Vampire lollipops? Arcing electricity? Animatronic ghouls? We’ve got that and more in today’s roundup of Halloween DIY projects. Come for the pumpkin with laser-beam eyes and stick around for the melon brains.

If you’re feeling extremely industrious, you might crank out a few of these props and goodies in time for Halloween tomorrow. Even if you don’t have that kind of time, you can make a splash with them next year.

We pored over some of the fantastic tutorials at Instructables to find some interesting, bizarre, and downright ingenious ways to really have a showy Halloween party. We selected the best picture from the tutorial to show it off here, included a summary, and a link back to the project.

If you have a project you want to share or find one in the course of browsing the tutorials at Instructables, share a link to it in the comments!

Not keen on the gallery layout? See all the larger images on one page here.

Read the rest of this entry »

Don’t panic, we haven’t gone back in time. What we’re looking at here is the world’s first but still-yet-to-be-released phone that runs on Windows XP, and its Chinese maker has just released some juicy specs and interface images to tease us all. The ITG xpPhone will be blessed with the chutzpah-filled AMD “Super Mobile” CPU, coupled with either 512MB or 1GB RAM. Storage options range from 8GB SSD to 120GB HDD (probably 1.8-inch) and everything in between. While the sheet confirms both GSM and CDMA support, ITG’s pre-order page — which looks more like a newsletter sign-up page at the moment — is still vague on the phone’s availability and price. For now we’ll just continue to gaze at the interface pictures until something happens.

[Via Gizmodo] Read the rest of this entry »

“The Wildest Dream,” a documentary scheduled for release next spring, tracks a mountaineer’s attempt to mirror an ill-fated 1924 climbing expedition on Mount Everest.

Roger Corman, the 83-year-old B-movie provocateur, has made his first foray into online video with “Splatter,” a three-part serial.

After a background check using the FBI’s criminal database erroneously indicates that an accountant has a criminal history, she is fired from her job at a mailing service. Proving her innocence and getting security clearance does not get her job back.

Your bosses may have locked the network down, but there are some ways to circumvent virtual barriers. Find out how to bypass a corporate firewall.

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Read the rest of this entry »

The Motorola Droid is the first Android handset on Verizon. Better yet, it can do some things the iPhone can’t.

Fears about the adjuvant squalene and myths about its link to Gulf War Syndrome have kept some from getting their H1N1 vaccines. But the real truth is the substance is simply not present in any vaccine administered in the United States.

The smartphone industry keeps cranking out more Android phones. What does that mean for the smartphone landscape, especially for the iPhone? Analysts and developers offer their perspectives.