Originally published November 29 2005
New "Skype certified" phones for sale
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The "Cyberphone" looks futuristic and plugs into your computer's USB port. A portable USB phone called the vTraveller looks like a cell phone and will be released soon.
Skype, the Internet phone service with the candy-cute interface and the new owner (eBay), lets you talk for free with other Skype members, and for pennies per minute with ordinary phone users.
In most cases, your computer's built-in speaker phone and a cheap USB headset or a pair of headphones will do just fine.
But for those of us who miss the feel of a handset and buttons to push, a handful of manufacturers are offering ''Skype certified" phones that plug in to your computer's USB port.
VoIPvoice, based in Manchester, England, sells something called the Cyberphone, a slightly futuristic-looking two-piece USB phone best suited for use at a desk.
The Pom Pom Dimmer is where high tech meets high touch.
This sensor-laden fabric wall switch, which responds to the gentlest brush of the hand, aspires to make light switching ''a sensual experience."
One tap on the Pom Pom's Fuzzy Sensors causes your lights to fade on or off.
Touch and hold the fuzzy bit of the Pom Pom and your lights will dim.
IFM plans to roll its Fuzzy Sensors, which are part of the field of ''e-textiles" Orth is pioneering, into lines of electrical appliances, such as lamps and possibly toys.
But at $129 for one Pom Pom Dimmer (available online at www.ifmachines.com), many of us might opt for a cheaper, if less sexy, light-switching experience.
Developers have created a new pastime, fauxjacking, that mashes together GPS mobile phones and Google Maps.
People can use the free, downloadable Mologogo Java application (available at www.mologogo.com) to create real-time visual records of their movements.
Mologogo's anonymous co-creators, who call themselves LemonHead and GravityMonkey, believe their invention will be part of a new wave of cheap location-based services for GPS devices.
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