Education & Technology

For mobile gamers in western Japan, a hearty seafood dinner awaits just a few key clicks away, thanks to a unique new cellphone fishing game that rewards successful players with home deliveries of fresh, real-world fish.The game — called “Ippon Zuri” (which means “pole-and-line fishing”) — was created by FIT, a Fukuoka-based system development company who teamed up with a local seafood wholesaler. Game play is simple: players use the phone keys to cast bait to promising-looking fish in the game’s virtual waters, which include sea bream, crab, and other seasonal fish. When a fish takes the bait, the player is sent to a slot machine screen where, if luck prevails and 3 numbers line up appropriately, the virtual fish is hooked and reeled in. A message is then relayed to the wholesaler, who picks up the real-world equivalent from the local seafood market and delivers it, whole and raw, to the player’s doorstep.

FIT president Hiromi Fukuda suggests that Ippon Zuri is more enjoyable than other fishing games because it allows players to eat what they catch. The game (which seems rather like a fancy seafood ordering system) promises more entertainment than a mundane trip to the supermarket and more convenience than a fishing trip to the seaside, and it makes a great pick-me-up for hungry fishermen feeling down on their real-world luck.

The game is open to Fukuoka-area NTT DoCoMo users who register at the Ippon Zuri site and pre-pay for the games (1,000 yen for 3 games) using Edy electronic money.

[Source: Fuji Sankei]

Sometimes they can be funny, sometimes thought provoking, other times they just mess with your mind. They’ll always take your breath away though and make you wonder at the skills of the people that created them. The following images are our favourite Photoshopped images. If you’ve seen better we’d love to hear from you.

Credits

Worth1000
Fark
Kjun
Photoshop Talent
Artist-3d
Devotion Graphics

Artist and activist, Chris Jordan creates amazing images that portray America’s consumption. Chris’ hope is that his images will have a different effect than raw numbers alone. Since simple numbers no matter how large can be rather abstract it can be difficult to connect with ones impact. Whereas a visual representation of vast quantities can help make meaning of 106,000 aluminum cans, the number used in the US every thirty seconds or two million plastic beverage bottles, the number used in the US every five minutes.

This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs. The underlying desire is to emphasize the role of the individual in a society that is increasingly enormous, incomprehensible, and overwhelming.

As with any large works they must be seen in person to participate in the full experience. We hope the images here and on Chris’ web site arouse your curiosity and desire to do so when possible.

Images courtesy of Chris Jordan  

Plastic Bottles, 2007
60×120″
Depicts two million plastic beverage bottles, the number used in the US every five minutes.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual size:

Barbie Dolls, 2008
60×80″
Depicts 32,000 Barbies, equal to the number of elective breast augmentation surgeries performed monthly in the US in 2006.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual print size:

Skull With Cigarette, 2007 [based on a painting by Van Gogh]
72×98″
Depicts 200,000 packs of cigarettes, equal to the number of Americans who die from cigarrette smoking every six months.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual print size:

Prison Uniforms, 2007
10×23 feet in six vertical panels
Depicts 2.3 million folded prison uniforms, equal to the number of Americans incarcerated in 2005.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual size:

Installed at the Von Lintel Gallery, NY, June 2007

Please see the complete series and show locations at http://www.chrisjordan.com/

Images courtesy of Chris Jordan

Sure, its exciting to see flash memory drop in price and increase in capacity, but flash isn’t the end-all-be-all. In fact, we already know what it’ll be replaced by before it’s even become the de facto standard: phase-change memory. And Intel just figured out how to double the capacity of phase-change memory, shortening flash’s lifespan before it’s even really taken off.

So what exactly is phase-change memory?

Phase-change memory differs from other solid-state memory technologies such as flash and random-access memory because it doesn’t use electrons to store data. Instead, it relies on the material’s own arrangement of atoms, known as its physical state. Previously, phase-change memory was designed to take advantage of only two states: one in which atoms are loosely organized (amorphous), and another where they are rigidly structured (crystalline).

Now, Intel has discovered that there are two more distinct states between amorphous and crystalline that can be used to store information, doubling the capacity of the memory.Phase-change is superior to flash as it’s much faster. It’s as fast as the DRAM and SRAM that’s used in conjunction with flash memory now. When phase-change becomes standard, it would be all that was necessary rather than a DRAM or SRAM module that reads and writes data quickly while the flash memory is just there to store data when the power is off.

Don’t worry, though. Phase-change memory won’t be hitting consumer devices for another few years, so your expensive flash-equipped devices won’t be going obsolete… yet. [Technology Review via Slashdot]