blind

Illuminate your blinds

Feeling a little blasé about how ordinary your blinds look from day to night? OK. Fine, so you don't care. How about if they did something more than just open and close?

Designed by Yoon-Hui Kim and Eun-Kyung Kim, the Solar Vertical Lamp takes an average vertical blind and embeds it with special mini photovoltaics and LED pixels. Close the blinds during the day and the miniature solar pads on the back of the blinds start to soak up the sun's energy. Once the sun goes down, artfully placed lighting pixels illuminate in certain parts of the … Read more

Trick your ride

WindowBlinds offers a generally compelling way to add some panache to Windows XP or Windows Vista. It lets you skin your graphic interface, offering a number of preconfigured themes that range in styles and change the entire look of your desktop. You also have the ability to make some serious tweaks to each theme, should it be close to what you want, but just not quite right. No matter what skin you choose, though, we doubt you'll have any complaints with the appearance of the polished, attractive themes.

You also choose from several toolbar icon sets to match your … Read more

Third Eye Blind singer: A Web site can be your album

Stephan Jenkins, lead singer of the band Third Eye Blind, digital music fan, and former beau of Charlize Theron, wants to clear up a few things. He wants people to know that contrary to what some have been saying about him, he doesn't hate the album format.

On Monday, Jenkins gave the keynote address at the SanFran MusicTech Summit. He said he was in favor of releasing singles and suggested that this would help avoid "album filler," the term used to describe the placing of so-so tracks on albums in order to meet the required number of … Read more

Third Eye Blind vocalist: Albums unnecessary in digital age

SAN FRANCISCO--Stephan Jenkins, lead singer of alternative band Third Eye Blind, is the latest person to agree that the album format is better off dead.

Jenkins, whose band is known for such hits as "Semi-Charmed Life," "Jumper" and "How's it Going to Be," gave the keynote address at the SanFran MusicTech Summit on Monday.

"I don't think it's necessary or useful," Jenkins told several hundred conference attendees. "The album is an arbitrary concept. It's not something that has to exist."

It's important to note that … Read more

The 404 198: Where we put the taint in tainted love

Dan the Mantern is responsible for a majority of the stories in the rundown today, so don't hesitate to burn him at the stake if you don't like what you hear. Personally, I think today's show is hilarious: Craigslist crime, driving exams and racial stereotypes, video game pirates, and the evolution of the Chinese "impossible" space drive. Once again, it's East meets West on The 404!

Big thanks to our buddy Jeff Sparkman for today's show title. We are literally the taint on the massive organ that is CNET.com. Anyway, even though Dan helps us by suggesting the stories for the show, I managed to sneak one by him, and apparently Caroline McCarthy also caught wind. It seems like Craigslist just can't stay out of trouble. This time around, a man used the job listings to post an anonymous ad for construction workers and requested that they show up wearing a blue shirt, yellow vest, safety hat and a blue shirt. The man then proceeded to rob an armored car before stripping his clothing to reveal the exact same uniform, effectively allowing him to disappear into the sea of construction workers. He later reappeared to make his getaway by riding an innertube down the local lake. I love the fact that robbers are getting more creative with their schemes--Jason Bourne over here, did this guy just watch "Ocean's 11" or something? For all that Craigslist has given the internet community (apartments, bikes, jobs, casual "encounters"), I think we can let this one slide.

Episode 198 Download today's podcast … Read more

iTunes to be more accessible to the blind

Apple will be making iTunes more accessible to blind consumers, under an agreement reached with the Massachusetts attorney general's office and the National Federation of the Blind.

Under the agreement, Apple will make iTunes U--a portion of the iTunes Store dedicated to educational content provided by colleges and universities--fully accessible to the blind by December 31, 2008. It will then work to provide full accessibility of the iTunes application and the remainder of the iTunes Store by June 30, 2009.

The blind and visually impaired will get fuller accessibility to the Apple application and Web site for downloading and … Read more

Target settles with blind patrons over site accessibility

Target and an advocacy group for the blind announced Wednesday that they've settled a class action lawsuit regarding the accessibility of Target.com for the visually impaired.

The retail giant will establish a $6 million fund for settlement claims and promised to make its site fully accessible to blind visitors as part of a deal ending a class action lawsuit filed two and a half years ago.

The suit against Target was first filed in early 2006 by the Baltimore-based National Federation of the Blind, which claimed Target.com contained thousands of access barriers making it difficult, if not … Read more

Nissan brake-resistance system steers drivers out of trouble

It looks like Nissan drivers of the future will have another electronic nanny nudging their vehicles toward safer driving. Nissan has recently demonstrated to Reuters a brake-resistance device that would attempt to keep drivers from changing lanes if another vehicle is detected in the motorist's blind spot.

Blind spot and lane departure warning systems aren't new--many vehicles we've tested include lights that illuminate or warning beeps to notify the driver of danger. The Audi A8 L W12, tested earlier in the month, vibrated the steering wheel if you drifted out of your lane without intentionally signaling. Nissan'… Read more

Where the opinions of Phil J. Ryan are not necessarily those of the 404

The legendary Phil Ryan makes his last appearance on The 404 as a CNET employee as we talk about the Netflix player, the 3G iPhone, and strange clouds above China right before the earthquake. It's an interesting show today, sorry if we came close to offending you! OK, we're not sorry. EPISODE 103 Download today's podcast