The Walt Disney Company (NYSE:DIS) announced yesterday that they have acquired Kerpoof Studios.  Disney paid an undisclosed amount for Colorado-based Kerpoof.  Kerpoof has built an online tool for kids to make artwork and create movies.  Kerpoof’s technology will become integrated into Disney’s.  This will allow kids to create artwork using Disney characters such as Mickey Mouse, the cast from Cars, and the Little Mermaid.

Kerpoof will continue to run in Colorado and their website Kerpoof.com will continue to stay online.  Krista Marks, Kerpoof’s co-founder will become GM of Disney Online Kerpoof Studios.  Kerpoof is especially popular with elementary school teachers.  Kerpoof monetizes their site through premium accounts for $45 per year.

[via Reuters]

How cool does the above picture look?  Rirkrit Tiravanija has put together a ping pong table made out of a mirror.  The mirror ping pong table is available on display at NYEHaus at Gramercy Park in NYC until February 22.

I think this is as artistic as the cherry spoon in Minneapolis and the articificial waterfalls that were placed around New York City.

Honeywell is not best well known for creating electronics.  Their core competency seems to revolve around utilities, but clearly they want to take on companies like Philips and Sony in this case. Honeywell has created an 82″ LCD HDTV.  The  Altura LE series HDTV has five sizes: 47″, 57″, 65″, 70″, and 82″.  The display is 120,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, 600 cd/m2 brightness and 178-degree viewing angle.  The Taiwanese supplier SOYO puts together the display for the Altura LE series.

[via SlashGear]

Vuzix has announced that they are now shipping Vuzix iWear AV310, a personal video player for your face.  The video eyewear places a 52″ large screen display over your head from any video player on the go such as the iPod Touch or iPhone.  The Vunix AV310 is the first virtual reality eyewear with widescreen aspect ratio.

The AV310 device is “state-of-the-art technology at a price point far below anything our competition has to offer,” according to the company.  The AV310 is a dual 428×240 LCD screen that can project up to 52″.   The virtual eyewear device is available for $250.

[via SlashGear]

Someone call the U.S. government espionage department!  This is one of the most high-tech spy gadgets I’ve seen.  The camera is smaller than a golf ball and can capture images at 320×240 resolution at 30fps.  About 1,200 still images and 6 hours of video can be saved on a 8GB micro SD memory card.  The rechargeable battery has about 2.5 hours of continuous operation from an 8 hour charge.

If you’re interested in buying it, go to the manufacturer website Hammacher.com.

[via BBG]

Minneapolis, the home of the Twins, Vikings, Target headquarters, Northwest Airlines headquarters, Best Buy headquarters, and my former place of residence suffered a tragedy in 2007.  The I-35W bridge collapsed and took several lives with it.  It was one of the saddest days in Minneapolis history.  The most important thing learned from the incident is that the U.S. must take extra precaution with its infrastructure.  The new I-35W bridge will have 400 sensors built into the concrete of the bridge.

The new Mississippi River bridge was designed using a paperless system using laser topography scanners, on-site tablets, and 3D renderings.  Below is a video demo put together by BusinessWeek:

[via CrunchGear]

Vertu has unleashed a new line of phones under their Constellation line.  The new line of phones are called the Pure Collection.  The Vertu Constellation Pure Collection is the result of two years of research.  The coloring process of the phone alone took a very long time.  The Pure White version, pictured above is made of polished steel and has a ceramic keypad.  The pillow of the phone is made of white leather.

A Vertu Constellation Pure is available in black too.  The black version is made of PVD treated steel, black ceramic keypad, and black leather.  Only 2,500 of each phone will be made.

[via Sybarites]

The ASUS Eee PC 1000HE is now available on Amazon.com in the U.S.  The blue version of the netbook is available for $374.  It has a 10 inch display on 1024×600, 160GB hard drive, and the Intel N280 1.66GHz processor.  The battery is 6-cell and runs for 9.5 hours.  The netbook comes with WiFi and Bluetooth 2.0.  There is a 1.4 MP webcam built in and 10GB of online Eee storage.

To buy the device, here is the Amazon.com direct link to it.

[via SlashGear]