Remainders - The Things We Didn't Post: Talk of Tomorrow Edition [Remainders]

In today's Remainders, the future! The soldiers of tomorrow get a new battery for their exoskeletons; a 2012 Olympic Stadium built from recycled weapons; a discovery showing that a big brain can indicate a great gamer, and more.
Hulk For Hours
The HULC exoskeleton is supposed to make you strong like the Hulk. Or strong like a creature with an exoskeleton. Whichever. We were fortunate enough to try the HULC out a few months ago, so we were pretty excited to hear that a new fuel-cell battery from Protonex gives HULC-wearers super strength for up to three hours. The battery, currently under development, will only be available to soldiers, so we consumers will have to remain content with our puny muscles, at least for the time being. [Engadget]
Let Icons Be Icons
On his blog "Ignore the Code," Lukas Mathis wrote a post that took a closer look at something we interact with every day: icons. Some of it is "no duh"-level stuff—if an icon is too detailed, it is confusing; if an icon isn't detailed enough, it is confusing—but he illustrates his points nicely throughout. "The trick," he says, "is to figure out which details help users identify the UI element, and which details distract from its intended meaning." The exception is application icons. For those, the more detail there is the better. There's nothing too profound about Mathis's icon-gazing, but it's nice to stop and consider what makes us click the way we do. [Ignore the Code]
Gamers' Bulge
It's not quite as exciting as discovering that playing video games makes your brain bigger—though I wouldn't doubt that some such study exists—but scientists have at least shown the opposite to be true: video game performance can be predicted by measuring a certain part of the brain. The part of the brain in question is the striatum, a section also linked to developing strategies and refining motor skills. Kirk Erickson, a University of Pittsburgh professor who led the study, explained, "This is the first time that we've been able to take a real-world task like a video game and show that the size of specific brain regions is predictive of performance and learning rates." What this means for you is that when your friend is asking how you keep pummeling him in Smash Bros you can reply, with science backing you up, "sorry bro, bigger brain." [Gun Play
A lot of new buildings going up these days include recycled materials, but the stadium being built in London for the 2012 Olympics is special among them. Why? Because it's going to be made partially from recycled guns and knives. In 2009 alone, London Metropolitan Police ended up with 58 tons of guns, knives, and keys, all of which are now being melted down for use in the stadium. In a similar but decidedly less cool project, the used bullets from the police force's firing range will be recycled into jewelry and photo frames. I told you it was less cool. [Fast Company]

Score Hits on Dating Sites By Showing Skin, Looking Aloof [STUDY]

Having trouble snagging the girl/guy of your dreams on OkCupid? Well, you may be missing the mark with your profile picture. The dating site recently did research into which snaps fare the best, and resulting are surprising. (Hint: Skin is in.)

Oktrend, the official blog of OkCupid, published an extensive report today that gives the rundown on the four biggest myths with regard to profile pics. Here’s the points we found most interesting:

Myth One: It’s Better to Smile

Apparently, women who smile in profile pics are less popular than women who just make flirty faces directly into the camera, questioning the credence of all those old adages about smiling and umbrellas and being fully dressed. (Just lay off the duckface, ladies, seriously.) Men, on the other hand have big pull with the ladies when they look away from the camera sans grin. So basically girls look for aloof gents in the digital realm as well. Who woulda thunk it?

Myth Two: Phone and Webcam Photos Are Uber Creepy

Apparently, these super los-res shots are not off-putting. In fact, the infamous “MySpace Shot” (you know you have a few of those) is extremely popular with dudes. (Posing with an animal is apparently dating suicide — so put Mr. Fluffkins away.) Check it out:

Myth Three: Leave Something to the Imagination

One would think that sleazy shirtless shots would dissuade women from getting to know a guy– digitally. Not so. Only the presence of a furry creature in the frame (aside from the dude) gets the ladies going more. Drinking in pictures is apparently a no-go. No word on whether chicks like guys who pose drunk and shirtless. (My own personal preference.)

Newsflash: Guys like boobs. Apparently women who show some skin get more initial play, however those who pose whilst doing something interesting actually get drawn into conversation. So I guess that means the web is kind of like real life, making this finding not that much of a shocker.

Myth Four: Let Them See Your Pretty Face

Apparently, you don’t need to show your face in order to get hits — I mean, hit on. Which I totally understand; I once fell for a guy because of his rad boat shoes. But, seriously, this finding is actually intriguing, seeing as how we’re taught that the eyes are the window to the soul and all that.

Interesting note on the way in which the research was conducted. OkCupid qualified profile success for women by amount of messages received, while a man’s success was tabulated by counting how many women a guy had a conversation with out of women he reached out to. That’s right, classic courtship rules appear to be holding strong in the 21st century, with men acting as the pursuers and women waiting to be pursued. Personally, I found that a lot more shocking (and saddening) than the fact that guys dig skin and girls like muscle.

[Charts via OkCupid]

[top img credit: davco9200]

Tags: dating, okcupid, social media

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Bipolar Girlfriend Just Broke Up With Me

And it only took me 10 months to realize I wasn't helping her a damn bit.

New Vlog/Show in the Works

I've been trying to develop a show to make my EI blog more accessible and viewer-friendly by putting a lot of the stuff I find (sites, toys, news, etc.) into video and posting it at the top of the page. I'm going to try blip.tv because it's got the best options that I can find for video sharing and distributing. Then I can plant the player below my header and it should update and display my newest video every time I upload one. I hope it makes the blog more fun and accessible.

Anywho, I decided today that I need to stop worrying about what it's geared toward (I still have yet to find my niche), and just show the best things I run into. I'll try to keep it grounded with the look and feel of the blog, but I do want to try some new approaches and find out what works best. The first video will be up by tomorrow. I hope you all enjoy it.

Happy Tuesday.. er.. Christmas!

I love Michelle. I came to visit her and her family for the holidays. Only barely, though. Yesterday my car kept dying and I ended up getting a new fuel filter (apparently running out of gas several times leaves the potential for gunk to get caught up in it, so the old one needed replaced). It was a little shaky at the beginning of my trip, but it made it through. Anywho, happy holidays everyone! I hope you're all spending it with someone special.

How Xbox 360 saved me... for now.

Holy diarrhea. So my family had some folks over from our church this evening. Just a few families (who happen to be raising an army of children). I was on child duty. Now it's not like I was watching toddlers or anything, most of them were anywhere from 8-ish to 14-ish. But they taught me something: I better figure out how to deal with kids. Michelle and I are planning to get married sometime in the next five years and definitely know we want a couple of little ones for our own. But tonight, I couldn't do anything right. One of them spilled soda on the carpet, and I was cool with it. Cleaned it up fast enough, no big deal. Them two of them started arguing and pushing each other so I stepped in and told them they have better things they can do with their time and fighting doesn't solve anything and so on and so forth. Then... they kept doing it, and in doing so, inspired the rest of the kiddos to join in. Now a dispute here and there, I can handle. When you have 10 or more children and young teenagers fighting (in the physical sense) and arguing, it's easy to lose control. Thankfully I pushed my way into the middle of it and sent opposing sides to different areas of the house to keep themselves busy for a while. But it was about to start up again and, fearing a Gangs of New York kind of situation, I pulled my Xbox 360 out and started playing it.

NOw I thought I loved video games, but not minutes after I turned it on and started playing it, little people gathered around to wait their turn to play. Microsoft, I know you get a bad rap sometimes, but in this instance, consider yourself a life-saver. Not to mention Michelle for buying it :) Those kiddos didn't start shit for the rest of the evening!

For the record, I love Michelle way more than Microsoft.

Blue Screen of Indegestion.

So after I finished dinner, I got online to put up a new post and as soon as Firefox started, my fans got really fast and loud, and all my running apps went haywire and POOF! It dissolved into the blue screen of death. This is the second time I've run into this screen in the 3 years I've had this computer. Last time all I did was take off all the essential pieces (battery, HDD, RAM cartridges) and put them snugly and safely back in their places. Started it up and everything was fine. That was 2 summers ago. This time I noticed that the fans sounded strange, so I turned the machine over (it's a laptop) and there was a solid half-inch or so of dust and nastiness all over the intake vents.. not cool.

So I dismantled everything down to where I could get at the fans, and the heat-sink and the motherboard, and cleaned it all up with my little anti-static brush. Now it money again and I can finally post.

Work was much easier than usual since, instead of lifting and pulling crates and boxes around, my job was the fork lift. This is ideal for someone like me who weighs as much as a... well, if I went on a mission trip to the third world or something, the locals would be trying to get ME to eat more. They'd be like "Give him your leaf soup, Miho. He needs it more than you do."

Anyway, I was coaxed into having lunch in the lounge with everyone else (I usually go out for fast food or meet friends for lunch) and had some under stimulating conversation with the guys I work with. Now they're not bad guys. Most of them would do you a favor in a heartbeat, no matter if you just met them or have known them for years. But they aren't interested in much more than collecting their bi-weekly paychecks and heading to the dive bars we have around here. Not really my crowd... unless it's Saturday night.

Now I'm going to try and find something interesting to write about on Helium or submit some of my own ideas. Happy Thursday!