Create your masterpiece by next Tuesday morning and email it to contests@gizmodo.com. Name your file FirstnameLastname.jpg and save it as a JPG, PNG or GIF. I'll go through the entries and select three winners and put the rest of the best in the Gallery of Champions. Get to it, for the good of America!

This wouldn't be the first time Qantas has blamed passengers' gadgets for an in-flight mishap; in July, a Bluetooth mouse was said to have resulted in a Qantas jet's autopilot being thrown off course. Passengers on Tuesday's ill-fated altitude drop will now be questioned regarding what electronics they may have been using at the time of the incident.

The issue of whether everyday personal electronics can actually cause any significant problems on board an airliner is clouded, to say the least. On one hand, it's hard to see how such common devices that meet FCC and UL interference standards can affect airliners that are designed to be able to withstand lightning strikes—critical components on a commercial jet are shielded to prevent any kind of interference getting through. On the other side, claims of the insulation degrading in older jets making them more susceptible to interference make sense. Then of course there is the perfectly rational "why chance it" argument.

This Wiki page delves into the issue in more detail, and Patrick from Ask the Pilot, one of my favorite online columns, gave the issue a characteristically sober and level-headed look earlier this year (verdict: interference technically possible but highly unlikely). So why Qantas would be making a push for this line of reasoning is kind of a mystery.

[UPDATE: Nick from Giz OZ has let us know that this story may be in fact a result of a misunderstanding—apparently a reporter got the jet's onboard computers (for navigation, etc) mixed up with the computers of actual passengers in his original report. The NTSB is still not ruling out interference from passenger gadgets, though.]

What about you guys? Do you heed the warnings to turn off everything, or fly in the face of danger with iPod blaring away during takeoff. Must admit I've been guilty of the latter, occasionally.

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[NZ Herald via Slashdot, Photo: Daquella Manera/Flickr]

Hu stated that Intel Atom dual core processors will start making an appearance in their products as soon as they can get their teeny tiny little hands on them. Company President Jerry Chen, apparently feeling left out, chimed in to say that there would be another refreshed Eee coming at around $300. With an even lower low end, Atom dual-core processor models and touchscreen units it's not really clear what Eee designation is supposed to mean anymore, though I'd say "things that Asus makes that someone might actually want" sums it up pretty well. [Digitimes]

I especially like the guy talking on the phone while going at it on his desk. Multitasking! [PopGive]

First and foremost, silver-zinc can offer up to 40 percent more battery life than traditional lithium-ion batteries and 200 + cycles at 100% discharge. ZPower claims that their product contains no toxic chemicals and is up to 95% recyclable—which I would assume means that they have addressed the problem of mercury leakage that plagues silver-zinc batteries at the end of their life-cycle. They also noted that the batteries feature a water-based chemistry that is completely non-flammable (unlike lithium-ion that has a reputation for the occasional explosion). The one major drawback of silver-zinc is the cost of the silver itself, but word is that ZPower is planning on a trade-in recycle policy that will help to offset costs. Sounds good, but we will have to wait and see if the notebook coming out next year will be important enough and affordable enough to drive sales.

Dr. Ross Dueber to Discuss First Silver-Zinc Battery
for Mobile Consumer Devices at Batteries 2008 in Nice

CAMARILLO, October 7, 2008 – Dr. Ross E. Dueber, president and CEO of ZPower, Inc., will discuss the industry’s first silver-zinc battery technology for consumer electronics at the Batteries 2008 conference in Nice, France, starting October 8th. His presentation will address the performance, environmental, and safety advantages inherent within ZPowerTM silver-zinc batteries, scheduled to launch in a major notebook computer in 2009. The annual event will be held at the Acropolis Convention Centre on October 8, 9, and 10. Batteries 2008 is a worldwide exhibition focused on power supply, with more than 400 attendees.
Dr. Dueber will discuss the next replacement for lithium-ion rechargeable batteries and what power source can take mobility into the future. “At the heart of the $55 billion global battery market is the chemical conundrum of power supply,” said Dueber. “Today’s consumer has the ability to watch an entire movie on a palm-sized device—but portable power technology has not kept up. Engineers admit that they are hitting the wall on lithium polymer and lithium-ion performance. Unstable lithium-ion batteries have resulted in a high number of product recalls by manufacturers of notebook computers. These market trends are creating a pressing need for a better battery.”

Silver-zinc battery chemistry is currently poised to move into the commercial marketplace for use in consumer electronics. This new silver-zinc battery chemistry uses the latest in advanced polymers, nano-technology, power electronics and processing methods to create a battery that surpasses other rechargeable batteries for notebook computers, mobile phone and consumer electronics applications.

The advantages of silver-zinc batteries can be summed up as follows:

High Performance – Up to 40% more run time than traditional lithium-ion batteries. And with recent improvements in battery cycle life, silver-zinc batteries achieve 200 + cycles at 100% discharge and thousands of cycles at intermediate discharge.

Clean Technology – Over 95% of key battery elements can be recycled and reused. The raw materials recovered in the recycling process of silver-zinc batteries are the same quality as those that went into the creation of the battery. Environmental impact is lessened since the need to mine for new materials is minimized.

Safe – Silver-zinc batteries contain no lithium and are inherently safe. They are not subject to the recent FAA air travel restrictions now placed on lithium-ion batteries. Silver-zinc batteries feature a water-based chemistry that is not flammable. The battery is therefore free from the problems of thermal runaway and fire.

[ZPower]

The DARPA Submersible Aircraft research project is focused on making a submersible aircraft, not, as they not, a flying submarine. There's a difference! This would be a plane first, designed to spend most of its time in the air, spending only short periods underwater.

The challenge is balancing the needs of an airplane (low weight) with a submarine (high weight). Here are the major requirements of the craft:

* Flight: The minimal required airborne tactical radius of the sub-plane is 1000 nautical miles (nm). The minimum surface tactical radius is 100 nautical miles. The minimum subsurface tactical range is 12 nautical miles. Note that the ranges quoted are one-way ranges. The platform would need to be able to fly to a location, insert and extract personnel without refueling and this would require the total operational range to be 1000 nm airborne, 200 nm surface, 24 nm under water.
* Loiter: The platform should be capable of loitering in a sea-state five, in theater between inserting and extracting personnel for up to 3 days (72 hours). The craft does not need to be submerged during loitering operations; it can operate at the surface.
* Payload: The platform should be capable of transporting 8 operators, as well as all of their equipment, with a total cargo weight of 2000 pounds.
* Depth: The operating depth of the platform will be constrained by balancing the need to reduce depth in order to minimize structural loads and snorkel complexity with the need to increase depth in order to minimize any potential signatures that could be generated by perturbing the free surface. The effect that the submerged platform will have on the free surface is exponentially proportional to the depth, therefore the platform should be able to operate at a relatively shallow depth and only have the snorkel affect the free surface.
* Speed: The speed of the platform in each mode of operation must allow the system to complete a tactical transit (1000 nm airborne,100 nm surface ,12 nm sub-surface) trip in less than 8 hours. This 8 hour time must include any time required by the platform to reconfigure between modes of operation.

If successful, it'll certainly be a feat of engineering. We'll see what they manage to come up with. [NetworkWorld]

The crew trekked down to Cambodia to use the military's equipment. At first, the Cambodian military didn't want to use a tank, so instead they taped a baseball to a rocket. This, obviously, didn't show how well the baseball would travel at such speeds, as it just blew everything up, as you can see above.

Then, after changing their minds, the Cambodians allowed a baseball to be loaded into one of their tanks using some super-secret method that was blurred out like the undergroomed nether regions of a Japanese porn star. This was much more successful, with the tank launching a baseball at about 203mph. The aiming, however, could have been better.

So simple, so ridiculous, so satisfying. Thanks, Japan! [Japan Probe]

When enabled, MyKey can cap the top speed of the car to 80MPH. That's not too bad, really. But it can also chime whenever the car reaches 45MPH, 55MPH and 65MPH, apparently to "alert young drivers about their acceleration." Oh-kay.

It can also limit the volume on the car stereo, which would piss me off to no end, and chime every five minutes when the seat belts aren't buckled. Lastly, it'll chime when the car is 75 miles from empty.

Essentially, it will beep at you all the time and keep you from listening to music loudly. Just the idea of driving down a road at about 55MPH, dipping below and above that speed frequently, hearing a beep every time I do, is enough to bring me to the brink of road rage.

Look for MyKey on the 2010 Ford Focus and later on other Ford, Lincoln and Mercury models. [Ford via CNET]

[Trends in Japan]

The LSST isn't slated to open up shop until 2016, but when it does, it'll record a whopping 30TB of data a night by aiming itself into the sky and recording what it sees. It'll be used to "trace billions of remote galaxies and measure the distortions in their shapes produced by lumps of Dark Matter, providing multiple tests of the mysterious Dark Energy."

What's more impressive is the setup they'll need to get all that data recorded. Check it:

* the Mountain/Base facility, which does initial data reduction and alert generation on a 25 TFLOPS Linux cluster with 60PB of storage (in year 10 of the survey)
* a 2.5 Gbps network that transfers the data from Chile (where the telescope itself will be based) to the U.S. and within the US
* the Archive Center, which re-reduces the data and produces annual data releases on a 250 TFLOPS Linux cluster and 60PB of storage (in year 10 of the survey)
* the Data Access Centers which provide access to all of the data products as well as 45 TFLOPS and 12 Petabytes of end user available computing and storage.

Pretty amazing stuff. [The Register]

They're all made out of the hoods of vintage American cars, making every table one of a kind and each one coming with what I can only assume is a light scent of gasoline. Not only are they beautiful, but they're also environmentally friendly: each table represents a hood that's not in a landfill and a tree that didn't have to turn into a table. They start at $850 and he also makes bed frames, desks and other furniture out of hoods. [Joel Hester via CoolHunting]

Apparently, a company offered VG a cool million for the opportunity to shoot the world's first space porn. That's more than the $200,000 they're charging per person for a flight, but it's unclear how the deal would have worked. Is that a million for the two actors, the director and the cameraperson? If so, that's not a very generous offer. If it's a million on top of four tickets, well, that's a bit more generous.

But still, I can't help feeling like that's a pretty low offer. Come on, Hefner. You can swing more than that, can't you? In the name of science? I'm sure Virgin Galactic is a dignified company and everything, but everyone has their price. Let's make this happen. [The Inquirer]

[Ab Solo]

If you must, submit your entries to contests@gizmodo.com with the subject line of "Adam is Awesome!" and no other subject line than that! Make your photos JPGs or PNGs or, if you must, GIFs. Send them in by Tuesday morning and I'll make a gallery of the best ones.

And remember that I'm a human being with feelings, you jerks!

Well, things aren't looking too great economy-wise. We might just be headed for a depression, which means you'll need to start changing your lifestyle. While you may start out by changing your lifestyle in subtle ways, you need to be mentally prepared for the fact that more, well, drastic measures may be necessary in the not-too-distant future. Luckily, I've hand-picked 10 gadgets that may be necessary in our frightening, Lehman-Brothersless future.

10. The first thing you're gonna want to do is start saving money. This Tomy RPG Piggy Bank makes saving money fun by featuring a simple game on the front that utilizes the money you insert into it. Make saving a game, you'll be more apt to do it! [Link]

9. A good way to save money is to stop using so much electricity. This energy saving remote lets you cut the power to all of your home theater electronics that suck up juice even when they're off. This should save you precious dollars every month. [Link]

8. Not everyone will be as responsible as you, and they may get desperate and try to steal your precious financial documents. Keep them locked up in this really intense hard drive/safe combo. It's fireproof and waterproof, so you can be sure nothing will happen to your data. [Link]

7. It's not just your digital property that you need to protect, its your physical property as well. This lock uses your fingerprint to allow access, so only you and your family will be able to get into your house when the looting and rioting begin. [Link]

6. OK, so they've cut the power to your home and you've barricaded yourself inside. You obviously can't go to the grocery store for food as all of the stores have been overtaken by roving bands of weapons-wielding former stock brokers, so you should ensure you've got plenty of non-perishable food to last you through the financial crisis. [Link]

5. So they set your house on fire, forcing you to flee into the woods. What you'll need is a tent that's quick to set up and quick to pack up when you hear the sounds of the bloodthirsty brokers crashing through the underbrush. This self-pitching tent sets itself up in the air as you throw it, allowing you to set up camp quickly and easily. [Link]

4. You'll want to be able to know the weather and charge your phone while you're on the run, and this is the device to do it for you. Assuming the national weather services haven't been overrun and destroyed, you'll be able to check on the forecast while charging your gadgets with this. [Link]

3. You need to escape the city, where all the former bankers are based, and since cars are susceptible to bombs and rocket launchers, you'll need something a bit more tough. The Rhino can withstand just about anything that's thrown at it and keep you and whatever is left of your family safe inside. [Link]

2. OK, so you needed to get out of the Rhino and dole out some punishment man-to-man. This recoilless auto shotgun can fire off 300 rounds per minute, making quick work of anyone with a blue shirt with white cuffs flecked with human blood around. Just make sure to pick up plenty of extra ammo while you're at it. [Link]

1. So you didn't make it. That's disappointing! You can at least leave a lasting memorial to yourself with your last near-worthless American dollars by purchasing this digital tombstone with your dying breath. It can display videos on its LCD monitor of you in happier times, buying gasoline for less than $150 a gallon and owning a house that actually has some value. Maybe in heaven things will be like that again. For your sake, I hope so. [Link] [Top image via Pink Tentacle]

I, for one, can't wait to get my mitts on one. [GetRobo]

This disease diagnosis works by detecting biomarkers — substances in the body that indicate specific diseases. For example, the protein PSA (prostate specific antigen) frequently appears at elevated levels in men who have prostate cancer; the currently administered PSA blood test is the most effective way to screen for the disease. With the Leeds team's new device, however, prostate cancer screening would become much easier.

When completed, it should make diagnosing diseases a much quicker and cheaper process, which will lead to earlier detection and better treatments. All good things! I look forward to testing myself for various diseases every day and becoming obsessed with checking and ensuring that I'm as healthy as humanly possible. [University of Leeds via io9]

The five major studios involved will help out by paying a "digital print fee" of about $800 to $1,000 per film, which is about how much it cost to send out physical prints. By doing so they'll help offset the billion dollar bill the theaters will be stuck with when upgrading all of their projectors. This means we'll be seeing more films shown digitally, as well as more films shown in digital 3D, a gimmick that you'll learn to loathe soon enough. But hey, more digital projectors is definitely something I can get behind. [WSJ]

Unsurprisingly, exercise is what made people the most unhappy from either gender. Men also were made more happy by "being intimate with another person" than women, while women were more likely to find happiness in pets. And everyone likes relaxing. What an illuminating survey!

In other news, black guys drive like this, while white guys drive like this. [Reuters]