Library Tech Confidential

Chumby is an eminently hackable, wifi-enabled, open-source, widget displaying ambient device currently in pre-release (full launch in early 2008).For now, you can play with a plethora of widgets that pull data from tons of popular sites and web2.0 services as well as pretty much anything else via RSS. Best of all, you can try setting up your own channels (essentially pre-programmed widget slideshows) and view them using an embeded ‘virtual’ Chumby like the one above.

It pulls down content from the web via wifi, but suffers from the need to be plugged in to draw power rather than incorporating a battery. With any luck, some enterprising hardware hacker will come up with a simple way to add an external battery (or, dream on, an internal one plus a handy docking station).

Price? ~$180USD. Do not want!

Guiding Light: Which book light outshines the others? - “If these people have nothing to hide, why do they sneak off to a dark corner with their tiny, battery-operated lights? Why do they continue to read after their spouses have gone to sleep? What, exactly, are these book lighters planning?” [Slate]