Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Monday, February 11, 2008

Color tile optical illusion

Source: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/231939037/color-tile-optical-i.html

You might have seen this shaded gray squares illusion before. Squares A and B are the same shade of gray. (It was created by Edward H. Adelson, Professor of Vision Science at MIT.

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Here's a similar illusion with colored squares. The "blue" tiles on the top face of the left cube are the same color as the "yellow" tiles in the top of the right cube.

Don't take my word for it. Use an image editing program with a eyedropper to see for yourself. I used Photoshop's eyedropper tool to take 5x5 samples and found that both the "yellow" and the "blue" tiles are C:50 M:40 Y:40 K:5.

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Take a look at the brown tile in the center of the top face and the yellow tile in the center of the side facing slightly to the left. They're the same color.

UPDATE: The color tile illusion is one of many excellent illusions created by R. Beau Lotto.

The Internet Finally Becomes A Factor In The Primaries

Source: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/AVc/~3/231587786/the-internet-fi.html

Four years ago, Howard Dean and Joe Trippi showed everyone how powerful the Internet could be as a campaign and fundraising tool. This year, it seemed like it was not as important.

But the news yesterday that Obama's campaign was loaded with cash and Hillary's was strapped showed that in the end, the Internet is the most powerful fundraising vehicle of them all.

The following charts come from a NY Times story this morning.

While this graphic doesn't show how much of this money came directly from the Internet, we all know that no fundraising technique "scales" like Internet fundraising.

Hillary's campaign has used the Internet well but not brilliantly. Obama's campaign has done a better job and his personality and candidacy is much better suited to the medium. And the net result of that is that he sits in a stronger position right now because of it.

Nokia 6220 Classic Takes 5 Megapixel Geotagged Photos, Includes Widgets [Nokia]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/233040872/nokia-6220-classic-takes-5-megapixel-geotagged-photos-includes-widgets

The 6220 Classic seems to be Nokia's answer to the latest Sony Ericsson Cybershots: a compact candybar with 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens which gets all its photos tagged thanks to its built-in Assisted GPS, a feature that is the norm in the latest Nokia line-up. The only bad thing: the candybar 6220 doesn't use its GPS to provide with full navigation like the Nokia 6210 Navigator however, although this can be enabled later with a software upgrade, probably for a price. At $471 (325 euros) it also comes loaded with Nokia Maps and a set of Widsets which, like Apple's iPhones widgets, are small specialized applications to shown the Internet content loaded through its 3G connection.

Nokia 6220 classic: redefining the definition of 'share' Converged device offers excellent imaging capabilities, navigation and advanced sharing features At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Nokia introduced the Nokia 6220 classic, a full-featured device that combines a 5 megapixel camera with A-GPS functionality to give new meaning to the phrase "to share". High quality images and videos can be snapped, tagged, edited and shared online, phone-to-phone or even viewed on a television. The Nokia 6220 classic is expected to start shipping in the 3rd quarter of 2008 in selected markets with an estimated retail price of 325 euros, before taxes and subsidies. The highlight of the Nokia 6220 classic is its 5 megapixel camera with Xenon flash and Carl Zeiss optics - on par with many single purpose digital cameras on the market today. With its high-speed HSDPA connection updating blogs or uploading photos and videos to favorite sharing sites like Share on Ovi or Flickr can be done right from the Nokia 6220 classic. A-GPS functionality allows photos to be 'geotagged' - making them easier to search and share. Images can also be viewed on a television screen with the integrated TV-out feature, sent from phone to phone via wireless Bluetooth connection, or viewed in full color on the phone's large 2.2 inch display. "The Nokia 6220 classic will help web 2.0 novices and experienced bloggers snap, save and share pictures and videos easily. Saving, tagging and uploading pictures can now be done on the phone, seconds after the picture has been taken," says John Barry, Director, Connect devices, Nokia. "The Nokia 6220 classic, with its 5 megapixel camera, auto focus and xenon flash is a credible and reasonably priced alternative to single- purpose digital cameras and has the added benefit of A-GPS for location tagging, Nokia Maps and possibility to upgrade to full navigation." The Nokia 6220 classic comes loaded with the new Nokia Maps 2.0 application which helps consumers find the best routes or explore any city for new restaurants, hotels, tourist attractions and other points of interest. The pre-loaded WidSets service brings web content directly to the device via mini-applications called widgets, providing quick and easy access to news updates, games and web communities. As a full- featured converged device, the Nokia 6220 classic also includes internet browser, email, music player, FM radio with RDS and up to 8 GB of memory. In addition to its imaging capabilities, the Nokia 6220 classic enables Adaptive Multi Rate - Wideband speech coding technology, giving a more natural sound to human voice in phone calls. It helps when having a conversation in a noisy environment such as in traffic or public place.

Bluetooth SIG looks at Bluetooth-WiFi to hasten transfers

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/232797282/

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless

If you'll recall, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group already had plans laid out to speed up Bluetooth by teaming it up with UWB, but needless to say, that didn't exactly take the world by storm. Thankfully, it seems the crew is trying something else in an effort to speed up BT transfers, and judging by the ubiquity of WiFi, we reckon this endeavor has a much better chance at gaining traction. According to Michael Foley, director of the Bluetooth SIG, these so-called Bluetooth-WiFi (just a temporary name, folks) devices will "use the regular low-power Bluetooth radios to recognize each other and establish connections, and if they need to transfer a large file, they will be able to turn on their WiFi radios, then turn them off to save power after finishing the transfer." For whatever reason, Foley also noted that it wouldn't be letting the dream go with regard to Bluetooth-UWB -- we're sure consumers will adore the confusion.

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The Nokia N96 redefines "high-end"

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/233034630/

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Rumored for a few weeks now as the N95's successor in waiting, the mighty N96 dual slider has gone all official on us at Mobile World Congress today. Though the phone it replaces is still a beast by any measure, the N96 pushes the envelope further by packing a solid 16GB of storage internally in addition to a microSD slot, something the N95 8GB lacks. The 5 megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss Tessar lens carries over, but there are now two LEDs doing flash and video light duty. The 2.8 inch QVGA display will come in handy for the integrated DVB-H mobile TV tuner, while a 3.5mm headphone jack, A2DP, and integrated stereo speakers should handle audio with aplomb. Other features include WiFi, AGPS, and morphing lights on the smaller second slide that hook the user up with game controls when it's time to relax with a little N-Gage action. Unfortunately, the first version of the N96 (and the only version announced thus far) supports HSDPA only on the 900 and 2100MHz bands, but we imagine the strength of the spec sheet should still be enough to sell a few of these stateside when it launches in the third quarter for €550 (about $797).

Gallery: The Nokia N96 redefines "high-end"