labs

Mozilla Labs vetting user talent for new products

On Monday, Chris Beard, vice president and general manager of Mozilla Labs, posted a rather vague, yet optimistic, blog entry about opening up Mozilla Labs projects to the Web community at large. The move comes just a week after the company lost Mike Schroepfer, Mozilla VP of engineering, to Facebook.

Beard has coined it a "concept series" and included three videos of products and services currently at a the conceptual level and not yet ready for public consumption. Of the three embedded in Beard's post, the most buzz-worthy was the mobile version of Firefox, which surfaced two months ago. The other two are a little more out there, with a bookmarks visualizer and what is seemingly the most complicated-looking interface demo ever done by the folks at Adaptive Path for a project called "Aurora" which was unveiled last night.

To get involved, Beard is asking users to keep their ideas structured into one of three buckets:

Ideas It all begins with an idea. A sentence, paragraph, or even bullet-points kick-start the process. Ideas can be simple and non-technical. It should be easy for anyone and everyone to help shape the future of the Web. So throw your notions, inspirations, dreams and visions out to the community. Mockups Turn your idea (or someone else's) into an image, sketch or video. Words are great, but you know what they say about pictures. Mockups offer up a visual and communicate ideas in terms that are just a bit more polished and real. They draw the next person in, tempting them to pick up the concept and run with it. Prototypes A prototype is interactive. Feel, touch and play with developing concepts. Prototypes get ideas across by showing off the moving parts. They aren't always fully functional or pretty, but they're more than a static image or two. They're a dress rehearsal of sorts, with minimal programming. Make a prototype in HTML, Flash, or whatever puts things into action.

Mozilla is also using tags on popular Web services to let people post up their mockups, the first of which have already shown up on Flickr.

I've embedded all three concept videos below. The aurora one is in HD only if you watch it on Vimeo, so click here to see it in it's full-resolution glory.… Read more

Inside CNET Labs 7: Dong's super...thanks for asking

In this week's episode, Dong has something to tell us about his current state of mind, and I think he makes several passes at me, but you'll have to listen to be sure. He's just feeling quite "happy" today.

Also, Dong talks about the problems he's currently facing with a vendor over a recent review. It's an exciting tale of mystery and intrigue, romance and action. Well maybe not, but it passes the time.

Finally, we finally answer some mail on the air. Thanks for sending them in and keep em coming and … Read more

Design students don thinking caps for Electrolux Design Lab

Every year, students from all over the globe compete in the Electrolux Design Lab, a contest inviting budding designers to show off their best ideas for kitchen appliances that address the needs of consumers. Established in 2003, the Design Lab gives undergraduate and graduate industrial design students an opportunity to win cash prizes and a grand prize of $7,745 dollars. Winners also receive a six-month internship at one of Electrolux's global design centers.

Contestants are asked to submit designs that are two or three years out. the designs should focus on the needs of modern kitchens, innovative design, … Read more

Inside CNET Labs podcast...thanks for the attachment

I just wanted to give a shout out to one of our listeners. Um, they sent us a very nice e-mail with the subject line "Hi". The text we found in the e-mail--"Hi, Please find attached herewith Profile. Regards, XXX"-- is nice and sweet, but not important. What is important is the awesome attachment that came with the e-mail. Now, we haven't opened the attachment because, well, we'd rather save it for a rainy day. I'm thinking I'll save it for that day when I begin my reign over and … Read more

iPhone 3G battery results: Music and video

Our CNET Labs team has unveiled their battery performance results for music and video playback on the iPhone 3G. We've completed talk time testing and we'll be doing another round of audio and video tests with 3G disabled--but at least we have another piece of the puzzle to add to our review.

To give the test results some context, we also retested the first-generation iPhone, and simultaneously tested a comparable 3G multimedia phone, the Samsung Instinct. Apple's public tech specs claim the iPhone 3G is capable of up to 7 hours of video playback and 24 hours … Read more

The world's biggest subwoofer

Danley Sound Labs' Matterhorn Subwoofer may be the world's biggest--at least I hope it is. The mother of all subs has 40,000 watts of power, and the whole thing is built into a 20x8x8 foot shipping container. I guess that makes it easy to return when you blow it up! It looks like too much of a good thing to me.

More is just more; it's not necessarily better. True, the more drivers a sub has the lower the distortion, but I think the Matterhorn may have passed the point of diminishing returns. Just kidding, the Matterhorn … Read more

My breakfast, lunch and dinner (times two) with the iPhone 3G

So last Friday (7/11, "iPhone day") I'm getting ready to do some performance testing on the iPhone 3G. Well, if by "getting ready" I mean stealing pizza and pop (hey, I'm from Chicago) from the poor saps--I mean fellow CNETers that were in the office since 4 a.m. that day to cover the second coming of the Second Coming. Don't hate. This is how I roll at CNET, and my colleagues respect me for it. I mean, why else would they suggest I do First Look videos like this?

Anyway, my … Read more

The supercomputers of Oak Ridge National Lab

OAK RIDGE, Tenn.--If you want to see someone's face light up, try talking to a scientist in a supercomputer lab about their machines.

I had that experience last week when, as the last major stop on Road Trip 2008, I visited the National Center for Computational Sciences (NCCS) at the Oak Ridge National Lab to get a quick look at what is certainly one of the top facilities of its kind in the world.

My host was computational scientist Bronson Messer, and during a whirlwind tour of the center, he showed me several of the world's most … Read more

Why Digg's new recommendation engine is a step backward

Announced Monday and now live for all registered users, Digg's new recommendation engine adds a new layer of social context to the upcoming section that lists stories dugg by other users and how much their reading habits match up with yours.

Like I said earlier this week, it's a two-fold effort: one to give the social-networking element of the site some love by giving users more exposure to like-minded people, and another to make sure the site's massive influx of submitted stories gets a little more attention.

The problem is, the new system does little to solve … Read more