For those of you who can’t make tomorrow night’s show of kinetic art, we have a sneak preview. This centipede was made by that virtuoso of aluminum Nemo Gould, whom we have several kinds of crushes on over here at SB*. If those kind of look like bundt pans and bike brake levers, you are exactly right, Sir or Madam!

*[SB adds: Seriously, you have no idea]

As a follow up to the Hexapod-Meisterschaft post (sent to us courtesy Laughing Squid) we bring you little bit of explanation, and a little bit of Massïve Hëxäpöd Meistermäschinen!

These six-legged carryings-on are the result of the Fachhochschuler Oberösterreich, which as near as I can figure out is a network of technical high schools in Austria (any Austrians reading this please to shed light on this?). They have a lovely hexapod competition, and from the funk these machines bring, they do teach them a thing or two at FH Oberösterreich.

You can get your own hexapod kit to play around with at the wonderous Trossen Robotics, which I personally think is really great idea because baby robots need new pairs of shoes over here, if you get my meaning (yes, we are proud participants in the Trossen affiliate program).

Speaking of Austria, we are shipping the Rotor off to Vienna this Saturday for RoboExotica; his crate is almost done and we promised to put enough water and padding in there this time, so expect to hear from him and what those crazy Austrian cocktail roboticists are up to.

RoboGames fave Kazu Terasaki demonstrates an incredibly cute concept in iPhone add-ons: if your phone rings, why should you go fetch it? in this day an age, make it come to you!

Kazu has developed a kit for making just about anything into a walking robot, a la this iPhone, check it out here (some assembly and Japanese language skills required)!

[via robots.net and Norri!]

[Yes, thank you I know video posts are a cop-out. I imagine someone might have something intelligent to say at some point around here, I promise. Many thanks to the adorable and Vienna-bound Head Rotor for holding down the fort for us for a while; it's been hectic around here]

Or maybe it’s upside down? Inside out?

The irresistible Lem sends along this experiment that one intrepid young scientist undertook to. . .well, he could be doing it to to explore involuntary impulse control, investigate natural reactions to outside stimuli, or working up a prototype for machine-face interaction.

Or he might have just wanted to see what happens when you tape a bunch of electrodes to your face and give yourself little shocks alongside an amusing little electronic track:

Remember kids, science is freakin’ AWESOME.

This will likely last precisely as long as it takes the Dailymotion people to wake up and find the C&D from Pixar in their inbox, but here it is anyhoo:

Tip o’ the hubcap to the ever-reliable Waxy

[Edit by SB: Aaaand there you have it. I am sure it is around elsewhere, and it's worth finding!]

So the Rotor was just over at the Seemen Development Labs and managed to get an exclusive spy photo of the latest alcohol delivery unit under construction by Artistic Director Kal Spelletich. This gadget walks gripper-over-gripper along an overhead wire, and carries a payload of an electrically-valved bottle of Jameson, as well as some cameras and video monitors allowing you to see the world through the robot’s eyes. Too early in the development cycle to even have a name yet, you can see it in action at Roböxotica, the International Festival of Cocktail Robotics, should you happen to be in Vienna the week after Thanksgiving.

The Rotor will be there, hopefully with Chassis in tow. See you in Wien, prost!

DocPop alerts us to Ganzbot, a personable (robotable?) device that speaks and emotes. Ganzbot is designed to be hooked into microblogging site Twitter, which, among others, has ensnared MissySB and the Rotor in it’s addictive embrace.

Being as The Head Rotor, Mr. Robotics and myself live in San Francisco, so along with the usual ballot type measures, we get the fun stuff like Prop R Prop 8. Yes on the first, HELLS no on the second (if we may be permitted to lodge oblique political preferences on this website, which we are, on occasion).

In the meantime, this video is the emblem of a sweet future for our robot overlords:

Thanks Laughing Squid for the video!

I will be watching the results on Twitter (follow WashPostResults for state-by-state reporting) while attending a very important business function at Lagunitas Brewery this evening, which will entail drinking enough beer so that we can’t tell the difference between the hero and the villain, Purim-style.

Roommates stealing your beer? Getting tired of coming home from class/work to find the whole 12-pack gone?

A fridge that only YOU can open:

Full details here: http://revision3.com/systm/rfid/