SlashGear Week in Review - Week 50 2010

Welcome to this week's edition of the SlashGear Week in Review! This is the last edition before Christmas; I hope you have your shopping done! Last Sunday we went hands on with the LG VL600 LTE modem and it was really cool. We like the service, but the scant data limits of 5GB and 10GB will keep many from adopting if they plan to use it as a broadband alternative. Monday some really cool cases for the iPhone 4 surfaced from Gear 4 that fans of Angry Birds will like. The cases come in three styles with colors and characters from the Angry Birds game.

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!