We have witnessed the rise of YouTube as a method to savagely inflict your home videos on relatives without first trapping them in said home. Unfortunately, huge quantities of schlock never make it onto the internet because the arcane arts of video codecs and bitrates scare even the boldest of would-be directors. Flip Video has been changing that, though – their Ultra series camcorder delivers an incredibly simple experience, producing files that are ready to upload from an attractively small and affordably priced unit. Despite my deep love of high-definition video, I lusted after the Ultra for many moons, satisfied only when I convinced a friend to buy one so that I could play with it. Now that lust has been renewed, with a vengeance: Meet the Flip Mino.

Functionally, the Mino is very similar to the Ultra; video quality is the same (640×480 @ 30fps). The unit has storage for 60 minutes of footage. The device, however, is 40% smaller, and just generally looks sleeker – sleek enough to reignite my lust. This time, though, I think I’ll buy it myself.

Get a Flip Mino in black or white for $180 at Amazon.

Filed under: Gadgets | Technology — Max @ 10:00 pm

This is a post about a tasty beverage.

I have a soft spot for “ades” especially lemon and lime. Unfortunately, most lemonades in the U.S. market are loaded with corn syrup which causes some sort of taste in the back of my mouth. Yuck. But then I found Honest Tea’s Honest Ade Limeade which has no corn-syrup to get between me and the lime juice. Although I do not take part in the tea selections of their product line, the other non-caffeinated beverages I’ve had were pretty tasty. In addition to producing excellent beverages, Honest Tea also is a pretty cool company, with a completely organic product line.

Fun fact of the day: Senator Obama’s drink of choice on the campaign trail is Honest Tea’s Black Forest Berry. While I’m partial to the “ades”, looks like we are both fans of Honest Tea.

Filed under: Home | Garden — Pilar @ 9:42 am

This is really cool – it’s a box that plugs into your TV and allows you to easily watch the “Watch Instantly” streaming movies available with your Netflix subscription. It’s got RCA jacks, HDMI, S-video, component video and optical audio. It’s just about perfect for me, a non-intel mac user; and though the $100 price tag stings a bit for something windows users get for free, the convenience of a standalone box just might make up for it.

Get more details about the Netflix Player Here.

Filed under: Gadgets | Technology,HD — Max @ 9:02 pm