OK, now what do I do with this?

designboom has an article on a natural and organic cocoa drink product that is produced by the Bribri women of Talamanca, Costa Rica. The "hockey puck" sized patties, which actually don't look that promising on initial inspection, are actually 100% cocoa with no sugar or anything else added.

 

You use a little grater, which also acts as a stirrer, to grate up the blocks and add hot water to make the drink.

fuseproject spotted the opportunity and realised that all it need was a design kick to get it going, so designed the little sack that the patties come in, the logo and the little grater. The project is designed to raise awareness of organic cocoa production and hence help save the rainforest. 

More details on designboom and fuseproject

Got WUD?

via inhabitat.com

Inhabitat.com has an article on these speakers made from wood "harvested sustainably for the southern region of Patagonia". Created by Santiago based Grupo Vibra (http://www.grupovibra.cl/).>

Turn Your Mobile Phone Screen into a Solar Panel

We’re no strangers to solar-powered cell phones. Umeox unveiled a solar-power Android just last month, and Samsung has launched three different varieties over the last couple years. These models come with built in solar-energy capabilities, but a small French technology company called Wysips has created a new technology that would allow any cell phone to use solar power. They designed a thin, transparent, photovoltaic film that is placed on a phone’s screen to continuously top off a gadget’s charge using only the sun.

The coating is incredibly thin, less than 100 microns deep, and contains strips of transparent photovoltaic cells laid on the screen that capture enough solar energy to produce electricity. On top of the cells is a layer of cylindrical lenticular lenses, which allow the user to see the light from the screen undistorted. It would not affect touch-screen abilities. According to Wysips, the coating can charge a typical cell phone battery in about six hours with constant direct sunlight, but it would take longer indoors.

With the coating, you would need to plug your cell phone in way less. Instead, just let it sit on your desk like you normally do and it will charge itself. Plus, it would allow phone companies to create slimmer batteries meaning slimmer, greener, devices. Wysips designed the coating so it can be tailored to any device — not just cell phones. They hope to see the technology implemented into tablets and e-readers as well. They are already working on a next-generation model, which would allow 30 to 60 minutes of talk time from an hour of charging.

+ Wysips

Via Fast Company

Video and image by LaptopMag

0

 print email thisemail facebookfacebook diggdigg

via inhabitat.com

Hopefully coming soon to certain manufacturers, a film that goes over the screen of your mobile phone that allows you to continuously charge your phone (as long as it is in the light I suppose). Click through for the video.

Marvell-powered OLPC XO 1.75 only draws 2 watts of power, finally charges via hand crank

via engadget.com

The magnificent OLPC has now got a new chip, the Marvell 1GHz Armada, which draws even less power than the old AMD or VIA ones that it had earlier. This means that it is now possible to top up the battery using the hand crank.