Security

If you've taken all the information we covered about home automation earlier and decided that you want to install one in your home, then the next (and obvious) thing you need to do is figure out which provider to go with. Vivint appears to be a prime contender, seeing as they've just recently got the Central Station of the Year Award.

Ever drive into New York City?  Most people don't, unless they have a garage space for $750 a month.  The odds of finding an available parking space in NYC are about as high as winning the Mega Millions.  But Adrian Bone of Lewes, England, has invented a 'Parking Patch' he hopes will solve two parking issues in Brighton, a city south of London on the English Channel, a city far smaller than NYC or London. But first Brighton, then the world!

Cross your heart and hope to... live? In an effort to ensure the often bumpy road to romance gets off to a smooth start, the Chinese city of Chengdu has provided a Love Zebra Crossing painted up in lovely red & white.

A robot policeman equipped with a CCTV cyclops eye and a navel-mounted panic button is the new face of crimefighting in China. Though fixed to the pavement and unable to chase feeling suspects, the ersatz RoboCop nonetheless has brought peace to the mean streets of Kunming.

When a neighborhood watch group escalates from its watchdog origins to outright vigilantism, is nothing to be done to protect the lives innocent citizens? So is the question asked by the Trayvon Martin camp. However, in their fervor to prove their point, they have assumed the same extreme behavior online as that which they are condemning on the streets.

Toward the end of 2011, the American Censorship Org took action against SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), a U.S. bill racing through Congress that threatens "prosperity, online security and freedom of expression." On January 18, thousands of websites like Wikipedia have pledged to go dark online in protest. To show its solidarity, Google has blocked out their iconic logo on their search engine.

SwitchEasy's colorful “Melt” 3D cases for the iPhone 4 or 4S keep your smartphone safe from life's hard knocks while managing to look hot and cool at the same time. The cases feature a slick, shiny, melty-look top portion molded in smooth polycarbonate plastic for easy ingress and egress from the owner's pocket.

Someday we'll be "flying" our cars and computers by the seat of our pants, if a unique new sensor system developed by engineers at Japan's Advanced Institute of Industrial Technology is adopted by car & chair makers. It seems each person leaves a unique impression when they sit down and the resulting digital pressure patterns can be used to identify drivers from the bottom up, so to speak.

I see your snowshoes and I raise you: Ice Shoes! Actually these Magic Spiker winter soles stretch over almost any shoe, turning the most mundane loafers into ice-gripping, non-slipping, cold-weather warriors. Pretty slick, huh?

The Geiger Fukushima iPhone was designed to be cheap yet effective in exposing radiation hotspots. It accomplishes these goals by working with the owner's iPhone and a dedicated app, thus reducing duplication of components. Bonus: it's made in Japan's hard-hit Fukushima prefecture!

Running with scissors again? Japan has something for that: the “Clippy” pocket scissors holster! This kissin' cousin to the classic nerdy Pocket Protector makes it possible for sharp travelers to practice safe snips.

Awakened like a sleeping giant, the 99 Percenters were first motivated by the Arab Spring - but now have orchestrated a movement that has taken on a whole life of their own. Commencing with a make-shift tent city constructed overnight in downtown Manhattan four weeks ago, Occupy Wall Street has caught not only America's zeitgeist but one that is cyberventilating across the globe as well.

Ready for the next tsunami? Then you've really got balls: enhanced fiberglass “Noah” capsule balls, to be exact. Japan's Cosmo Power designed these bright yellow survival spheres so users can escape onrushing floods and ride the relentless quake-spawned tidal waves to rescue.

A Japanese research team has been awarded the 2011 Ig Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their patented invention, the Wasabi Smoke Alarm. As previously reported at InventorSpot in March of 2008, the silent alarm releases a mist of pungent wasabi oil that will wake up those with hearing disabilities in case of fire or a related emergency.

Japan's largest mobile phone service provider, NTT DoCoMo, has produced a prototype cellphone case that adds a radiation detecting function to your smartphone.

Watch out for the F50, China's first flying robotic drone. Small as a pizza pan and equipped with an HD video camera, you can be sure it'll be watching you!

While the blogoshere is cyberventilating once again about the imminent demise of Facebook (anybody remember the "We're Quitting Facebook Day" scheduled for May 31, 2010?), the ghost of Guy Fawkes has been evoked to stir the conspiracy pot. Five hundred years to the day, the Hacker activist group known as Anonymous is claiming they will coincide their destruction of Facebook with Fawkes attempt to blow up the House of Parliament on November 5, 1605.

The China Experimental Fast Reactor, or CEFR for short, has begun pumping power into China's national electric grid. By greatly increasing fuel efficiency and minimizing the discharge of long-lasting toxic waste, the CEFR pioneers the new direction nuclear power plants must take in a world where nuclear power is coming under increasing scrutiny.

Japanese teachers recently subdued and immobilized a knife-wielding intruder using a variation of the traditional, two-pronged Sasumata. The incident highlights this ancient fighting weapon in its modern iteration as a non-violent, noninvasive, “Man-Catcher” school safety device.