12-yo Girl Prevents Kidnapping By Pretending iPod Touch Is a Phone

This week in Stanton, Delaware, a 12-yo girl was confronted by a man driving a white van. He told her to get in. She held up her iPod Touch and said she'd dialed 911. That may have saved her life.The girl was accosted in the late afternoon this Wednesday by a suspect who's described as a white male, 35-45 years of age, dark hair, crew cut. And her quick thinking caused him to flee the scene immediately.Thank goodness she thought of that in time. And—as Cult of Mac points out—what a ringing endorsement for iPod Touch VoIP apps. If she had read our primer on turning your iPod Touch into a hacked Verizon iPhone, she actually could have called for...

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Apple's Thinking about Scratch Resistant and Durable Gadget

Based on an Apple patent application, it seems that the company is contemplating ways to make gadgets more scratch-resistant and durable with cheap nitride coatings on top of stainless steel exteriors.The nitride coatings would not only be low-cost, but they would also leave your gadgets looking great: In addition to providing a durable, hard surface that is both scratch and impact resistant, the nitride layer allows for the natural surface color and texture of the underlying stainless steel to remain visible to the user. It is this natural surface color and texture of the stainless steel that adds to the aesthetically pleasing appearance...

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Gran Turismo 5 Prologue

In a very interesting statement at E3 today, GT series creator Kazunori Yamauchi brought us both good and bad news. The good news is that he confirmed that the Polyphony Digital team was focusing nearly all of their efforts on Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, working hard to bring us features like vehicular damage, private online races, new tracks, and more cars. Of course, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch, and he added that these updates could push the full version of Gran Turismo 5 back into 2010. He also confirmed that Gran Turismo Mobile, for the PSP, is still in “active development” but probably not be released until after Gran Turismo...

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Capturing the Facebook ObsessionBen Mezrich is the kind of nonfiction writer we used to call a hype artist. He takes relatively mundane subjects — counting cards in Vegas, derivatives trading, the New York Mercantile Exchange — and turns them into high-octane page-turners, replete with sex, skullduggery and plot twists worthy of James Patterson.His protagonists — invariably young, testosterone-fueled men — are real, and he bases his books on true-life events, but he amps those events up to the point where the final product is an indistinguishable blend of fact and fiction. “In some instances,” he writes in a typical Ben Mezrich author’s note,...

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DriftingWhen you think of Japanese drifting cars, you think of souped up sports cars twisting along narrow roads. At one Japanese practice track, a modified mini cab/multi-cab in Philippines , a type of micro truck or van is drifting in way that would make drift king Keiichi Tsuchiyama proud.*See my video compilation for Mini-Cab/Multi-cab joining sports car on performing Drifting...*Don't you ever dare the Power of small engine cars......

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Nintendo 3DS portable game system specs revealedNintendo Japan has just released the technical details of its upcoming 3DS portable gaming system, which will feature three-dimensional graphics, multitasking, and web browsing capability.Seven months after Nintendo announced the development of a portable 3D gaming console on which "games can be enjoyed with 3D effects without the need for special glasses", the gaming giant has just released more detailed specifications on its blog.The device will measure 134mm x 74mm x 21mm, just slightly longer and wider -but thinner- than the Nintendo DS Lite.According to gaming website IGN.com, the Nintendo...

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