People submitting to CUUSOO requires that you get an idea, create the project you dream of, post it up to the site, get 10,000 supporters, and whammo! You’ve got your own project. If your project passes the CUUSOO review here, it will be produced by LEGO and you the creator will receive 1% of total net sales throughout the project’s lifespan. Have a peek at the CUUSOO concept here in this fancy animated video:

Then know that the creator of this Minecraft project was none other than the developers of the game itself: mojang. To get the project going, mojang worked with a couple Minecraft fans to produce some awesome sets that would help to inspire CUUSOO users to bring them into the LEGO fold. It appears that the set above might be the one to be winning in this situation, but the ones below are magnificent as well, of course! Read this statement from mojang and jump with glee!

Minecraft is about placing blocks to build anything you can imagine in the virtual world. You can build anything you imagine with LEGO bricks in the physical world. Minecraft and LEGO were meant to be together.

We’ve invited a couple of the LEGO fans behind the earlier LEGO Minecraft projects, suparMacho and koalaexpert, to collaborate with us to shape the idea. We’re also interested in your ideas, and will select the best LEGO Minecraft models to also join our efforts.

As the official Mojang LEGO Minecraft project, we will work with the LEGO Group to secure a licensing agreement and donate the 1% royalty from LEGO CUUSOO to charity. Let’s make LEGO Minecraft happen together!! =D

Will you pick up the Minecraft lego set? It really truly is a match made in heaven – if you’ve played with both you’d have to agree!

[via CUUSOO blog]

This feat has brought fourth the attention of Lego themselves, who sent a congratulatory letter to the boys complimenting their ingenuity and thanking them for using Lego to do the deed. “We are always amazed by the creative ways in which Lego fans use our products, and humbled by how many unsuspecting places we appear, like attached to a helium balloon in … space,” said Lego’s brand relations director Michael McNally. At the moment just one video has been uploaded from the set of media the boys have collected, seen here:

The whole assembly consisted of a rip-stop nylon parachute that the boys tested by lobbing off their 40-story condominium unit, an $85 weather balloon, and $160 in helium from a party store. In addition there was a wide-angle video camera, a cell-phone with GPS (for locating the setup after it landed), and several more point-and-shoot cameras, all inside a styrofoam box which also held out the Lego man. The entire craft traveled to around 80,000 feed, that three times the average cruising altitude of a commercial aircraft, and fell to the earth payload intact.

We look forward to the rest of the photos and video from these two awesome scientists!

[via YouTube]

Mehlhase works at the Niels Bohr Institute. The LHC model built uses 9,500 Lego parts and cost the builder about 200 euros. The construction process was done on the weekends and is a 1:50 scale recreation. I wonder where the Lego Higgs boson particles are.

The build took about 30 hours. The limits of my Lego capability are helping my kids build things using the instructions. It’s always cool to me when people can Lego freestyle something that turns out this good. Have you ever built you own bit of Lego awesome?

[via PC World]

So wait, you could get this Xbox branded harddrive with 320GB for $130 USD OR you could head to Target and get a lovely looking Seagate 320GB harddrive for less than half that price at $60. What’s the big deal here, Microsoft gaming devision, are you trying to pull the wool over our eyes? No way, man, of course not, there’s something in there that’ll blow your socks off, that’s why the HD costs so much!

What is it? Do tell!

It’s Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars, of course!

A couple things to consider here: this game costs $20 USD on its own here in the USA, and the game is not available with the harddrive in Japan, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia and the UAE. So those countries are out the $20 USD value, and the rest of us get a great deal! Wait a second… math. Think this one through, ladies and gentlemen.

The tower is 10-feet tall as I said, and it has 65,000 pieces. One of the coolest touches on the building is that it has some colored brick on the side to make a pattern that looks like reflected skyline of the city. This mimics the shiny glass of the real building. The finished effect is really cool. I can only imagine how long it took the artist, Sean Kenney, to build this thing.

The building is on permanent display at the Chicago LEGO Store. You have to check out the artist’s website and see some of the things he has made from LEGO. The LEGO busts and photos are awesome. Apparently the build time was a full month at full-time, presumably 8-hours a day, along with two assistants.

[via Brothers Brick]

Researchers into new methods of networking have discovered a way to use LED lighting to distribute full HD films and other content to computers. The LED lights are used as a wireless networking solution that delivers up to 800 Mbit/s download speeds. Anonymous is apparently testing a new attack tool called #RefRef. The tool was apparently tested on Pastebin and a 17-second test shut down the website for 42 minutes.

Last week Britain signaled that it intended to make it legal to copy a CD or DVD by owners. The intent is to allow the moving of a digital copy of the music or film to computers or other digital devices. A rumor surfaced that the iPhone 5 was already sent to carriers for testing. The rumors are still pointing to a launch of the new smartphone in September or October.

Intel Ultrabooks were supposed to hit the market at under $1000. Insiders are saying that the new machines are being sabotaged by Intel greed with a bill of materials that forces the machines to sell for more than Intel says they should. Chris spent some hands on time with the Blackberry Torch 9810 and shot a video of the device for us to check out. He was concerned that there may not be enough different here to help Blackberry get back to where it once was in the market.

Android Ice Cream Sandwich will be tied up with Texas Instruments as the chipset reference platform .TI has offered up a photo that they will be using to promote the tie up and it’s cute. The interesting bit is that we expect to see some awesome chipsets form TI next year. MotoActive surfaced last week showing off a cool Android watch for the athletic folks out there. The little watch appears to have a 1-inch screen and offer all sorts of details on your run or workout along with media playing.

The FCC went out and measured the actual interent speeds around the country and offered the data this week. The survey found Verizon’s fiber connectivity the fastest and Cablevision was the slowest. ComScore’s latest numbers show that there are now 25 million Google+ users around the world. Google has only offered that it has 10 million registered users so far.

The Juno space probe that will head to Jupiter will take with it three different LEGO minifigs. The minifigs are likenesses of Galileo, the pagan god Jupiter, and Juno the sister of Jupiter. Microsoft announced that it had invited Google to bid with it Novel patents. Google denied the claim and then Microsoft offered up emails to show they did in fact invite Google.

A new study that surfaced recently claims that our moon may be the result of two moons that collided and formed one. The theory explains why the near and far sides of our moon are so vastly different. The Nyko Zoom for Kinect hit pre-order at Amazon and other retailers last week. This is the accessory for the Kinect that shortens the distance you need to be from the Kinect to play.

The Skype app for Android was updated last week. The update brought with it support for video calling on several new handsets. Rue reviewed the Motorola Droid 3 smartphone late in the week. She liked the phone and the main quibble was that the phone didn’t support 4G.

NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance orbiter has found evidence of liquid water on the surface of Mars. NASA says the black streaks it thinks to be water only show up in spring and summer. A hacker at the Black Hat conference has shown a way to hack the wireless connectivity for insulin pumps. The hack has the potential to do harm to the diabetic wearing the pump.

Google’s robot car that needs no driver got into an accident last week. The accident was blamed on the human though; the car was being driven manually when the accident occurred. An awesome old school sit down Outrun arcade game was hacked into a real driving game. The arcade game was put onto a chassis and can really take to the roads with eh driver watching the screen to see where he is going. Thanks for reading this week’s edition, see you next time!

Each of the figures are milled from aluminum and will be traveling with the Atlas V rocket through 2016 where the figs will be having quite the view of our galaxy’s largest planet Jupiter. It was NASA who approached Lego for this installation, and the folks at Lego, being the adventurous types they are, decided the idea of sending some of their most fantastically simple friends along for the ride would be an awesome idea. Both groups have stated that they’re seeing the project as a way to promote STEM programs and children’s education.

The cost of creating these one of a kind figures was $5,000 PER figure, each of them underwrote by Lego of course and thus far only made for the project itself. The manufacturing of each of these figures was a deliberate process ensuring no part of the project would be any bit of interference for NASA’s sensitive measurements for the mission. Each minifig attached to the space probe is essentially the same size as the average minifig you’ve got sitting on your desk at home.

Once the mission arrives in July of 2016, the space probe Juno will collect information on the planet Jupiter itself, its moons, and its atmosphere. Once the probe has orbited the planet for one year, that being right around 33 orbits, NASA will purposefully de-orbit the probe and crash it into the planet’s surface. Those who wish to follow the Lego mission can do so at LEGOspace.com, and be sure to let us know if they’ve gone to Pluto instead!

Just so you know, the launch of JUNO, aka the Lego mission, is 11:40 A.M. EDT on the 5th of August – that’s only two days from now!

[via Wired]

It’s made out of a bunch of different bricks and has all the little touches for the movie droid. It’s too bad it can’t project a tiny Leia on the ground too. Its remote controlled and has a middle tripod leg that comes out of the droids belly when it needs to motivate and it can then move forwards and backwards. The dome can also twist and turn.

This may be the coolest LEGO project in the Star Wars universe. It even has flashing lights on the dome. Pete constructed the robot for the LEGO Space event at the National Space Center UK. I hope he won a prize because the droid is epic.

[via Brothers-Brick]

I leave the key in the car locked in the garage, but I do take them out on occasion and promptly lose them. A dude has created a very simple and geeky way to keep up with all his keys using those green rectangles you plug your LEGO bricks onto, some eyehooks, and various LEGO bricks. The dude took the standard 2 x 4 LEGO bricks and screwed an eyehook into each brick.

The dude then took wire ties and hooked the keys to the eyehooks. The result looks like a cobbled together mess unless you are into that style, but I don’t see why you couldn’t just run those eyehooks through your normal key ring. The end result is that the dude can walk in the house, press the LEGO onto the green base plates, and hang his keys by the door.

[via Reddit]

The name of the item is Concrete Building Blocks and as the name suggests the blocks are made from concrete like a block you might use for a retaining wall in your backyard. The blocks look really cool and you buy them in sets of six. Each set will cost you $8.50. As you can imagine the blocks aren’t as uniform as the real LEGO bricks made from plastic and they don’t appear to fully snap together.

The concrete blocks are designed to look just like the 2 x 4 LEGO bricks you played with as a kid and might still play with today. Each brick measures 1 5/8″ x 3/4″ x 1/2″. The seller of the Concrete Building Blocks also notes that the bricks vary in color and texture. It appears some of them might be missing corners too.

[via Etsy]

When you combine LEGO-style building blocks with Transformers you really get my geek lust stoked and that is exactly what the first KRE-O building sets are offering. The construction sets are now in stores and the first series are Transformer sets that are tie-ins with the flick that hit theaters last week. There are a number of sets with prices running from $7.99 to $59.99 depending on the set.

Some are simple minifigs while others are larger and more complex Transformer bots. The sets are available in 16 different characters and styles and are for ages 6 and up. The transformation process from robot to vehicle requires the user to disassemble and reassemble.

[via Hasbro]

I’m trying to not have a nerd aneurism over the trifecta of geek perfection this thing embodies with LEGO, RC hardware, and Star Wars all in one device. The crane the Sandcrawler has is also remote controlled as is the conveyor belt. The interior of the crawler is fully detailed and looks like the set of the latest LEGO Star Wars video game.

There is so much to talk about and see on this project that worlds can’t do the thing justice. You have to check out the video below to see what the Sandcrawler has to offer. This is a good way to spend nine months of work for a geek with time on his hands.

[via Brothers-brick]

The Unimog kit is being produced by LEGO to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the truck and its kit has 2000 pieces and is the largest Technic set ever sold by LEGO. I would end up losing at least 500 of those parts during the build. The kit is a 1:12.5 scale, which considering the size of the real vehicle makes the Technica set gigantic as well. The features of the model are the same as the real vehicle.

The Unimog LEGO kit gets a winch on the front and a pneumatically operated crane on the rear than can move 360-degrees. A snowplow is optional as well. This is one of the kits that has pistons you have to install into the little LEGO motor. The kit will cost you about $250 when it lands in August. Go ahead and add this to your Christmas list now.

[via Jalopnik]

The instrument in question is a ukulele. This little thing looks like a shrunken guitar that I always think of people in Hawaii sitting around playing. The builder is Ross Crawford and the photos show an impressive design. He notes that the build had some challenges, namely getting the shape, strength, tuning, and intonation. I would imagine those were very big challenges with the instrument being made from LEGO.

He says that while a normal ukulele is tuned to G-C-E-A, his is tuned to C-F-A-D. I have no idea what that means other than it doesn’t sound exactly like a normal ukulele would. He even made a stand out of LEGO to place the instrument onto. The coolest part of the build and the one that seems to be complex is the head with the tuning parts.

[via Brothers-Brick]

The Nexus S 4G smartphone hit Sprint and Best Buy stores yesterday, looking very round, and running Gingerbread.

Some new HP notebooks are here, for both business and consumers, the HP ProBook 5330m and the EliteBook 2560p and 2570p, plus the HP Mini 210.

Moar tablets! That’s what we say. Here are two: The BeBook Live is an affordable Android option, coming this summer, and the Fujitsu Stylistic Q550 is running Windows and channeling a netbook.

The HTC Salsa and ChaCha Facebook phones dance in for pre-order.

That’s it for our Morning Wrap-Up, stay tuned as the day goes on for more news and analysis.

Designer Ben Caulkins took a big box of gray LEGO bricks and created what may be the crowning achievement in the world of LEGO design. Ben built himself a Halo Master Chief Spartan suit that he can wear, and that suit looks really, really good. Ben spent six moths building the suit and constructed it to fit his body. Ben says that he thought a lot about what part he would create first and settled on the helmet. That helmet also required the most planning he says.

The visor is from a motorcycle helmet and looks really good. The next part was the body armor. Some LEGO purists won’t like the next part. Some of the bricks had to be glued together to keep them from falling apart. I think we can forgive Ben for having to use glue. The suit is awesome, and I can see you being able to wear the thing without breaking it without some glue. You can read all about how Ben created the suit and some of the issues he worked through on The Brothers Brick.

[via Kotaku]

This giant white wall you see here isn’t the Great Wall of China or some military memorial, it’s a sculpture made completely out of white LEGO bricks the wall is circular and starts at a low level and then rises up to the full height like a ramp. The wall took 270,000 white LEGO bricks to make. The design of the thing is cool too. It has a checkerboard pattern with some bricks sticking out and some flat.

Apparently, it took six weeks for the artists to build. The work is titled “metaphorical Horizons”, and it is on display in the central hall at the World Trade Center in Amsterdam. The designer of the wall is Lene Rønsholt Wille. I wonder how many bricks he actually had to get to make this thing work. There were always some in my collection that just wouldn’t snap together. I also wonder how many times he had to reconfigure and work around issues on the fly.

[via Wired]

Well, perhaps not quite packed full: in actual fact there will be thirteen LEGO sets, on their way to the International Space Station. There, astronauts will build models and, from September, use video links with classrooms back on Earth to help kids explore science in an arguably more attention-grabbing way.

It’s all the work of LEGO Education, the company’s arm devoted to integrating LEGO’s various ranges into the classroom. There’s a list of the different projects the astronauts will be tackling here.

[via Wired]

Designer Jonathan Robson has designed something that is Lego, but is not made from Lego bricks, which is more than a bit strange sounding. I would bet anyone that played with Lego as a kid or an adult will recognize the helmet Robson made as being the same style that the little Lego minifigs in space and other environments would wear. Robson created this helmet complete with a gold flip down visor for kids to play pretend with, but the thing does more too.

The helmet has speakers inside that are use to read kids audio comics that are Lego themed. Once the helmet is purchased and the kid is subscribed to the audio comics, a new print issue will come in the mail with a code that allows the downloading of the audio file. The helmet has a USB port on the back that a Lego flash drive is plugged into and then the audio plays back inside the helmet. Controls on the side of the helmet operate the volume and allow the user to skip forward and backwards in the pages. This is so cool!

[via Jonathan Robson]

Both of these projects have videos demonstrating their articulated operation. We’ll start by looking at a short clip demoing bad pixel’s smartphone stand.

You see, it’s a relatively simple project. The levers and gears come together to make something workable so bad pixel could get his Wiimote-driven GameBoy emulation on in peace. It’s a decent solution to a specific problem using stuff he already had laying around. But here, check this out. He used this really awesome piece of software to design the whole thing. It’s called SR 3D Builder. Here’s a quick screenshot.

This piece of software lets you design LEGO projects in a slick little 3D interface. SR 3D Builder was designed by Sergio Reano out of Italy, and you can pick it up here. It’s free. Knock yourself out. It’s still under active development. Sergio released version 0.5.6.9 on the 8th of April. Oh yeah, bad pixel’s instructable.

Next, we have this bad boy. Watch this video of Shepherd’s Lego NXT robotic factory demonstration.

Shepherd here created this project because he has been fascinated with this style of Delta Robot for quite some time.

They are known for moving small objects very quickly, usually at two hundred or more moves per minute. Parallel robots (another name for Delta Robots) are often used in many industries such as the food industry where the payload is small and light and the production rates are very high. Many times a series of parallel robots are used to do things like assemble cookies, package small items, stack pancakes and much, much more.

The positions of the robotic arms are controlled by independent servo motors and the actuation of the gripping hands are controlled by a pneumatic system. There isn’t really much I can say about this with any air of authority. He explains the whole process on his blog, Tinkernology. He goes into significant detail on the design aspects of each aspect of this robotic system. It’s a good read.

[via Singularity Hub]
[via xda-developers]

The jug she used was just the right size for a bottle of pirate rum and to hold the Lego boat. She made her own building tools out of what appear to be wooden sticks with small Lego bricks glued to the tip. She could put one stick in to hold the ship steady and another stick with the parts attached to build the model up.

She says that the entire build process took her about three days to construct. She also notes that it took a week of planning and a large number of expletives to pull off. Check out the video below to see the build and the finished project.

[via Brothers Brick]

We haven’t found anything on the instrument that suggests it was used for astrology, which was suggested in the past,” he said. “I think the maker was showing off a huge amount of knowledge and skill. They demonstrated that you could take these theories about how astronomical bodies move, and make a machine that would calculate them. That was a completely revolutionary idea.
- Wired

Wright’s reconstruction in 2007 couldn’t have happened without Hewlett Packard. They got involved in the study of this ancient astronomical calculator by providing for it to be scanned using a technique called Reflectance imaging. This technique uses multiple photos of stationary objects with a moving light source. This technique allows the computer to construct a texture map of an object that would otherwise be difficult to photograph. You can check out HP’s scans of the Antikytheria here.

The first video is Wright’s live demonstration of the model via New Scientist. The second is a rendering animation that breaks the calculator down into it’s components and shows how they all fit together. Mogi Vicentini, a friend of Wright’s, rendered this video. It starts from an exploded view of the mechanism and collapses it together over the course of a few minutes into a rendering of the finished box. I reccommend pausing and then skipping around through the video to see the different still renderings. The final video is a Lego reconstruction of the predicting device by Andrew Carol, he builds complex lego devices and and posts them up on the Woz’s site.

[via Intel Free Press]

You probably won’t be able to take the self-loading LEGO dice tower into a casino in Vegas, or at least not take it to a table with you, but it couldn’t hurt to try, right? After all, if you’re a superstitious person, sometimes you just can’t roll your own die, and there might not be anyone around that you trust enough to win you a hundred thousand dollars, or lose it all in one swift throw of the dice.

The LEGO dice tower uses a lever to load the dice into its tower, and then it will roll them out the bottom for you. Simple enough of a design, but one that makes us want to be a kid again and start building crazy contraptions. Check out the video below to see the tower in action.

[via UberGizmo]

More rumors swirled about a half-size iPad that suggest Apple may be working on a smaller version of the iPad. That would be no surprise even if Jobs did already say 7-inch tablets are DOA. A geek took some sticky notes and a string of Christmas lights and hacked them into a way to show which of his pals were online. The lights the geek used are the GE Color Effects GE-35 LED sting and the LED data bus was hacked to create the IM status device.

Coloud has been making headphones that are sports and super hero branded for a while now and those were cool. The company has now rolled out an epic R2-D2 themed set that is really cool and sell for a tick under $50. The rumor that will not die made another round this week with the Verizon iPhone said to be coming right after Christmas. The device is also said to be an LTE handset.

A phone design concept popped up by researcher Fabian Hemmert that has tactile feedback. The phone could hold your hand, blow on you, and kiss you. This will single handedly bring new meaning to phone sex me thinks. One analyst is saying that a new HP webOS tablet is set to hit the market in March 2011. BMO Capital Markets analyst Keith Bachman cites sources in Asia for the tip.

A group of Japanese guys got together and created cool skydiving simulation using Google Earth, a projector, and some fans. The result looks pretty fun and more realistic than you might expect. German doctors made a claim this week that the world has been waiting to hear for decades. The doctors claim to have cured a patient of AIDS using stem cells and other techniques.

GNU Founder Richard Stallman stated this week that the Google Chrome OS is careless computing. He points out that when your data is stored on a company machine rather than your own machine you lose some of your legal rights. An awesome DIY Tron Skatecycle was spied early in the week and the thing has glowing wheels that look like the new lightcycles. The device started out as a device skate cycle called the Freerider.

A cool map of the world that highlights Facebook relationships shows just how connected we are globally. The map shows 10 million pairs of friends out of the 500 million people on the social network. Analysts said this week that they think a Verizon iPhone will gain users mostly at AT&T’s expense. That would mean that the number of new users to the iPhone with Verizon offering one would be less than some might expect.

Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg was named the Time Person of the Year for 2010. The magazine says that the site founded by Zuckerberg has changed the way people relate to each other. Tablet sales in the business world are predicted to double according to a ChangeWave survey of businesses. Most of the businesses want to use the iPad and 7% of the businesses surveyed say they already give employees iPads.

A cool new way to raise money for charity has been unveiled by Google. Money for each opened tab on the Chrome browser will be given to charity with a new “Chrome for Cause” program. A wild looking stringless guitar from Misa Kitara has surfaced. The guitar uses a touch screen for strings and can be pre-ordered now for $849 on a normal plastic version of $2899 for an aluminum version.

A crazy self-sterilizing door handle won a Concept Design Award. The thing is really cool and kills off germs on its own. Door handles transmit more germs and illness than I care to think about. Geeks and Lego never fail to impress and this cool T-800 bust made from Lego is no exception. The statue even has glowing red eyes and base has tiny Lego skeletons inside.

For most of us, the largest utility bill is electricity. A concept home has debuted that is square and covered in solar panels to generate electricity. The panels power the hot water, lights, AC and all else in the concept and might even have power to sell back to the electric company. I have never seen a house key that was cool until the Keybrid turned up. The key has a ring integrated into the design and can be used as a money clip or clipped to other things. You can pick up a pair of the things for about $17.

Word Lens for the iPhone is an app that can translate signs in a foreign language so you can read them. The app is cool and it only works for printed text (naturally). PDP is showing off its cool Tron: Legacy controller that is licensed by Microsoft for the Xbox 360. The controller has glowing orange lines and sells for about $50.

EA has some of its coolest iPhone and iPad games on sale right now for the holidays at 99 cents. There are a bunch of different games available from Tetris to Madden NFL and more. A live video demo of the Notion Ink Adam tablet surfaced from the company for us all to drool over. The tablet looks pretty cool to me, check out the video for yourself here. Thanks for reading this week’s edition and have a Merry Christmas!

The level of detail in this bust is impressive. Unfortunately though, there aren’t a lot of details regarding the design process, or if the designers have any intention of making a full-body Terminator. The images were found on Flickr user thire5′s album. The bust includes those glowing red eyes, and a stand where the T-800 upper-body rests. And, as you can see on the “inside” of the stand, there are even tiny LEGO skeletons in there. Again, just impressive. Hopefully we get to see more Terminator inspired creations, using more LEGO blocks, of course.

[via OhGizmo!]

Now there’s a mini documentary (released yesterday over at FastCoDesign,) by A Small Mammal production for Digital Science, directed by John Pavlus, and in it you can see how this device works! In an interview done for the post on FastCo, Carol had the following to say: “The Mechanism is interesting to me because people think of these astronomical predictions only being possible with sophisticated NASA computers. But to realize that someone actually built a mechanical machine to do that 2000 years ago is pretty impressive — and figuring out to to do it myself in Lego is fascinating too.”

Take a peek at the documentary here, and marvel at how to create a 2000 year old device, we but have to reach out our hands and pluck from a collection of read-made childrens toys to construct it. All hail the modern world.

[Via FastCoDesign]

Carol tool 1,500 different Lego Technic pieces and used them to make a recreation of an ancient Greek computing device that was used to predict celestial events like eclipses with supreme accuracy. The actual device was discovered in a shipwreck in 1901 and it took 100 years for us to figure out what it did.

Carol took those Lego pieces and reconstructed the Greek device known as the Antikythera Mechanism with incredible accuracy and the thing actually works for tracking the lunar eclipse cycle. Check out the video below to see just how complex this creation is.

Via CNET

There’s sixteen figures to this set, and it’s unclear whether a full case will give you a full set or not. Better just buy infinite of them to be sure, sending all your doubles to me. Sounds alright, alright?

[Via The Brothers Brick]

If you wish, please feel free to create this masterpiece in honor of our recently departed friend Irvin Kershner, director of the only original Star Wars movie without a Death Star, The Empire Strikes Back. Check out the list of legos you’ll need here, then check out the full instructions over at Chris’ blog Mint in Box. Furthermore, you can purchase other ornaments created by Chris over at Creations for Charity if you do so wish.

[Via Brothers Brick]

The kit can be ordered directly from Lego.com via the digital Designer section. You will need the Lego Digital Designer 4.0 software and then you can get the design files from the source. The design has some options for a traditional sleigh or a rocket power sleigh.

You can get your Santa minifig at Toys “R” Us. Apparently, they are giving the Santa figures away with Lego purchases right now. This is pretty cool and perfect for your geeky Christmas tree. The kit will cost you about $35.

Interestingly enough, Disney cancelled another Pirates-based game earlier this year, but this one was more of a full-fledged title, and not based on the LEGO universe. The new title, which will launch along side the latest installment in the movie franchise, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, will focus on Jack Sparrow again, but you’ll also be able to choose up to 70 playable characters.

The events in the game will take place during the first three movies (The Curse of the Black Pearl, Dead Man’s Chest, and At World’s End), but will also have some moments from the new movie, too. TT Games will be launching the title on every major console, including the PC, and mobile consoles. It’s set to hit shelves in May, 2011.

Press Release

Disney Interactive Studios, TT Games and The LEGO Group Announce LEGO® Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game

Jack Sparrow and Crew to Embark on a Swashbuckling Adventure in LEGO Brick Form

BURBANK, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Disney Interactive Studios and TT Games today announced that they are joining with The LEGO Group to bring Jack Sparrow and other familiar characters to life in virtual LEGO® adventures with LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game. The video game is being developed by TT Games, the group behind a portfolio of critically acclaimed, best-selling LEGO video games, and will be published by Disney Interactive Studios for the Wii™ console, Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, Games For Windows – LIVE and the Nintendo DS™ family of hand-held systems. The video games will be released simultaneously with the highly anticipated new film “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” in May 2011.

“Combining the excitement of playing as Jack Sparrow and other recognizable characters from the franchise will make the game fun for players of all ages throughout the world.”
LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game will be based in the world of the globally successful film franchise, incorporating storylines, locations and characters from the first three films (“Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,” “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” and “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End”) as well as the upcoming fourth film, “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.”

LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game will re-create the action, adventure and memorable moments of the Pirates of the Caribbean mythology in LEGO form, incorporating the humor of LEGO minifigures and fantastic worlds built from LEGO bricks and elements for players to explore. Players can take on the roles of more than 70 characters and experience the pirate adventure, irreverent humor and amazing creatures of the Pirates of the Caribbean films, through action-adventure gameplay and hilariously quirky LEGO cut scenes. Throughout the game, players will also have the freedom to explore environments from the highly acclaimed movie series in more than 20 levels. The game features two-player cooperative mode, in which players each control a character to experience the story together, and freeplay mode, which lets players return to levels to discover new items.

“Pirates of the Caribbean is a globally successful franchise based in action, adventure and humor perfectly suited for a LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game adaptation,” said Graham Hopper, executive vice president and general manager, Disney Interactive Studios. “Combining the excitement of playing as Jack Sparrow and other recognizable characters from the franchise will make the game fun for players of all ages throughout the world.”

“The action-packed world of Pirates of the Caribbean is a perfect fit for LEGO video games,” said Tom Stone, Managing Director of TT Games Publishing. “With so many wonderful characters, in such amazing environments, our teams are having great fun – and we’re sure that players will, too.”

To date, the Pirates of the Caribbean movies have generated more than $2.5 billion at the global box office while the multiple Pirates of the Caribbean video games have sold more than 6 million units globally.

In a companion release today, Disney Consumer Products and The LEGO Group announced an upcoming collection of LEGO brand Pirates of the Caribbean construction sets that will launch in conjunction with the video game and film release in Spring 2011.

About TT Games

TT Games, wholly owned by Warner Bros. Entertainment, is the combined publishing and development group behind the hit games LEGO® Star Wars™, LEGO® Batman™: The Videogame, LEGO® Indiana Jones™: The Original Adventures, LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 and BIONICLE® Heroes. Incorporating renowned UK developer Traveller’s Tales, TT Games has a distinctive focus on console, handheld, mobile and PC games of the highest quality, aimed at young gamers and their families. For more information, please visit www.ttgames.com.

The clock is called the Lego Minifig Alarm Clock and the clock looks like a giant Lego minifig character. You can get the cool clock in Darth Vader or Storm Trooper styles and they look really cool. The characters have posable arms and legs so you can stand them up or sit them down.

The characters are 8-inches tall and have the alarm clock in the chest. The clocks are aimed at kids 6 and up. They are appropriate for 30 something geeks too. The clocks are in stock right now for $29.99.

SlashSPACE
Today, Boeing has received first signals back from LightSquared’s SkyTerra 1 satellite after its launch at 12:29 p.m. Eastern time on November 14th on an International Launch Services Proton vehicle from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. What will this big momma do, you ask? It’ll bring us 4G connective capabilities, that’s what! When operating fully, the satellite will use and combine ground-based beam-forming equipment and ground stations to create LightSquared’s Space-Based Network, the company’s first. LightSquared plans on combining with a network of more than 40,000 base stations to offer both ground and satellite coverage for the entirety of the USA, offering a wholesale 4G LTE wireless network in “the first four markets” by Q3, 2011. Off blast!

[Via PopSci]

R3 Media Network

SlashPhone
LG Vortex Heading To Verizon
Walmart Give Away $100 Giftcard For Purchasing a Smartphone

Android Community
Gingerbread Confirmed Today, Working on Nexus S, As Presented by Google CEO Eric Schmidt at Web 2.0 [TASTY]
Motorola MOTOPAD to be 7-inch Android 3.0 debut?
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Pulse News Reader Goes FREE on All Platforms Today [FREE]
LG Vortex Announced by Verizon, Available November 18
US Cellular Announces Nov 19 Release of Their Version of Samsung Galaxy Tab
AT&T Unrolls Release Date of November 21 and Pay As You Go Data Plans for Samsung Galaxy Tab

SlashGear
Apple iTunes announcement “you’ll never forget” promised for Tuesday Nov 16 [FEATURED]
Android 3.0 MOTOPAD is Motorola & Google’s Honeycomb opener?
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Why I can’t wait to get rid of my DVR [COLUMN]
DIY USB Floppy Disk Mixes the Best of Both Worlds [NOT MILEY RELATED]
Pillow Universal Remote Control Costs only $30 [SWEET GIFT]
Halo’s Master Chief Helmet is Wearable, Made of LEGOs
Holiday Gift Guide 2010 [FEATURED] [LOTS OF SWEET GIFTS]
Facebook Modern Messaging System Offers Full Social Integration and History [FEATURED]
Movie Review: Skyline [COLUMN]
T-Mobile Samsung Tab Review [REVIEW]
Verizon Galaxy Tab Review [REVIEW]
LG E2360V LED Display Review [REVIEW]

To see more Daily Slash posts, click here: [The Daily Slash] or here: [SlashGear Morning Wrap-Up]

The helmet, which is ridiculous in how accurate it is to the helmet in which it is based from, is made entirely of LEGOs. However, while that’s impressive in its own right, it gets really interesting when you realize that you can actually wear it. For those who purchased the Legendary Edition of Halo 3, you’ll remember that a Master Chief helmet was included in the package, but you couldn’t wear that one (without some work, anyway). This one is designed to be worn. It’s just a shame it’s right after Halloween.

[via Brothers-Brick]

If you want to go a bit smaller in scale with your declarations and make them really geeky this year, you need to build this Lego Christmas tree diorama thingy. What we have here are the plans to build that looks like a little corner of a house with a blocky Christmas tree in it.

You can get the plans for building your own at the source link if you have Lego Digital Designer 4.0 software. This is the same software you needed for those Lego tree ornaments I mentioned a week or so back. You can also buy the complete kit at Lego Digital Designer for about $25. You can supply your own bricks too and just work form the plans.

One of the things that struck me when I first purchased one of these new-generation iDevices (I bought an iPod Touch) was the lack of good 2-player games. With a game like this on the rise, and you can bet it’s going to be downloaded hotcakes, maybe that’ll change. In this iPad version of Creationary, players “roll” to see which of 4 selected categories they will have to work with: nature, vehicles, buildings, or things.

Here’s were the game differs from real life: the GAME begins building a sculpture of blocks, and the faster players guess correctly, the more points they earn. Thusly, it’s also a one player game (I would suppose this is the reasoning.) Over 100 models will be available at the launch, with plans for periodic and seasonal model refeshes. Yay! Read the whole press release below:

Hours of Mobile Fun for Apple iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch Available Now for Free Download-

ENFIELD, Conn., Nov. 9, 2010 /PRNewswire/ — LEGO Systems, Inc., the North American division of the world’s leading construction toy brand, today announced general availability of the first official LEGO® branded application for iPad – a true-to-the-original board game version of Creationary, which tests how quickly players can guess what is being built from LEGO® bricks. The free game works on iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch mobile devices.

Players “roll” the LEGO dice to find out which of the 4 randomly selected categories they are guessing: nature, vehicles, buildings or things. The game starts building an object from that category out of LEGO bricks, and players must guess which of the four possible answers is correct by tapping the illustration that they think matches what is being built. The faster players guess correctly, the more points they earn. As the game is played over time, the more difficult it becomes. If players guess incorrectly, the game ends. Scores can be shared with friends via email or on Facebook.

With 100 models available at launch in infinite play combinations, and plans for periodic and seasonal model refreshes, the mobile version of Creationary will delight passionate fans with an on-the-go way to play while also recruiting new fans – and families to LEGO board game play.

“LEGO bricks, whether in physical or digital form, provide hours of shared family fun, and mobile devices are a perfect way to take LEGO play on the go,” said Michael McNally, brand relations director, LEGO Systems. “More than 2.5 million people are using our LEGO Photo application, so we were inspired to celebrate the success of our new LEGO board games with another app that brings LEGO bricks to life in an entirely new way.”

The collection of 10 LEGO Games caters to a wide range of purchase and play occasions, ages, play types and price points. Each board game provides everything needed to start building and playing right out of the box, including customizable LEGO dice and separate building and game play instructions. LEGO Games are designed to be a new game every time they are played, encouraging children of all ages to build the game differently or change the rules and dice to keep game play fresh and exciting.
Download the free LEGO Creationary game in the App Store on iTunes. For more information on LEGO Games, visit http://games.LEGO.com or ‘Like’ us on Facebook.

LEGO Systems Inc. (LSI) is the Americas division of the LEGO Group, a privately-held firm based in Billund, Denmark that is the world’s leading manufacturer of construction toys. The company is committed to the development of children’s creative and imaginative abilities through high-quality, creatively educational play materials, and its employees are guided by the motto adopted in the 1930s by founder Ole Kirk Christiansen: “Only the best is good enough.” For more information, visit www.LEGO.com

LEGO, the LEGO logo and the minifigure are trademarks of the LEGO Group. ©2010 The LEGO Group.

If you are a geeky type, plain shiny glass balls may not be good enough for your Christmas tree. What you need is something with more geek appeal. You can grab up the directions for making some sweet and festive looking ornaments for your tree out of Lego bricks.

The plans and instructions for the ornaments are offered in multiple colors and you will need software called Lego Digital Designer 4.0 to open the files with the designs. Naturally, you will need a stash of Lego bricks as well in various colors.

SlashDEATH It’s a pretty sad day today because the larger part of the internet learned of the discontinuation of one of the most well-known and heavily sold analog turntables in the world: the SL-1200MK6 Technics by Panasonic. Now you’ll just have to go buy one at a flea market or a garage sale or a second-hand record store like everyone else has been for the past four decades. Sad day! Read all about it: Panasonic Discontinues Technics Analog Turntables

R3 Media Network

SlashPhone
T-Mobile myTouch 4G Gets Official Introduction By T-Mobile
Samsung Mesmerize Now Available On U.S Cellular

Android Community
Samsung Galaxy Tab to get Exclusive content including apps and games
Motorola releases Q3 numbers; First growing quarter since 2006
Giant Android mascot roams Sydney [WEIRD!]
Toys ‘R’ Us to sell Android Tablet for £90 [CHEEP!]

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Big day for features, yes? Also, just for fun, see if you can find the Golden LEGO contained in a post on SlashGear today. It’s shiny! To see more Daily Slash posts, click here: [The Daily Slash]

If you are the sort of person who rocks at creating LEGO sculptures and want to donate, or if you’d just like to donate to this cause without purchasing something, that’s alright too. For either form of donation over $50 USD, you get an engraved Creations for Charity 2010 assembled and glued by LEGO celebrity Sean Kenney (certified professional), topped with a really real gold-plated brick from ChromeBricks. Weird! Awesome! Get over to the store and buy up a bag o bricks!

[Via The Brothers Brick]

The top 10 toys for Christmas 2010, according to the report are:
1) iPhone 4 (14%)
2) iPod touch (13%)
3) iPad (12%)
4) Kinect for Xbox (6%)
5) Zhu Zhu Pet Hamsters / Kung Zhu Hamsters (5%)
6) Flip Video Camera (4%)
7) Toy Story 3 Jet Pack Buzz Lightyear (4%)
8) PlayStation Move (4%)
9) LEGO Harry Potter Years 1-4 Video Game (3%)
10) Barbie Video Girl (3%)

Children quizzed this year added up to be thus: approximately 39 percent of children of all ages quizzed wanted Apple gadgets this year. Seventeen percent of 5-8 year olds, 50% of 9-12 year olds, and 66% of 13-16 year olds all had Apple right up on top of their lists.

The report was made up of 2,138 children and parents equally quizzed. The report found that 3 out of 5 parents asked would be buying presents that would “keep their youngsters quiet throughout the holidays.” That’s scary. I mean it makes sense, sure, keep the kids quiet so you can live your life, but that’s a kid. Parents, do you want a world where everyone is busy on a screen forever? Do you want that kind of world for future generations?

On the other hand, maybe on the brighter side(?), both sexes of children increasingly opted for gender neutral gadgets. And whether we like it or not, children on average had 39 gadgets (OR toys) to play with, more than twice as many as their parents did at the same age.

What’s you’re opinion on all this? The most important thing I find to be happening here is the shaping of future generations. I write for a gadgets blog, but I don’t like the idea that that’s all our future is made up of. You’ve got to remember your days of jumping into the lake, running around the local playground and playing some baseball too. Even if it’s only when you’re a kid, even if you don’t end up loving that forever. That’s my thought on that.

[Via Telegraph UK]