A New York Times article lauding the introduction of a new form of automated corner shop vending machine. The first of these behemoths is an 18 foot long machine – dubbed Shop 2000 – in Washington that dispenses everything from razor blades to eggs and nappies (diapers y’all). Personally I think it’s doomed to failure. It only holds 200 items (as opposed to 2000+ held by most conventional ‘convenience’ stores) which is too few really. And besides, I really like…

Identifont is another cool site designed to help you identify a font that you like. To use it you answer a set of questions (like ‘does the Q tail cross the circle?’) to narrow down the choice until you get to the one you’re after.

The Internet Moving Image Archive is a selection of over a thousand pre 1964 copyright free ‘ephemeral’ films from the US such as newsreels, government propaganda films and commercials.

So you’ve just gone out and spent x hundred pounds on a new Palm PDA. Forget about the address book, or note-taker, what better use for it could there be than turning it into a wheeled robot?

A surprisingly coherent and damning indictment of the greed and manipulation now endemic in the entertainment industry as a whole. Composed by no lesser personage than Prince (yes the little Purple One). You’ll have to put up with a little txt speak though: How long, however, b4 a critical mass of established artists realize that it is in their best interests, both artistically and commercially, 2 leave the system 4 good? Methinks we are beginning to see the writing writ…

Here is an interesting report outlining just how quickly the DVD format has taken over the world of home entertainment. Apparently there are now some movies – e.g. Training Day – which make more from the DVD release than at the box office. VHS tape, it appears, does not have long to go in this world. In related news, Sony has announced that Betamax is finally dead. Wow, I didn’t know it was still alive.

Just in case you were wondering just how much it cost to book, say, Aretha Franklin ($75K) or Bill Cosby ($100K) for your daughter’s 21st shindig, here’s a table outlining some college gig hiring fees for famous name performers. What a strange thing for Clear Channel – the American radio giant – to put onto the Web. Oh and of course if you were booking from here in Europe, no doubt that fee would be doubled by travelling, accommodation and…

The Puppet Tool is…er…a Shockwave tool for making puppet animations. I think it’s art. [via Metafilter]

IM Tuner from SonicBox is a new Internet radio software package which lets you tune in to the sounds you like. Better get it fast before the nasty RIAA people price the Net radio stuff out of the market with their ridiculously high royalties.

Meet Lewis, the robot photographer who can autonomously swan around a room taking photos of people. It’s all very technically brilliant, but for goodness sake don’t tell the paparazzi or there’ll be a huge fuss from their union.

So apparently this guy built a complete Space Shuttle cockpit mock-up for his college and now has just sold it on EBay. Well I suppose it was something to do of a Friday evening!

Scottish Hydro-Electric has announced the availability of high speed broadband Internet services via electricity sockets. Yes folks, that’s 2Mbps broadband Internet access from any room that has a power socket. This kind of PowerLine technology has been talked about for a while, but last I heard it was not feasible because of the radio interference and emissions problem. Looks like they have it sorted now though. Mind you it is only a ‘trial’ so don’t start dumping the old ADSL…

Get those flowers back in your hair, ’cause it appears that VW, emboldened by the success of the Beetle’s re-introduction, is planning on launching a new version of the once popular VW Microbus. Unfortunately this one is far from being the hippy wagon much loved by San Francisco dwellers of the 60s, but instead will sport a V6 engine, DVD video system and power sliding doors. [via Fark]

Game Studies is, quote – ‘a cross disciplinary journal dedicated to games research’ – unquote. It seems to be a little more in-depth than most of the boy games sites out there, which makes it interesting in its own right. This issue contains an interesting interview with Will Wright of The Sims and Sim City fame.

The Elder Geek site looks to be a comprehensive and useful resource covering all things Windows XP, with all sorts of tips, fixes and features on the subject. Defintely worth a bookmark.