Machine, she looks amazing.  It looks as though it takes 9 people to pilot her, possibly another running the crane she’s suspended from.  Watch the video and see her reach out and tap an onlooker’s umbrella with one of her legs. [via Gizmodo] Less

Robotics, consumer, pets Wade Roush wrote: Sadly, my old Roomba Red robot vacuum cleaner is now collecting dust—and not in the way it’s supposed to. Its rechargeable battery no longer recharges, and iRobot charges $70 for a replacement. I figure that’s money I might as well put toward a newer model. And now I’m sorely tempted: today Bedford, MA-based iRobot launched two new Roomba models designed especially for homes with hairy pets. When my old Roomba was still kicking, it was a huge blessing, since I have a long-haired Australian Shepherd who sheds copiously. My only complaints about the device were that its dirt bin filled up with hair so fast, and that I had to pick dog hair out of the brushes after every outing. Cleaning the brushes was so time-consuming that it almost canceled out the convenience of having a robotic vacuum. The new Roomba 532 features improvements intended to address those two issues. It has an additional “sweeper bin” that’s 3.5 times the size of the old vacuum bin, as well as an extra set of brushes and special cleaning tools for keeping the brushes hair-free. According to the company, the 532 also has “counter-rotating brushes” that “reach deep into carpets to pull out pet hair and dander.” I’m already salivating. The new Roomba 562 has everything the 532 has, plus one more set of brushes, a more capacious battery, and an on-board scheduling feature, allowing owners to program the vacuum to sweep automatically up to seven times a week, returning to its home base to recharge when it’s done. The Roomba 532 goes for $349 and the 562 is priced at $399. Of course, while many people buy Roombas to clean up after their pets, there’s another group of iRobot customers who buy them to entertain their pets. (John Landry, the former CTO of Lotus who’s now in the venture capital business, let slip after a recent Xconomy forum that he’s one of the latter.) So far, iRobot hasn’t come out with a robot tailored especially for the latter group—unless you count the ConnectR, a “virtual visiting” robot that the company is currently beta-testing with a limited group of users and that can be used, according to iRobot’s marketing materials, to “tell Fido he’s a ‘good boy’ even while you’re on vacation.” The company did, however, bring out one more Roomba model today: the new $599 “Roomba 610 Professional Series” robot (pictured at left), designed to vacuum large areas like offices or retail spaces. It comes with interchangeable sweeper bins—so that you can swap a full one for an empty one without delaying the robot in its appointed rounds, apparently—and it’s capable of using up more of its battery power before automatically returning to its recharging station. Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

R0b0t J3su5! - Scientology and Robot Jesus Podcast. From the drug-induced mind of science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, this secretive cult has captivated the minds of the world through their army of celebrity faces.  Scientology teaches how your depression, irritability, and unhappiness are actually the echoing cries of alien souls destroyed by the evil Galactic Overlord Xenu in the volcanoes of Hawaii 75 million years ago.  …Seriously. Less

So yes, we've reached our 50th episode, and it's time for a midseason stretch. We'll be back on October 2nd with more weekly fun. Until then, keep your eyes peeled on jigsawfanclub.com for site updates, interim blog reports, and new Jigsaw merchandise. Also, why not become our fan on Facebook? We'd be ever so happy to see you. Kanpai. Less