Midland Radio Corporation is bringing its Bluetooth-enabled motorcycle helmets to North and South America. Midland’s full line of Wireless Intercom devices provide rider-to-rider and rider-to-passenger communication with wind and weather-resistant features. You can also connect directly with Bluetooth compatible electronics like cell phones, GPS, and MP3 players.

The entire product line comes packaged with bonus accessories for each unit — two types of mounting hardware (base with screw and base with adhesive), two types of microphones (Boom and Wired mics), and stereo cables for superior HiFi stereo sound.

Image: Midland Radio Corporation.

Nikkei Electronics Asia suggests that the first USB 3.0-enabled PCs and devices could begin appearing as soon as holiday season of this year. Early estimates had USB 3.0 not arriving until sometime in 2010, but Nikkei says that thanks to the faster-than-expected development of “compliant integrated circuits (IC), instruments for equipment developers, and more” throughout the industry.

The USB 3.0 spec, aka “SuperSpeed USB,” claims that it will offer 4.8Gbps transfers, allowing for everything from crazy-fast file dumps to 1080i HD video streams to external monitors. Like the USB 2.0 specification before it, USB 3.0 will be 100% backwards compatible with prior USB hardware, but you’ll need 3.0 hardware on both ends to achieve the highest transfer speeds.

Image: USB Implementer’s Forum, Inc.

Uncle Milton Industries, a manufacturer of science-based toys, is about to unveil a first: a toy that interacts directly with your brain. Available this August for about $120, the Star Wars Force Trainer lets you levitate a ball using only your mind. Seriously!

The toy works by reading the beta waves from your brain with a wireless headband attachment. The main part of the toy features a ping-pong ball in a clear tube and a fan underneath that allows it to float. But there are no buttons to push to activate the fan; it happens when the headband senses changes in your brainwave patterns.

The Star Wars Force Trainer uses technology that doctors use to monitor brainwaves, the same tech used by amputees to send instructions to artificial limbs. Included in the toy is the voice of Yoda, who helps guide you through several increasingly difficult levels of control.

I’m more intrigued by this technology than the Force Trainer itself. The toy strikes me as a novelty to show all your friends — but something that would grow repetitive pretty fast. But the tech, if harnessed with enough imagination, could lead to some true innovations not only in toy-making but in electronics of all kinds.

Happily, this toy is just the beginning. Already, Mattel is manufacturing a similar toy that will be available this Fall. And Uncle Milton is planning an entire line of toys that utilize this brainwave-sensing technology. The company is planning to show off its toys at Comic-Con International in a few weeks, so perhaps we’ll learn more about it then.

Image: Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.

What if connecting to the Internet were as easy as plugging into a power outlet? IT device developer Hercules aims to make it just that simple with its new line of ePlug powerline ethernet extenders.

Just plug the device into an electrical outlet and it provides Cable/DSL access throughout your house by piggy-backing on your existing electrical wiring. The ePlug works by separating out low-frequency signals from high-frequency waves, on which digital data is transmitted. It even prevents the functioning of electrical equipment from being disturbed.

The Hercules ePlug is being pitched as an alternative to WiFi (though I don’t really understand why you’d want or need one). Oh, and the ePlug lineup is currently listed as “not available in the U.S.,” though EveryJoe expects that to change.

Images: Guillemot Corporation S.A.

A Japanese group called the Koress Project have announced development of a tiny little box that posts your heartrate to Twitter, so your friends and loved ones can see how you’re doing. The Akiduki Pulse Box, as it’s called, requires a heart monitor to work, but takes care of posting details about your health for you.

The Akiduki Pulse Box is 100% open source, and Koress is already making plans to commercialize the device and even hold seminars to teach others how to manufacture the device themselves. The device’s running joke is that if your heart should stop beating, all of your Twitter followers will know you’re dead.

Here’s the big question: As silly as the Akiduki Pulse Box might seem at first… Is this the next logical step for Twitter? Devices and services that automatically post information about you, so you don’t have to do it manually? Can you imagine what other hardware or software devices might be produced with “Twitter automation” in mind? Maybe a program that monitors kids’ homework progress so parents can get updates on how it’s coming? Repair service professionals who have devices hooked up to their machinery that Twitters to let you know what’s being done to your car or computer or whatever, as it happens?

Images: Mycom Journal.

Panasonic is releasing the first Blu-ray recorder for the UK, and it’s a slick package that comes with all the extras.

From Panasonic’s press release:

The continued trend toward Full HD in TV broadcasts, discs and digital AV equipment has spawned demand for innovative digital recorders. Panasonic’s response is the “HD Everything” concept – products that allow anyone to easily control, preserve and share a wide variety of Full HD images.

Specs include:

• DVR recording in high-def
• Copy up to 24 hours of content from the DVR over to a single Blu-ray disc in high-speed copy mode
• High-image-quality PHL Reference Chroma Processor Plus and P4HD
• Dolby TrueHD and DTS-Master Audio Essential sound
• Save images from an HD camcorder or LUMIX digital camera, or music from CDs onto the built-in hard disk drive or a Blu-ray Disc
• Support for Panasonic’s VIERA CAST Internet function, so users can easily access Internet content such as YouTube and Picasa Web Albums
• freesat+ Twin Tuner allows you to record two programs at once
• 1080/24p playback

View the full specs for all three models at Panasonic’s HD Everything website. No word on when or if these three models will be released outside the UK.

Image: Copyright 2009 ©Panasonic.

You’re in luck if so. Stealth.com has just announced a rugged, waterproof, chemical-proof, dust-proof computer with no fan and a tiny footprint. They’re billing it as a computer “for environments where ordinary computer hardware won’t survive.” Like the desert, I guess. Or maybe a fishbowl.

The Stealth WPC-500F meets  IP67/NEMA 6 environmental specifications, and is cooled through advanced heat pipe technology instead of fans. An aluminum chassis also acts as a heat sink to dissipate internal heat and provide noise-free operation, using the Intel Atom processor. Its footprint measures just 7.51″ wide x 11.37″ deep x 2.97″ high. Ports include video, serial, USB, and power connections. It contains high performance hard drives built to withstand extreme temperatures, vibration, humidity, and high altitudes. The system is compatible with Windows and Linux.

Obviously the WPC-500F is intended primarily for military-type uses, and will be available starting in early July from Stealth.com. One of these bad boys will set you back a minimum $1,995.

Vizio is about to up the ante with the release of its “XVT” line of flatscreen TVs, certain models of which will come with a slew of pre-loaded applications that give you access to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, along with video download services like Netflix and Blockbuster.

It comes with a wicked cool remote that, like some cell phones, includes a slide-out QWERTY keyboard.

The full list of Internet apps is as follows:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Flickr
• Yahoo! Widgets
• Netflix
• Blockbuster OnDemand
• Amazon Video On Demand
• Rhapsody
• Vudu
• Revision3
• Showtime
• Pandora

The Vizio XVT will be available this holiday season with these options in 42″, 47″, and 55″ models, for $1,199, $1,699, and $2,199, respectively.

Image: Copyright 2009 ©Vizio.

London-based artist/designer Crispin Jones decided that sitting at the computer is far too lonely an experience. So he created Tengu, a small electronic character that reacts to any sound in the vicinity with a funny face. The louder the sound, the more frantically a Tengu’s face will animate.

Connect your Tengu to your computer using a simple USB cord, which is included, and it works with either a PC or a Mac. You also get a set of stickers to customize your Tengu with. You can buy them at Jones’ Tengu website.

Check out the video below to see Tengu in action.

Image: Copyright 2009 Crispin Jones.

It’s just a concept right now, but it looks pretty slick: the Cue VJ is a laptop add-on that lets you perform as a professional VJ (video jockey).

As you can see from the video, it features touch screen control as well as a manual knob for fading effects, as well as some sophisticated software designed to take advantage of its unique hardware to let you mix videos on-the-fly in unique and powerful ways.

What do you think?