Thatfeller's Finds: January 2008

30.1.08

The World's Most powerful flashlight

Currently being reviewed by The Guinness Book of World Records, The Torch is the world's brightest and most powerful flashlight. It is easily capable of melting plastic, lighting paper on fire within seconds, and if you want, frying an egg or a marshmallow on a stick! At 4100 lumens, The Torch is 100 lumens more powerful than The Polarion Helios, the former most powerful flashlight. Incredible? Watch The Torch in action.

I want one.

A Ghost Town, Buried in the Sand

Kolmanskop is a ghost town in southern Namibia, a few kilometres inland from the port of Lüderitz. In 1908, Luederitz was plunged into diamond fever and people rushed into the Namib desert hoping to make an easy fortune. Within two years, a town, complete with a casino, school, hospital and exclusive residential buildings, was established in the barren sandy desert. But shortly after the drop in diamond sales after the First World War, the beginning of the end started. During the 1950's the town was deserted and the dunes began to reclaim what was always theirs.

28.1.08

Breakfast Fortified with Iron

The Iron Chefs: Cooking bacon and eggs using nothing but a regular household iron and a lot of ingenuity. Cheers to Gary, Olly and Toast!

24.1.08

Wall-E

I know it's not due until summer, but it looks like it might be fun. Pixar has done a great job so far!

23.1.08

ShootingStar

This is a technical explanation of some of the extensive technology that has to be designed on the International Space Station to accomplish simple things that we take for granted here on earth. It will change your perspective!

Machine Guns are Cool

Machine guns are cool. Miniguns (or Gatling guns, or chain guns) are machine guns with many barrels. This one is reallyfun: it shoots 40 rubber bands per second!

Here’s a dual version:

This Lego machine gun shoots about 10 rubberbands per second.

This Lego Gatling gun is slightly faster, but ultimately quite a bit cooler.

This is the real thing, mounted on a helicopter. Note that only about every tenth bullet shows up in these images.

16.1.08

I'm afraid I want one.

This looks like a wonderful device. I want one.

The Apple Macbook Air. How cool is that!

15.1.08

Bridge Demolition Shockwave

A very cool video of a cameraman being hit by the shockwave from a bridge demolition.

Religion Sucks

These might be a little touchy, but that's never scared me before. They’re a take-off on the Mac/PC commercials that are so popular, and they’re done pretty well: they’re cute and relatively funny. But they deal with the subject of “religion”, and they make the point that religion sucks, even the socially acceptable form of religion. If you really like “church as usual”, this is not for you! If you think “church as usual” is ripe for change, then you might enjoy these. If you just generally hate church, you might like ‘em too.

10.1.08

Planets in scale and size.

There's "big." And then there's "BIG." And then there's this. Oh my goodness; I suddenly feel small.

Cat in a Jar

If you or I did this to a cat, it's cruelty. If the cat does it to itself, it's really funny.

Cat Fits In A Fish Bowl

Blind as a Bat: Seeing in the Darkness

I've always thought the phrase "Blind as a bat" was kinda weird: they catch bugs in the air in the dark. Ben is like that: "even the darkness is not dark to him." Must be weird living with a guy that doesn't care if the lights are on.

Dang.

8.1.08

How NOT to pass your driving test

7.1.08

He's a British performer named Mat Ricardo, doing six funny minutes on a Dutch TV show...

Kids, dirt and soap.... the perfect mix

Why does this sound familiar?

Fire Tornado

A tornado is terrifying. A forest fire is terrifying. What happens when you combine the two? Technically, it’s not a tornado (an event that is powered by storm clouds) but a vortex (powered by the fire’s updraft). It’s still terrifying if you’re a firefighter and it’s your job to put it out!

This one is in a forest fire in southern California in May 2007: