A new Health and Wellness podcast set to be posted on June 18 offers tips to maintain Independence for Aging Loved Ones. The podcast features Kelly Floyd, an occupational therapist and assistant manager at Rehab Services at Vanderbilt Hospital. Listen to a variety of interviews, tips and tidbits on health and wellness topics ranging from choosing child care to healthy dining to the civilized workplace. Listen from your MP3 player or your computer.

via sitemason.vanderbilt.edu

The third podcasting conference to be hosted by the Guardian, in association with Lightbox Education, took place at the new King's Place premises on Friday 24 April. The conference hall was packed with secondary and upper primary school teachers and advisers from across the UK The third podcasting conference to be hosted by the Guardian, in association with Lightbox Education, took place at the new King's Place premises on Friday 24 April. The conference hall was packed with secondary and upper primary school teachers and advisers from across the UK.

via guardian.co.uk

Lee Yoon-chai, the chairman of Pigeon Corp., a local household products company famous for the fabric softeners by the same name, got his first glimpse of fabric softeners back in the 1970s when he was on overseas business trips while working for Dongnam Chemical. At the time, Koreans used bars of soap to wash clothes, rubbing the soap into the clothes and then pounding them with a small club, a process that allowed the soap to penetrate into the fabric for a more thorough cleansing effect.

via joongangdaily.joins.com

The Carnegie Council is pleased to announce a new service: free video podcasts on ethical issues in international affairs. Along with the Council's popular audio podcasts, video podcasts are available on iTunes and on Really Simple Syndication (RSS). To learn more, go to
[Click Here For Download]

"We are always looking for new ways to increase our outreach," says Council President Joel Rosenthal, "and the astonishing growth in our web traffic shows that there is a hunger for resources that discuss the moral dilemmas raised by global events. With video podcasts, concerned citizens everywhere can watch our materials anywhere anytime, at their own convenience."

via sev.prnewswire.com

Love sports and hate reading? Then The Sun has just the thing to fill your athletic addiction. Although, if the first sentence is true you probably aren’t reading this, but I’m feeling lucky that you’re in a word-digesting mood today. Or maybe you’re on the John and this happens to be the only reading material on the bathroom floor. Perhaps a friend will carry on the message for those not looking to read.

via yumasun.com

Forget about shuttle diplomacy, economic diplomacy or even transformational diplomacy: the new one for this week is science fiction diplomacy. This might sound like something out of the television show "Babylon 5" but science fiction diplomacy is happening right now between Korea and the Czech Republic. The Czech Embassy is holding an exhibition showcasing the life and times of writer Karel Capek. If the name does not ring a bell then maybe one of the words he introduced would. In 1921, Capek made popular the frequently used international word "robot" in his play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots).

via koreaherald.co.kr

Students listening to podcasts of their lecture material, while using study aides, have been shown to perform higher in an exam than those taking notes while attending actual lectures, according to a newly published study. The study, entitled iTunes University and the Classroom: Can Podcasts Replace Professors?, was carried out using downloadable educational podcasts from iTunes University versus lectures delivered by professors. Participants in both conditions were told to note their study time and the activities used to prepare for an exam.

via gadgetrepublic.com

Norway's national broadcaster has pulled a series of 212 podcasts each featuring a different song by the Beatles. The podcasts would have essentially constituted giving away the entire Beatles catalog for free. Although the band's music has not been licensed for the Internet, NRK said on Tuesday that its 2007 radio series "Our Daily Beatles" would be made available as a free podcast. Each installment features the story behind a Beatles track; a version without music ran as a podcast in 2007.

via reuters.com

Parrot releases its new portable speaker system called the Parrot Party Black Edition. It includes an integrated support for Bluetooth stereo (A2DP profile). which allows you to pair any Bluetooth-enabled devices such as mobiles phones, PDAs and computers. It also allows non Bluetooth devices by directly plug your audio device into the line-in socket on the Parrot Party.

via coolgadgetszone.com

I want to talk briefly about bluetooth cellphone headsets, as California’s new cell phone ban is due to take effect in a few months, and I might need to buy one for myself. The decision I face reminds of the plight of Stanley, the iconoclast everyman of absurdist playwright Eugene Ionesco’s Rhinoceros, played by Gene Wilder in the 1974 film adaptation. In the story, Stanley and his friends are shocked (not surprisingly) when people suddenly begin turning into rhinoceroses. Ionesco takes the allegory for conformity in society to the extreme as more and more people turn into rhinoceroses–what was shocking at first, soon becomes avant garde. Desire to resist tranforms into envy as more and more people change into the large, clumsy, powerful beasts.

via gizmosforgeeks.com

Sharp 922SH is the latest 3G mobile phone to be launched in Japan market through SoftBank. Featuring supports for 1-Seg, international roaming service, HSDPA and Bluetooth connectivity, the 922HS is quipped with a full qwerty keyboard, a 3.5-inch 260,000 pixel display with 480 x 854 resolution and a 2M camera.

Sharp 922SH measures at 56×116x17mm at 132g and comes with four different colors including pearl white, metallic black, bronze gold and pearl pink. It is expected to be available on 28th March but price is unknown yet.

via coolgadgetszone.com

What? Oh, you thought I meant the Samsung Q1U? No, I've been shopping for a mic down at the local electronics store and, no word of a lie, this turned out to be the best offering. It's a USB mic that I'm going to use with the Everun as a self-contained interview and podcasting tool. Using Ustream I'll be able to do live audiocasts (with optional recording online) and using Audacity I'll be able to do interviews for post-processing and posting at a later time. Everything can be done on the Everun.

The reason I went for the USB mic is that the Everun MIC input stage isn't very sensitive. It's also a bit noisy so by using the USB mic, the A/D is kept away from all the nasty electronics. The sound quality from the Q1U is reasonably good with a minimal amount of background noise which is more than acceptable for online use. I've recorded an audio file into Audacity and exported as a 128kbps MP3 so you can judge the quality for yourself.

via umpcportal.com

The greenies among us will love this: the Strapya mini solar cell phone charger! Smaller than an iPod, this device only needs to drink up 6-10 hours of sunlight and then it serves as a completely dependable backup power source for your cell phone. The mini solar charger hooks up to your phone via an adapter and offers up to 3 hours of energy on the go. Such a useful, environmentally friendly device sounds like it might be expensive, but at just 1,900 yen ($17.54) this is probably one of the cheapest ways to help save the planet we've seen in some time.

via dvice.com

Sony has just launched a new line of phones dubbed the XPERIA, starting with the XPERIA X1. Looking like it's aimed directly at phones such as the Sidekick and Ocean, it's got a full QWERTY keyboard that slides out from underneath the phone.

In addition, it has a 3-inch touchscreen, WiFi connectivity, 400MB of storage onboard, and microSD support. It runs on a modified version of Windows Mobile, so how that's implemented should make or break this guy. It should be able to run on pretty much every network both here in the US and in Europe, so look for it to hit your local carriers sometime this summer.

via dvice.com

You know that feeling when you gaze into the eyes of your iPod or iPhone and imagine spending the rest of your life with that device? Who wouldn't want to lock into a endless bond with a gadget from this man? Soon it may be a possibility with the iRing, a conceptual design that symbolizes and eternal bond and includes quite a bit of functionality...

via dvice.com