Tech Universe: Friday 25 March

The EPOC Headset. Photo / Emotiv Systems

WEARING YOUR HEART ON YOUR HEAD: The Emotiv EPOC 14 electrode EEG headset reads your feelings. But that's not all - it lets you control Flickr with your thoughts and emotions. It connects wirelessly to your computer and interacts with the EMOLens software. As you feel happy, sad, anger or fear while looking at Flickr the software tags the photo accordingly. That co-worker who shakes his head a lot and laughs to himself all the time? He may just be checking Flickr for
kitten photos. More at Emotiv and video on YouTube.

SAW STAR TREK?: Natalia Paruz is better known as The Saw Lady. She's a musician and street performer in New York. The saw is hardly a high-tech item, but you should hear it playing the original Star Trek theme song. Just because it's Friday. And Star Trek. More at SawLady and video on YouTube.

DOES THIS LIMB SUIT ME?: HAL is a robot exoskeleton suit. It detects weak bio-signals and then operates motors to move joints in concert with the wearer's muscles, helping them to walk or lift objects. As factory workers age, and as the general population ages, having this Hybrid Assistive Limb that can help with lifting and walking could be a real boon. The suit was developed at Tsukuba University, Japan. HAL, really? More at Tsukuba and video on YouTube.

DOT TRIPLE X: Move aside .com, the .xxx domains may be coming to town. ICANN, against strong urgings by many parties, has issued a Draft Rationale for Approving the .xxx top level domain name for use by adult websites. Some opponents don't want the domain as it will make porn more visible and accessible, while some in the adult industry worry it'll make them an easier target for being blocked. Just like a real-life red light district, actually. More at PCWorld.

SPACE RACE: What can you achieve with 1,000 NASA employees? A spaceship, of course, made of people. No, forget Soylent Green, these employees assembled in formation at Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building carpark. Their achievement was to create a human spaceship for the Space Shuttle Program's 30th anniversary. They should have invited The Saw Lady. More at iO9 and video on YouTube.

- Miraz Jordan knowit.co.nz