Tag archive: Columbia

There are a few battery-powered electric jackets on the market today, but none quite like this one. Most come with a bulky heating pad-like insert and run off of heavy D-cell batteries that are less-than-innovative. When popular sportswear brand Columbia (well-loved here in Oregon for its hometown status) decided to take its electric heating technology (which has been in boots for a few years already) to jackets, they brought in experts to… Read More

If you've been smoking marijuana like a cigarette lately, you might want to cut back on your Facebook time. The National Center on Addiction and Substances Abuse at Columbia has released a study indicating that the more time teenagers spend social networking on sites like Facebook and Google+, the more likely they are to drink, smoke, and use drugs.  According to IB Times, roughly 70 percent of the 1,037 teenagers studied spent time on… Read More

  If you're a fan of double-fisting beers by the campfire but need a free hand, the smart people at Columbia Sportswear have brought a strange and ingenious hoodie to your rescue. The Columbia Koozie Hoodie ($75) has strategically-placed pockets designed to safely hold two bottles or cans of beer, and is stain-resistant in the case of accidental spillage. If you are the kind of beer drinker who prefers a bottle of microbrew over a regular… Read More

If you initially mistook Columbia’s Mobex backpacks ($99) for one of the kitten-sized miniature tent models hanging on the wall at your local REI, join the club. The unusually poofy backpacks may draw stares on the trail, but as we found out when we had a chance to actually strap one on, they’ll come from the hikers you’re flying by.

Back in April, the four men behind Swedish-based file-sharing site Pirate Bay were found guilty of copyright violation, fined $4.5 million, and sentenced to a year in jail. But as the appeals process grinds on, the site continues to operate as before, even thought it’s been bought by Global Gaming Factory, which spent $7 million on it, intending to turn it into a legal pay service. It’s all apparently become too much for the… Read More

Internet search giant Google has released its 2008 End-of-Year Zeitgeist, noting what was hot worldwide in Internet searches for the year. Unlike search engines like AOL and Yahoo who base their end-of-year summaries mostly on the frequency of terms—hence allowing Britney Spears to rule the search engine listings for years on end—Google bases its Zeitgeist both on frequency and on the novelty of terms. In other words,… Read More

If you’re looking for an electronics case that hasn’t been carved out of cow, molded from the same stuff as IV tubing, or that looks like the Velcro wallet you owned when you were seven years old, Better Energy Systems’ Tread line may be the solution. The company expanded its line of recycled rubber gadget cases on Tuesday with a slew of new offerings built from the same rubber that once graced highways as inner tubes.… Read More

Apple has announced an exchange program for the ultra-compact USB power adapters that have been sold with the popular iPhone 3G in several countries. Although Apple has received no reports of injuries from the adapters, the company says the power adapter's metal prongs can break off and remain in a power outlet under certain conditions, creating a risk of electric shock. The adapters have been sold with every iPhone 3G in the U.S.,… Read More

In another market expansion for the Apple iPhone, América Móvil has announced (PDF) it has signed an agreement with Apple to bring the iPhone to its Latin American markets later in 2008. Like Vodafone's announcement earlier this week that it would be bringing the iPhone to a swath of new European markets, the release contains no other information, including the financial terms of the deal or whether America Movil will… Read More

Five Hollywood studios—Walt Disney, 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, Paramount, and Universal—represented by the MPA have reached a settlement (PDF) with Beijing Jeboo Interactive Science & Technology Co. over setting up Internet cafes with software that enables customers to watch pirated versions of Hollywood movies. Among the movies available via the "Jeboo Bar" were Click,Hitch, and Pirates of the Caribbean… Read More

Computer maker Dell may have made its name by elimianting the middle man and only selling directly to customers, but since the return of founder Michael Dell, the company has been looking shore up eroding sales figures by moving its products into traditional retail channels. Today, Dell unveiled another step in that strategy, announcing it has inked a deal with Carrefour Group to put Dell notebook and desktop systems in 365 retail locations… Read More

Even Hollywood doesn’t quite have the resources to chase down every pirated video peddler on city streets, but its studios have found a way to try to reduce the flow of pirated movies another way – by hitting distributors. One major Chinese distributor is feeling the pressure lately, as five studios have come down on it with a lawsuit seeking $432,024 in damages. According to PC World, Jeboo.com allegedly provided copyrighted… Read More

The so-called “format war” between high-definition DVD formats HD DVD and Blu-ray might not be a shooting match on most days, but when you add a little gasoline to the fire in the form of an international trade show like CeBIT, the camps seem to enjoy an occasional tactical engagement. Sony has been bragging lately that the high-definition war is all but over, declaring themselves the winner based on recent U.S. sales data and… Read More

Anti-phishing group PhishTank, which is a service of openDNS and tracks phishing attempts on the Internet, offers information about phishing and ongoing scams, and offers an open API to developers looking to build phishing protection into applications, has released its phishing statistics for October 2006. Overall, the PhishTank community noted more than 7,000 suspected phishing attempts, of which almost 3,700 were verified and just under… Read More

VIA just launched a contest that could be a win-win deal for anyone lucky enough to succeed. If you are like me, you have a wife or girlfriend who just doesn’t “get” gaming. Who for some strange reason thinks your hours spent on the PC in the evening protecting the world from criminals and alien invaders is just one colossal waste of time. However, she finds shows like Oprah, Dr. Phil, and The View fascinating, and… Read More