It's nearly 6am here at Hamburg Finkenwerder, the private airfield (which is more like a mini-city) of Airbus, and we're writing this in the middle of the press conference to hand over the first A380 to Lufthansa.
In only a couple more hours, after the pomp and circumstance dies down, we'll be boarding the superjumbo for her inaugural flight from Hamburg to Frankfurt. Be sure to stick around and follow along with us, but right now, we can't wait to show you what are the first unofficial photos of the Lufthansa A380, which we shot ourselves only moments ago as the first group of press to arrive on site here at XFW.
Check out more outtakes over on our Twitter and over the next few days. It's only a 40-minute flight, but their secret new First Class seats, updated in-flight entertainment and more mean full investigations on our part. Enjoy the pics, and expect more soon!
Disclosure: We've snuck off to Germany for the A380 launch thanks to Lufthansa.
There may be nothing better than having a Super Mario Bros. themed cake at your birthday, wedding or party. How can you go wrong really? I mean…take one of the greatest memories from our childhood and add some suga’ to it. These sweet creations are almost too awesome to eat…who am I kidding…I’d me chin deep in each and every one of these if they were in front of me.
…and if you’re looking for something good to eat why not try the Luther Double Down?
Like most office drones, it’s hard to pass by a Starbucks on the way to work without stopping for a cup of America’s finest. But a new trend has baristas cringing and customers rejoicing: the Instant Brew. It’s not on the menu, but most baristas will make you one if the store isn’t too busy.
The Instant Brew is when baristas brew coffee directly into the cup and not into a giant vat of joe. It’s also known as a pour-over or single-drop. This trend is becoming more popular among small specialty coffee houses, and it produces a stronger brew similar to a French press, but without the grit. Thanks for the image Shawn! There's a few more items from Starbucks which may further piss off your local barista.
The Short Cappuccino: A cheaper, better cappuccino served in a smaller eight-ounce cup. This is a more European-size portion of the drink without the extra milk most baristas use to fill the tall cups. Most foodies agree that a proper cappuccino should be one part espresso, one part steamed milk and one part foam.
Biscotti Frappuccino: buy an individual biscotto and ask your barista to blend it into any Frappuccino drink for a crunchy treat.
Red Eye: a shot of espresso in regular drip coffee
Black Eye: two shots of espresso in regular drip coffee
Green Eye: three shots of espresso in regular drip coffee (with a side of insomnia and serious heart palpitations)
Poor Man’s Latte: order an Iced Americano with no water and half ice, then pour in your own half-and-half at the condiments station; the result is a Breve Latte for a fraction of the cost.
Chocolate Cream Frappuccino: a Frappuccino made with chocolate syrup and chocolate Frappuccino base
Cake Batter Frappuccino: a vanilla Frappuccino made with both vanilla bean and almond flavoring
Crunch Berry Frappuccino: a strawberry-and-cream Frappuccino with hazelnut flavoring; it tastes just like Crunch Berries cereal.
London Fog: Earl Grey tea blended with vanilla flavoring
Zebra Mocha (aka Penguin Mocha): a combination white-chocolate/chocolate mocha
Red-Tux Mocha (aka Bleeding Penguin): a Zebra Mocha plus raspberry flavoring
Starbucks is also testing new brewing methods in key markets. Their concept store, Roy Street Coffee and Tea, also serves beer and wine and creates little heart-shaped designs in their cappuccinos. More importantly they offer cold-press coffee using the elusive Clover coffee machine, an $11,000 device that takes hours to brew a pot of coffee, served cold and black.
Today I found out what the M’s stand for in “M&Ms”.
In 1941, Forrest Mars Sr., of the Mars candy company, struck a deal with Bruce Murrie, son of famed Hershey president William Murrie, to develop a hard shelled candy with chocolate at the center. Mars needed Hershey’s chocolate because he anticipated there would be a chocolate shortage in the pending war, which turned out to be correct.
As such, the deal gave Murrie a 20% stake in the newly developed M&M; this stake was later bought out by Mars when chocolate rationing ended at the end of the war, in 1948.
The name thus stood for “Mars & Murrie” the co-creators of the candy.
The “M&M” was modeled after a candy Forrest Mars, Sr. encountered while in Spain during the 1930s. During the Spanish civil war there, he observed soldiers eating chocolate pellets with a hard shell of tempered chocolate. This prevented the candies from melting, which was essential when included in soldiers rations as they were.
During WWII, production of M&Ms skyrocketed due to the fact that they were sold to the military and included as part of United States’ soldiers rations.
The original M&M colors were: red, yellow, brown, green, and violet.
M&Ms were served in cardboard tubes when they debuted.
The “M” printed on the M&Ms was originally printed black. This was changed to white in 1954.
William Murrie, father of Bruce Murrie, was originally hired by Milton Hershey in 1896 as a salesman. In his first week on the job, he managed to over sell the plant’s production capacity. This so impressed owner Milton Hershey, that he tabbed Murrie to be the future President of Hershey; this later happened in 1908, a position he held until retiring in 1947.
When William Murrie first took over running Hershey, the annual sales of the company was $600,000. Upon his retirement in 1947, he had grown the company to now have a gross annual sale amount of 120 million dollars; which means, over the span of those 39 years he increased the annual sales rate an average of around 50% per year.
In the 1920’s, Murrie tried to convince Hershey that they should produce a chocolate bar with peanuts. Hershey didn’t like the idea, but let him go ahead as long as the bar wasn’t under the Hershey brand name. And so, in 1925, the “Chocolate Sales Corporation”, a fictitious company Murrie came up with, debuted the “Mr. Goodbar”, which was wildly successful.
Forrest Mars Sr. not only helped invent the M&M, but also famously invented the Mars bar, which was a “malted milkshake in a candy bar”; he also launched the Uncle Ben’s line of food product.
At the time of his death at age 95 in 1999, Forrest Mars, Sr. had grown his father’s company to the point where he now had amassed a fortune for himself of over 4 billion dollars. At that time, he ranked 30th on the list of richest Americans, with his sons Forrest Jr and John ranking 29th and 31st. He left the company to his children who still exclusively own it today (it is not a publicly traded company).
Lego fans are some of the most passionate and imaginative fanboys. There seems to be nothing that Lego lovers can’t achieve. When they combine technology with Lego creations, the results are pure geeky genius.
Here’s a perfect example of what a person who loves Lego and technology can create. Chris Harrison has many Lego and Apple tributes in the form of Lego iPhone docks. On the left is a Star Wars Lego iPhone dock, while the image on the right displays the new and improved green dock.
If you have an iPad, you probably need a iPad stand. These are better than most because they are constructed from Lego and you can make these DIY stands. Rob Marquardt built the top iPad stand so it will function in landscape or portrait. Jeff Eaton designed the iPad Stand MkII, so that is also supports the iPad vertically and horizontally.
To do your banking with Lego flair, you might like to try a credit card transaction on this functional Lego NXT ATM. Built from Lego bricks, the Lego NXT Automatic Teller Machine includes HiTechnic IRLink and a Codatex RFID Sensor. It requires a PIN number on the functional keypad and has a display screen. This Lego ATM also accepts banknotes, changes notes into coins, gives cash back from bank cards.
This Lego robot is called the MultiCuber. It can solve Rubik’s Cubes at a competitive level. MultiCuber is constructed from Lego Mindstorms components and a laptop. It can solve 2×2, 3×3, 4×4, and 5×5 cubes.
Social media combined with Lego, how cool is that? The Lego Mindstorms robot NIKO can receive commands to be remote-controlled. Send special command tweets to @N900Niko to put the robot through its paces. NIKO can take picture, move forward and spin around. Have to you tried social media networking with a Lego robot yet?
Industrial Robot, RV-2 SQ : DigInfo
Mitsubishi Electric came out with a new robot arm that can work with small pieces in small spaces. The RV-2SQ is 10% faster, moves on 6 axes at high speeds, and best of all, builds Lego vehicles.
If you have a soft spot for fast cars, then this MOC of a Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grandsport may make you drool. It can be operated by remote control, including the sequential gearbox with 7+R speeds, convertible top, all wheel progressive brakes, handbrake, retractile spoiler and flap. This Lego technic supercar has a scale of 1:8.
King of Lego sculptures, Nathan Sawaya, created a five-foot tall Lego model of the Blackberry Tour 9360. Even better, the screen display works! He integrated a large flat screen TV into the model to simulate a Blackberry screen.
LEGO NXT Key Card Strong Safe
This Lego NXT safe, is accessed by a black and white key card. If the light sensor reads the right bars in the proper position, the safe will open. If not, the key card is rejected and access is denied. There is a NXT display screen at the back of the safe. The screen reads, checking…and if the card is correct, it then reads Access Granted before playing a little tune.
If you are a big Lego fan, then you might dream of someday owning a Lego vehicle. If you like Ferrari then you might also love this car. This Ferrari F1 racer actually drives and is human-sized. It took 80,000 Lego bricks to build this Ferrari racer.
This custom PC mod is Big Blue. It’s a tribute to the greatest Lego sets from the past including the Yellow Castle, the Firefighter Station, and Galaxy Explorer. It also has an HDTV tuner, spectrum analyzer, and built in touchscreen.
Luke put his geeky creativity to work again and came up with a fully functioning Lego router. It has two air vents, a row of clear bricks for the LEDs to shine though, and an opening for ports in the back. It also matches the Lego computer that he built. A boring Linksys WRT54GL router turned into a Lego router, that’s geeky greatness right there.
Lego mindstorms NXT Motorcycle 2
This Lego Mindstorms motorcycle is pretty cool. It’s not a trke, it’s a bike with front-wheel drive. We can’t wait until they make a human-sized version.
There are many doppelgangers and lookalikes out there. You could be minding your own business and see your evil twin stroll right on by. Well, imagine watching a Disney movie and seeing an animated version of yourself. That’s what this is. A tribute to celebrities that look like Disney characters.So sit back and enjoy the creepy similarities.
The Beast and Mickey Rourke – Even their back stories line up. Both started off good looking until some disaster struck. One was cursed by a magical beggar woman, the other cursed by terrible plastic surgeon after trying to return to boxing. It’s okay, though. Both make a comeback.
Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmations and Madonna – With that evil look of a geriatric desperately trying to hold onto what little youth they have left (or lost long, long ago) these ladies take their elderly angst out on acquiring youthful things like puppies or children from other countries.
The Little Mermaid’s Prince Eric and Patrick Dempsey – Both are idolized by chicks. Eric gets a statue made of himself that Ariel obsesses over and Dempsey played his role on Grey’s Anatomy which catapulted himself to the hearts of every college girl in America who needed somewhere to go after Sex and the City wasn’t around anymore.
Hercules’s Hades and Gary Buesy – Seriously. There might not be a better matchup. Both lurk in the shadows of Olympus or Hollywood, using their insanity to terrify everyone.
The Little Mermaid’s Ursula and Queen Latifah – You can view it in the light that both crave that singing voice. Ursula steals if from Ariel and keeps it in that weird shell around her neck and Queen Latifah (a.k.a. Dana Elaine Owens) began as a musician and turned to acting. But in simpler terms, both are large and in this picture, their hair is the same color. Good enough.
The Sword in the Stone’s Merlin and Richard Harris as Dumbledore in Harry Potter – Yeah, this may seem easy. But I very well could have chosen Ian McKellen or the new Dumbledore played by Michael Gambon instead of Richard Harris. But they don’t really have the same look that Harris does. Maybe it has something to do with the eyebrows.
Peter Pan’s Captain Hook and legendary Howard Stern – Okay, you have to use a little imagination for this one. It’s not a perfect matchup. But it was either Howard or Weird Al and it came down to the hair. Also Captain Hook is tall (Howard’s 6′5″) and frequently complains (Howard often complains about his looks). Imagine Peter Pan being the FCC and cutting off Hook’s hand which could metaphorically be Howard getting fired from NBC. But The King of All Media didn’t peter out. Instead he came back and became a name synonymous with mischief.
Peter Pan and Justin Bieber – The boy who wouldn’t grow up. Teenage girls flock to him. Some fly. But in the end, everyone despises him because every girl loves him (Wendy, Tiger Lily, Tinkerbell, etc). It’s almost too similar. Maybe Bieber’s shadow will run away from him.
The Lady and the Tramp’s Peg and Goldie Hawn – There’s no real similarities other than that they look alike. Not saying Goldie looks like a dog or whatever. Just the way Peg’s bangs hang over her face and the way she struts around is quite reminiscent of a 1980’s Goldie Hawn.
The Lion King’s Rafiki and Morgan Freeman – Maybe it’s because they both look so wise. Maybe it’s because everyone loves them both. Maybe it’s because of the white hair and beard. Or maybe it’s because of the freckles.
Four-year-old Wang Yiming poses with Emily Chang and the CNN crew.
Beijing, China (CNN) -- I first encountered Xiao Bao at a Beijing dance studio. He was wearing a Mickey Mouse T-shirt, zooming around the room, passing out lollipops and bottles of Cokes his parents had brought for our CNN crew. He seemed just like any other four-year-old, incredibly cute, giggly and overwhelmingly energetic.
Then he made a quick change, throwing on a black and gold costume and sunglasses, and suddenly he was China's youngest Michael Jackson impersonator.
As soon as the music started playing he started hip-hopping, pop and locking and moonwalking -- like a pro. My favorite part was that he moved his mouth to the English lyrics to "Dangerous," without actually saying them out loud or understanding what the lyrics mean.
At the end of his routine, he held his last pose an extra few seconds to get the appropriate amount of applause and ooh-ing and aww-ing. He definitely basked in the attention. When asked to tell us his favorite singer, Xiao Bao said in his limited English, "My-co Jay-ke-sun!" Then he collapsed into a fit of giggles.
Wang Yiming, famously known as Xiao Bao (which means "little treasure" in Chinese), first started performing when he was two years old, in a provincial children's talent competition. By the time we met him he had already danced his way through national competitions and television shows. These days, the aspiring "prince" of pop has gone global.
Earlier this year, Xiao Bao rocked out on the "Ellen" show in Los Angeles. Ellen Degeneres, a dance-lover herself, seemed quite impressed.
The attention and travel has been more than his parents could have ever hoped for. Xiao Bao was born extremely premature, weighing just over two pounds.
"The doctor told me they couldn't guarantee anything," his mother Bian Aiqin says. "It would be a miracle if Xiao Bao survived."
Their doctor advised them to assist Xiao Bao in doing physical exercises to build his strength.
"But he was too small for exercises," his mother recalls. "So we decided to play music for him, hoping he'd move to the beat."
And he did.
"To our surprise he was so attracted to the music. He stopped crying the moment he heard the melody," Bian says. When he got bigger he started dancing.
Xiao Bao's parents admit he has not led a normal childhood. After they discovered his love for dancing, the family moved from neighboring Hebei Province to Beijing so Xiao Bao could practice at China's best hip-hop dance studio six times a week.
Their little YouTube sensation continues to appear on television and most recently performed at the Shanghai World Expo. He's met celebrities from NBA superstars to Mickey Mouse himself (during a trip to Disneyland courtesy of "Ellen").
Xiao Bao is currently home schooled, but his mother says she hopes to put him back into regular school when his schedule allows for a normal routine. But they insist they're doing this only because he wants to.
His teacher agrees. "It's normal that when he's not practicing he's just moving around," says hip-hop coach Yang Ling. "Dancers need that kind of desire to perform whenever, wherever."
"He's still a child and there's a long life ahead of him," Xiao Bao's mother adds adds. "Nobody knows what will happen. So all I want is for him to be happy now."
His father, Wang Xiaojun, agrees, "His happiness is dancing."
As we finished our shoot and departed the studio, Xiao Bao still clad in his Michael Jackson costume gave each of us a kid-sized goodbye hug.
No less energetic than when we met him, he bounded into his mother's arms for another afternoon of MJ tunes as China's little Prince of Pop.
The Moject project proved that smartphones and pico projectors do indeed have a thing for one another, but Ethan Janson has taken things one step further with an unnamed contraption that holds his iPhone 3GS, a Microvision Show WX and an "ancient" point-and-shoot camera. Put simply, the handmade thingamajig allows him to play his iPhone games on a far larger screen, and since the Show WX is continually in focus regardless of distance from walls, there's never a blurring issue when flailing about in order to control the gameplay. The full skinny is down there in the source, but shortcut takers can head straight past the break for a video.
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All you art collectors out there. Here is a chance to get a Giclee copy of some of Ian M Sherwin work. Ian is planning on doing a whole series of Marblehead, Massachusetts paintings. His work is amazing.
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