Designed by a physician and inspired by the US and Canadian militaries, the ColdAvenger not only protects the skin from the elements, it also protects your respiratory system with a removable ventilator.

Made of medical grade biocompatible plastic, the ventilator creates a "micro-climate" by mixing inhaled cold air with exhaled warm moisture to achieve a balance of warmth and humidity to protect the airways from the damaging cold. The simple design does all this while allowing totally free-breathing and keeping moisture off the face. The ColdAvenger's patent-pending ventilation technology keeps temperatures inside the mask 40?- 60?F higher than outside air.

If you work a lot in the outdoors, or you are an avid skier or snowboarder, I would think that $80 wouldn't be too much to pay to avoid that painful feeling you get when your lungs are full of nothing but dry, cold air. [ColdAvenger via ORW]

Earlier today, we posted our first dSLR follow focus mod, and it nothing if not simple. This other follow focus mod...well...its hand crank drill drive shaft is but a stone's throw from a hamster wheel and a hot poker. [FocusDrill]

Each side plays just fine. [The Bourne Identity (Amazon), $15]

Google just put out an SEC filing saying founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin plan on dumping some of their holdings of the company's stock.

When they finish selling 5 million shares apiece, they'll still own 15% of the outstanding shares, but their voting power will have dropped below 50%. So they are ceding absolute control of the company.

From the filing:

Larry and Sergey currently hold approximately 57.7 million shares of Class B common stock, which represents approximately 18% of Google's outstanding capital stock and approximately 59% of the voting power of Google's outstanding capital stock.

Under the terms of these Rule 10b5-1 trading plans, and as a part of a five year diversification plan, Larry and Sergey each intend to sell approximately 5 million shares.

If Larry and Sergey complete all the planned sales under these Rule 10b5-1 trading plans, they would continue to collectively own approximately 47.7 million shares, which would represent approximately 15% of Google's outstanding capital stock and approximately 48% of the voting power of Google's outstanding capital stock (assuming no other sales and conversions of Google capital stock occur).

This man—looking as badass as Ed Harris in The Right Stuff—is Felix Baumgartner. He actually has The Right Stuff: The cojones to reach the edge of space in a weather balloon. Up to 120,000 feet—and then jump.

Baumgartner will join United States Air Force Captain Joe Kittinger as the only man to jump from near space altitude. Kittinger jumped on August 16, 1960, from the Excelsior III balloon, which at the time was flying at 102,800 feet—that's 19.47 miles or 31 kilometers up in the sky. Compared to Baumgartner, however, Kittinger's suit looks miserable:

In fact, his right glove failed in the descent, and his hand dilated to twice its size. Absolutely crazy.

Hopefully, Baumgartner won't have any of Kittinger's problems. He will jump sometime in 2010, after a few test jumps at lower altitudes, as part of Red Bull's Stratus mission. Kittinger will be assisting Baumgartner from the ground control, while the mission team monitors his position and body state as he plummets down to Earth, surpassing the speed of sound.

I love these nutty people.

For all the talk of sexting, you'd think it was the only kind of text out there. Not so! There's plenty of other ways to message, most of which come with just as much regret:

Becksting:

Texting after one too many fine imported lagers

Sectsting:

Blasts to give your cult to-the-minute updates on Xenu's ETA

Flexting:

A picture message that doubles as an Admit One to the gun show

Anorexting:

Updating your friends on calorie counts and Weight Watchers points

Hexting:

Sending bad juju via SMS

T. Rexting:

Sending out obscure lyrics from 70s glam-rock bands

Dexting:

Sharing your Dexter fan fiction, 160 characters at a time

Treksting:

Spending an hour creating the perfect ASCII Vulcan salute

Activated display phones in AT&T stores are fun. You can send dirty text messages to strangers or make long-long-long distance calls. What this individual did is far better than any prank though: He donated money to Haiti on AT&T's behalf.

I'm assuming that this person donated $10 at a time by texting HAITI to 90999. Whether AT&T will actually release the funds is uncertain, but kudos on the effort. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna take after a few Redditors and visit my local cellphone stores to send a few text messages.

In the meantime, please keep in mind that there are many ways to donate to Haiti aid and that Lifehacker has a great guide on avoiding scams along with plenty of links to help you make sure that your money goes to someone in need. [Reddit—Thanks, Marc!]

The duaLink cable is essentially a specialized USB hub: It splits from one USB connector into two iPod/iPhone cables. Great for incredibly rich people with two iPhones, or upper-middle-class folk with two iPods. Available now for $26. [Engadget]

"You may be thinking that you're more gangsta than me, but you motherboarders have never seen my PC." That, and more brilliance, from IBM Fellow John Cohn's music video, Engineering Paradise. [@IBMResearch]

In today's Remainders, the future! The soldiers of tomorrow get a new battery for their exoskeletons; a 2012 Olympic Stadium built from recycled weapons; a discovery showing that a big brain can indicate a great gamer, and more.

Hulk For Hours
The HULC exoskeleton is supposed to make you strong like the Hulk. Or strong like a creature with an exoskeleton. Whichever. We were fortunate enough to try the HULC out a few months ago, so we were pretty excited to hear that a new fuel-cell battery from Protonex gives HULC-wearers super strength for up to three hours. The battery, currently under development, will only be available to soldiers, so we consumers will have to remain content with our puny muscles, at least for the time being. [Engadget]

Let Icons Be Icons
On his blog "Ignore the Code," Lukas Mathis wrote a post that took a closer look at something we interact with every day: icons. Some of it is "no duh"-level stuff—if an icon is too detailed, it is confusing; if an icon isn't detailed enough, it is confusing—but he illustrates his points nicely throughout. "The trick," he says, "is to figure out which details help users identify the UI element, and which details distract from its intended meaning." The exception is application icons. For those, the more detail there is the better. There's nothing too profound about Mathis's icon-gazing, but it's nice to stop and consider what makes us click the way we do. [Ignore the Code]

Gamers' Bulge
It's not quite as exciting as discovering that playing video games makes your brain bigger—though I wouldn't doubt that some such study exists—but scientists have at least shown the opposite to be true: video game performance can be predicted by measuring a certain part of the brain. The part of the brain in question is the striatum, a section also linked to developing strategies and refining motor skills. Kirk Erickson, a University of Pittsburgh professor who led the study, explained, "This is the first time that we've been able to take a real-world task like a video game and show that the size of specific brain regions is predictive of performance and learning rates." What this means for you is that when your friend is asking how you keep pummeling him in Smash Bros you can reply, with science backing you up, "sorry bro, bigger brain." [Gun Play
A lot of new buildings going up these days include recycled materials, but the stadium being built in London for the 2012 Olympics is special among them. Why? Because it's going to be made partially from recycled guns and knives. In 2009 alone, London Metropolitan Police ended up with 58 tons of guns, knives, and keys, all of which are now being melted down for use in the stadium. In a similar but decidedly less cool project, the used bullets from the police force's firing range will be recycled into jewelry and photo frames. I told you it was less cool. [Fast Company]

Watch as this bad boy—the Humvee-mounted Laser Avenger that destroyed a drone in January 2009—obliterates bomb after bomb during a test at the Army's Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama. It just takes a few seconds, and boom.

Not exactly Star Wars material, but this will save a lot of lives in the future—and destroy others too, I'm sure. [Danger Room]

The announcement that Asus was getting into the eBook reader game was a bit of a surprise, but not an unwelcome one. Now that new hands-on pics have hit Flickr, it looks like our initial enthusiasm was founded.

What's most alluring about the DR-950 is still the thinness—just .35-inches despite the 9-inch, 1024×768 display.

It's also one of the first mass market black and white eBook reader's I've seen that doesn't use e-ink. Instead, Asus is using the unfortunately named SiPix Microcup electronic paper, which purports to be more a more energy efficient alternative.

Other specs include 2-4GB of storage, an SD card slot, Wi-Fi and HDSPA, a USB port and a 3.5mm headphone jack. Pricing and timing are still up in the air.

Honestly, there are a lot of these hitting the market these days, but given that pioneering Asus did in the early netbook days, we'll give them the benefit of the doubt that they're bringing something exciting. It certainly looks that way so far. [Asus UK Flickr via Engadget]

Nick Veasey is not superman, but he has one of his superpowers: X-Ray vision. Veasey spends his time taking stunning X-ray photographs, including this Boeing 777 and its twin GE90-115B turbofan engines, which took three months and 500 separate x-rays.

TED just posted this talk by Veasey, in which he explains how he does his stunning images:

Basically, a lot of patience, talent, and too much radiation in his own bones. [Nick Veasy via TED]

If I had a backyard big enough for a home office, the MercuryHouseOne is what I'd be saving all my pocket money up for. It's a mobile solar-powered lounge, hard and space-age on the outside but warm and soft inside.

It was shown off recently at the Venice Biennale art exhibition by the Architecture and Vision design firm, and while it's not on sale I hope Ikea or another retailer can rip it off, err I mean, take inspiration from it. It's made from Italian Carrara marble, and the outer top half is covered with solar panels for powering up the inside. Check out the gallery below for more pics of this awesome space age playroom. [Architecture and Vision via Inhabitat]

Owle Bubo isn't an obscure Star Wars bounty hunter. It's a $130 billet aluminum iPhone case, complete with swappable 37mm macro lens. It's well-made, attractive, and makes iPhone video easy. But you probably don't want this one.

Products like the Bubo confuse my little retail suggestion brain. For some of you, $130 is a pittance to get a sturdy case with four female tripod mounts, a cold shoe for lights and microphones, and two comfortable handles that steady up your iPhone videography.

For others, $130 is nearly the price you paid for the phone itself—or the price of a decent Kodak or Flip video camera.

So Much Right

Let's start with what Owle gets right: The design—from packaging, to the physical feel of the Bubo in your hands, to the friendly instruction manual complete with jokes about Perez Hilton)—is excellent, especially considering it's Owle's first product.

The cool metal feels wonderful in your hands. The mounting points allow for nearly any combination of accessories, a quality I'd love to see emulated by other cameras and rail systems. (Consider that even most pro video cameras have a single tripod mount and a single hotshoe.)

Video quality is improved over the iPhone 3GS's default, simply by dint of the large glass lens that rests over the iPhone's sensor. It adds a slight fisheye effect, but one that is generally welcome, alleviating the typical claustrophobic feel of iPhone video.

Video Testing

But is it over a hundred dollars worth of improvement? Depends. Below I've embedded Owle's video they shot during CES that shows a side-by-side comparison of video with and without the Bubo.

Pretty good, right? Well, below are two videos I shot within seconds of each other of a mossy rock and then uploaded straight to Vimeo. Frankly, besides the wider lens and slight difference in sharpness, I'm hard pressed to see anything profoundly different.

So fine. It's better with Bubo, for sure, but not much. You can't judge the Owle Bubo without remembering that the power of its camera isn't that it's particularly high-quality, but that it's wedded to a phone with hundreds and hundreds of useful, fascinating apps that extend its capabilities to a fantastic degree. (It's hilariously true to say the iPhone is the most powerful camera in the world—if you discount image quality.)

Yet There Was A But

But a couple of things about the Bubo make me wary to recommend it quite yet.

It's heavy. Heavier than the iPhone on its own, certainly. Heavier than many "real" camcorders I've used. According to the box it shipped in—there's no weight information on Owle's website—it's just under two pounds before you put the iPhone in or mount any lights or microphones. On my light Manfrotto tripod, it kind of made it want to lean a little, although if everything was tightened properly it seemed to be fine. No big deal, but for handheld shots I could see it getting tiring. (Then again, all cameras are tiring after a while.)

The system for holding the iPhone in place scares me, too. You're forced to put your iPhone in a rubberized case. (One was included with my test sample, but several others from major case manufacturers are supported.) Then you jam that case into the back of the Bubo where it is held in place by tension alone. I never once had an issue where my iPhone started to slip out, but still...it's a bit scary. A simple flip-down tab would go a long way toward appeasing my fear of seeing the heart of my camera system go clattering to the concrete.

Finally: price. It's not too expensive for its level of quality—solid hunks of aluminum aren't cheap—but it does take it out of impulse purchase territory for most, which is a pity. A planned composite (read: plastic) version is in the works which Owle expects to sell for around $70. Considering the optics and tripod mounts will still be the same quality as the Bubo's, that seems like a fair price.

One final niggle I'd like to see improved in future versions: It would be nice to see a divot in the bottom tripod mounts for stabilizing pins, common on most tripods. That would help prevent the Bubo from potentially spinning itself out of the tripod screw during all-day use.

Appealing design that looks like it came from Night Owl's lab

Turns the iPhone into nearly any sort of recording rig you can dream up

Improves video and imaging quality, if even slightly

Expensive

Heavy

iPhone mounting system seems iffy

You know, I have this friend of a friend who actually said "I need whatever it is right now" and "I'm hard. I'm ready now" while referring to the magic Apple tablet. A friend of a friend, ok? [Penny Arcade]

This is the life of an Apple Genius: Computers caked in toxic waste, screaming customers, dead cats, raging homophobes, and oh yeah—getting punched in the face.

We're protecting the identity of the Geniuses who relayed these tales of total cockbaggage with pseudonyms, since some of them might still work for Apple. If you want to see all of the stories on one page, just click here.

Now tell us, which Genius deserves some free pizza to ease their suffering, like we did for abused Genius Bar customers? (Sorry we can't send you guys a medal, sheesh.)
Which horrific story most deserves free pizza?(survey software)

Gadgets don't get any more simplerer and usefuler than the GeoSkeeper, a wrist cellphone that only has GSM/GPRS, a speakerphone, GPS, and six buttons, so the "elderly, chronically ill, children or lone workers" can instantly communicate in case of emergency.

That's all it does. The user calls pre-programmed numbers using the buttons, turns on the emergency alarm if necessary, and gets tracked using the GPS, even alerting when the user gets out of a certain area to whoever has the control. Available in[Aerotel via Engadget]

Well, let's hope the bad guys weren't watching German television last week. A demonstration of one of those highfalutin—and highly invasive—full-body airport scanners caught a Swiss Army Knife and a cellphone, but none of the, uh, bomb components.

The big reveal comes at around 2:07, and is moderately to extremely terrifying. As Schneier on Security points out, the subject didn't get scanned from the side. That's reassuring until you see that there were still a few front-facing explosive bits that got through, and he didn't even have to hide anything in a body cavity.

So, to sum up: full-body scanners are equal parts creepy and ineffective, the end. [Schneier on Security via Boing Boing]

We found the original Philips LivingColors lamp to be pretty astounding with its multi-million-color glow. Now the lamp gets an impressive v2 makeover.

The latest LivingColors lamp produces 16 million colors through a combination of 7 LEDs—an overall quality of light that's 50% brighter than version one.

And while the intuitive remote and bulbous shape remain mostly unchanged, you'll now have the option to purchase an opaque version (which we're guessing produces a more directional light flow) along with a more typical metal base stand. Look for the update in Europe soon, with models ranging from about $230-$350. [geekandhype via Unplggd]