By Andrew Liszewski

You may think someone carrying around a wallet full of receipts, membership cards and mountains of change in their back pocket looks uncomfortable, but I can’t imagine the discomfort of having one of these LEGO brick or baseplate creations in your pants. They range in price from ~$24 for the baseplate versions, to ~$32 for the ones made of individual bricks, and if you’re anything like me, the randomness of the colored bricks in the wallet in the lower right corner is probably driving you crazy. Don’t they know the rules for building LEGO walls? You start with one color and only move on to the next color once you’ve run out!

[ ColorByNumbers - LEGO Wallets ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you have dreams of one day making it big in the NBA/WNBA, you can’t stop playing basketball just because the sun’s gone down… and the streetlights have all burned out… and the moon has disappeared. Not at all! You have to keep practicing until the wee hours of the morning, and the only feasible way you could do that is with this glow-in-the-dark basketball net.

After a day in the sun the Nite Hoop will glow for a good 8 hours, so the only thing stopping you from honing your skills all night long is your neighbors getting angry at you for playing basketball at 3 in the morning. $32.98 from Things You Never Knew Existed.

[ Nite Hoop Basketball Net ] VIA [ I New Idea Homepage ]

By Andrew Liszewski

You won’t be able to get your hands on one until June or July, and presumably this mish-mash of a product shot isn’t what the final version will look like, but if you need a rugged, compact, professional-grade H.264 video encoder, the VideoTank HD should suit your needs. At just 3.3 x 3.3 x 1.6 inches in size it’s perfect for field work, with video being captured/saved to swappable compact flash cards, and capacities up to 32GB in size being supported which is enough for 2 hours of 1080i material.

There’s a basic LCD display on board for adjusting settings, though the recorder can also be controlled via RS-485 or USB if you happen to have a laptop on hand, and other notable features include a headphone jack, mic inputs and even high-end outputs like HD-SDI, but the most important feature, the price, has yet to be revealed.

[ DVEO VideoTank HD ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

By Chris Scott Barr

The Google Nexus One is probably one of the closest things to a real competitor to Apple’s iPhone. Yet it has lacked one of the features that really makes the iPhone stand out amongst most other devices. Yes, I’m talking about multitouch. Why bring this up now? Because thanks to the update released by Google yesterday the Nexus One officially has that one feature it was lacking.

Now owners of the phone will be able to pinch-to-zoom in the browser, gallery and maps applications. It’s good to see someone really challenging Apple in this market, as competition breeds innovation.

In other Nexus One news, Google Maps has been updated so that it will sync starred items with maps.google.com, as well as feed you suggestions from the same site. If you like the dimmer “night mode” that most GPS devices automatically switch to at night, you’ll be happy to know that this feature has now been added to Google Maps Navigation.

[ Google ] VIA [ Dvice ]

By Andrew Liszewski

A few years ago we brought you the PlayPump which was a clever water pumping device that was not only disguised to look like a piece of playground equipment, but was also powered by kids as they played with it. And that’s essentially the same idea behind the sOccket Ball; to convert the energy from kids playing into something useful. (Not that there’s anything wrong with kids playing.)

Inside the ball is an inductive coil system like you’d find in those flashlights you have to shake to recharge, but instead of shaking, the kids simply have to kick the ball around to charge the battery inside. 15 minutes of play results in enough energy to power an LED light for about 3 hours, which is a far better alternative to kerosene lamps. The one downside to the sOccket, if you could even call it that, is that the ball isn’t ‘regulation’ meaning it has a slightly different feel and weight than a regular soccer ball. But if the company behind the design is able to get them into production and into the hands of kids in developing nations, I don’t think anyone’s going to care.

[ sOccket ] VIA [ Planet Green ]

By Gaurav Kheterpal

Before the iPhone 3GS was launched, Apple drew a lot of flak from its customers over the lack of video capabilities. Though the iPhone 3GS came out with the best in its class video capabilities, old iPhone users were still disgruntled about the lack of video on their phones.

Although not the only such app (we’re thinking Qik as well), and it’s been out for a bit… but you might want to know that Apple has given its blessings to iVideoCamera – an iTunes Store app that can add video capabilities to any iPhone – new or old. iVideoCamera can shoot short videos, save them on your iPhone and even export the videos to popular websites like Facebook and YouTube. You can also change the point of focus during recording, something the native 3GS application can’t do. While the video quality of iVideoCamera is no match to that of iPhone 3GS, it is reasonably good at 320 x 426 and a recording rate of 10 frames per second.

After all, some video is better than no video at all on your old iPhone.

[ Laan Labs ] VIA [ Geeky Gadgets ]

By Evan Ackerman

Most electronics are not judged on their capacity to become pillows. This is a mistake. Naps are the most important time you will ever spend doing anything anywhere, and every object should be designed with that in mind. The Mu Space music player (it’s just a concept, for the moment) opens up and unfolds into a cozy little pillow with an actual bed (or sheets, anyway) attached to it. The speakers can be rotated around to play music outwards or inwards, and it has a USB interface and takes memory cards. They don’t make them yet, and I don’t know how much they’re going to cost, but I want one. Now. Yawn.

[ Yanko Design ] VIA [ Gizmodo ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While it’s clearly targeted at home theater enthusiasts or anyone who gets excited at seeing a large panel of audio-visual ports, I have a feeling that a lot of geeks might pass on this AV tee designed by Olly Moss for the simple fact that it only has 2 HDMI ports. Only 2?! I mean what year are we living in, 2008?

$18 for the tee in all sizes, or $45 for a hoodie, from Threadless.

[ AV T-Shirt ] VIA [ Uber-Review ]

By Chris Scott Barr

When Microsoft entered the console gaming market, it was a great day for gamers here in the US. Now I don’t have anything against Nintendo or Sony, I love their consoles. What I don’t love is all of the exclusive hardware that Japan gets from these companies, since they are located in the region. Well since Microsoft is located here in the US of A, the tables are turned. Take this new 250GB hard drive that has been announced for the 360. Guess where it’s being launched first. Wait, Japan?

What’s even more strange is that despite a confirmed March 11 launch in Japan, there is no plan for a US release. Does Microsoft not think that we download enough? Or maybe they know that we’re in a recession, and aren’t going to pay $170 for a 250GB hard drive. I’ve ranted about this before and it still infuriating, you can buy a 2.5-inch hard drive (which is what’s used for the 360) for 1/3 of the price they are selling it. That’s one heck of a markup. They should take a cue from Sony and let us use our own drives to upgrade.

[ Microsoft ] VIA [ PCWorld ]