Now even vending machines are going to require ID when you want to buy a pack of smokes.

The system is being introduced in Japan in 2008 and is known as Taspo (Tobacco Passport), it uses RFID technology so that vending machines will only vend if you present your card (watch out for black market smokers passports on eBay).

Over in the UK we have a more capitalistic solution, vending machines sell packs of 20 which only contain 16 cancer sticks and cost way more than they do in the shops, as an ex-smoker I find this pretty amusing.

More info over at tioj (Japanese), found via Tokyo Mango.

We’ve written about quite a few electric shock gadgets most of which tended to be toys, this latest shocking gadget has a much more serious motive the No-Contact defence jacket.

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I’ve seen wind-up flashlights before but this is the first one I’ve come across that you charge up by pulling a rip cord. The Pull-to-Charge LED Forever Flashlight (that’s one long product name) will never require new batteries and can be charged by just a couple of pulls on the cord.

An added bonus of the Pull-to-Charge LED Forever Flashlight torch is that the same pull cord mechanism can be used to charge up your cell phone. Simple connect your phone with the supplied adapter (there’s no list of compatible phones unfortunately) and get pulling.

The flashlight is available from Gadget Universe for $29.95.

This is what you get when you combine a light bulb, plasma and a clock, the bright idea plasma clock. Marketing spiel follows:

The Bright Idea Plasma Clock™ adds a beautiful soft glow to any room, hallway or shelf while keeping perfect time. With a removable base and built-in mounting slots, it’s almost like having two clocks in one! Placed inside the display base, the clock is a dramatic lighted centrepiece. Outside the display base, you can hang the clock anywhere on your wall for the ultimate in artistic expression. With a variety of different display options, the choice is yours!

From the picture you can’t really tell if the plasma side of the light is any good but if you want to give it a try the plasma clock is available at Safield for £19.99.

Yeah, you’ve always wanted it, clean, pure energy, that’s cheap as free.

Well you can,,,

Ok,, do you have $50,000 USD lying around? If so, here’s the deal for how to generate your own power through a combination of solar power, electrolysis, and fuel cell power generation.

Thanks to a great article from the folks at Wired Magazine.

A guy named Stephen Friend, who is obviously a friend to the environment (what, if I don’t do the pun, it’ll just go to waste) put together a complete energy generation system that uses local water and solar power to generate energy.

He used his smarts to put together a complete mail order power generation system from the folks at the FuelCellstore.com. There they have all the stuff you could need to generate, store, and release naturally generated power in a safe and managable way. Read the rest of this entry »

I like to think that I don’t have a super stressful life. Sure, there are times when I want to lay down and take a nap rather than doing whatever I have to do, but that’s rare. I realize that there are a lot of unlucky people out there who do have unhealthy levels of stress for whatever reason. The StressEraser is a gadget that tries to give those people a little help by controlling their stress levels.
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If you are one of those persons that keep constantly checking your email at all times of the day, wasting your time and patience, I’m sure you’ll find this Email Clock concept to be very helpful. The clock was designed by Tom Igoe, a teacher and researcher at the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University that suffers from the same email checking obsession.

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The HRP-2W is a new humanoid robot from Japan that was created to help us in our daily tasks. In a demonstration, a robot with camera eyes poured tea from a bottle in a cup, and another robot with wheels served their human masters in a room equipped with sensors in the floors and cameras in the ceiling. The researchers from the University of Tokyo are trying to simulate what our lives would be like if we lived seamlessly with robot technology in our home.

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