One look at eBay and you can see that “Guitar Hero III” or “Rock Band” are being sold for big bucks. These two rhythm simulators are among this year’s hottest holiday presents and are sold out at the retail level leaving the online auction house as the only alternative for snagging yourself a set. However one Australian youth’s dreams of a music-making Christmas have been shattered by his father as a consequence of being caught red handed smoking pot in the family’s backyard.

The trouble started when the father, whose identity is being withheld but makes his living as a school teacher, came home and caught his son in the company with some friends toking up. As a lesson the anti-dope Dad decided to place his son’s Christmas gift, the guitar/game combo of “Guitar Hero III”, on the eBay auction site and up for sale.

Admit it, you like to be different and have unique things that your friends and neighbors would love to have. With the holidays it’s pretty hard to break free and be different since everyone is doing the same ideas: Christmas tree in the corner, lights on the house, maybe a talking Santa outside your front door. But if you really want to stand out in the crowd having a 7-foot-tall upside-down Christmas tree in the corner of your family room may be the ultimate.

What you see is what you get: a pre-lit, 7-foot-tall X-mas tree. The tree comes with 800 pre-strung lights on it and 3,700 PVC branch tips spread across its 54-inch diameter. It might not be suited for hanging your Christmas ornaments on it but you have to admit that there is plenty of room under the tree for presents. It weighs 84 pounds so better make sure that it’s securely fastened to the ceiling (unless you want to lay a trap for Santa.) A nickel under $600 and it’s yours forever.

In William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream” the name of the King of the Fairies was Oberon. He is also the King of the Shadows so something dark might be befitting of a name worthy of this deity which is precisely what the makers of the latest new watch design from Tokyoflash were probably thinking. Like most of the watches offered by these fellows the Oberon dispenses with the tradition two hands and minutes/hours number divisions in favor of patterned LED lights. When you read the time on the Oberon you start by looking at the outer ring of LEDs to determine the hour, the second ring of lights determines what minute it is and the third inner ring is devoted for grouping minutes into blocks of ten. It might sound complicated but picking it up is fairly simple and only takes a few glances at your watch. The watch will also tell you what date it is, all you need do is press a button and you can do that by LED lights too.

Geeks have Christmas trees too not just because we enjoy the holidays but it also helps us get more presents to be placed underneath the holiday tree. You may want to share some of your passions with guests by having unusual Christmas ornaments adorned on your tree. Maybe you have a Star Trek ornament, or maybe there is an Elvis Presley ornament that rocks when you switch it on. In any case there is more ways to display your hobbies and likes than ever before during this holiday season.

One of the cooler things that the Brick has spotted this year is a LED ornament called Season’s Readings. The idea is pretty simple, it’s a Christmas ornament that has a LED band around its mid-section where words scroll along. You can select 8 different holiday themed messages such as “Merry Christmas”, “Happy New Year”, “Feliz Navidad”, “Joy to the World”, “Peace on Earth”, “Seasons Greeting”, “Home For Xmas” and the non-denomic “Happy Holidays”. All it requires are 4 AA batteries and $14.95 of your hard earned cash.

The marketing research firm NPD has turned in their analysis of what the top video game titles and consoles were last month and the news is very good for the industry as a whole. Leading the top in sales of new software was Activision’s “Call of Duty 4″ for the Microsoft Xbox 360 which sold an impressive 1.57 million copies. Nintendo’s “Super Mario Galaxy” came in second place and if you combine the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 sales for “Assassin’s Creed” it would actually take the silver medal. Not coincidentally Ubisoft’s “Assassin’s Creed” has emerged as the best-selling new IP for games in recent years.

Nintendo’s handheld DS gaming device sold an amazing 1.53 million units in November which was enough to give it the top of the chart for hardware sales. In second place was Nintendo’s Wii gaming console with 981,000 Wiis sold followed by Microsoft’s Xbox 360 in third spot with 770,000 units finding homes. Sony moved 577,000 PlayStation Portable to give it fourth place and the price drop in the PS3 convinced 466,000 consumers to go out and buy one of the consoles last month.

Earlier this year Blizzard Entertainment, the makers of the world’s most popular MMO game “World of Warcraft”, sent their fans into overdrive by announcing that a new game project would be revealed at a Korean “Starcraft” gaming convention. This lead to much speculation that the game would be a new MMO, possibly even a “Starcraft” themed massive multiplayer game. Job postings by Blizzard looking for programmers for a next gen MMO only helped to fuel the fire but when the day arrived the mystery game in question turned out to simply be “Starcraft II”.

Now that several months have slipped by and the hype has dissipated it appears that a Blizzard representative has confirmed that there is a secret MMO game in development at the company. In a discussion thread on the Blizzard forums about the merger between Activision and Vivendi (which owns Blizzard) a Blizzard rep let loose the first official comment about the rumored MMO by saying “It is an unannounced next-gen MMO and that doesn’t mean an expansion for World of Warcraft either.”

The makers of the Safe Type Ergonomic Keyboard are rolling out what they call a Vertical Mouse designed to relieve some of the strain you place on your hand, arm and neck muscles while scrolling and clicking. It may look like a joystick but the Vertical Mouse lets you do the same things that you can do using a traditional mouse. The scroll wheel is positioned at the top of the unit allowing your thumb to do your web browsing needs. Nestled on the side grip are the right and left buttons. Unfortunately for all you lefties out there and customers of Ned Flanders’ Leftorium it only comes in a right-hand model.

With a one-year warranty and compatibility with all USB computers (including Mac but sorry, no Windows 95 or NT support), the SafeType Mouse goes for $74.

If you are looking for that extra-special Christmas present for yourself and feel that your ear needs to have more attention from passersby, might we suggest treating yourself to one of only 100 special Motopure H12 Bluetooth headsets being manufactured by Motorola and luxury custom mobile phone maker Alexander Amosu? This sheik fashion-meets-technology statement is made from 18 karat gold (in your choice of yellow or white) and incorporates over 180 cut diamonds amassing a total of 3.47 carats. You can even choose to mix up your diamonds in the standard brilliant clear white, pink or even black color choices just to express your individuality.

Naturally something like this doesn’t come cheap. Before you jet over to Selfridges or Harvey Nicholls in London to place your order you should know that the base model, the bottom of the line, the cheapest one they’ve got will cost you $8,175 while the tricked out big blinged one that will transform your earlobe into a member of 50 Cent’s entourage runs $12,775 plus tax. All we have to say is that for that kind of price tag you not only better remember where you set your headset down but we suggest that you alarm it as well.

This next story should give you pause to think about what may be ahead in the near future for the emerging biotechnology sector. A science team at South Korea’s Gyeongsang National University announced that they have successfully cloned kittens that have a modified gene that alters their skin color. When placed underneath an ultraviolet light a unmodified cat will look green. These new genetically modified cats have a fluorescent protein inserted into their DNA which makes their skin appear red under the same kind of UV light.

Three cloned Turkish Angola kitties were born in early 2007 but one died shortly after. The two surviving cats now weigh 3.5 kilograms and appear to be perfectly healthy representatives of the feline race. Aside from being able to make funky colored critters the new procedure is hoped to be used for bringing back the populations of animals on the endangered species list as well as identifying and eliminating genetic diseases in people and pets.

Frosty frozen mornings are here and if you commute to work using your own vehicle then you know all about taking extra time to get your windshield and side view windows ice and frost free. One neat concept that seems especially practical for this task is a rechargeable cordless heated ice scraper designed to clear up your vehicle’s view. Available on Amazon.com by Get Organized, you simply charge up the scraper using your car’s power/lighter outlet and then pull it out when you need to get the ice away. With no batteries needed or a power cord to get in the way the scraper heats up fast and can remove up to 4 inches of ice and snow from your windshield lickety split. A charge is good for up to three hours of power and when the windshield is all clear the scraper automatically shuts off. Priced at $16.99 it would make a great stocking stuffer along with a new pair of thermal mitts (or indoor parking.)

Time magazine has released its list of the top ten videogames of the year. Can you take a guess at what made their number one spot? If you guessed “Halo 3″ you don’t win a prize. “Like a pebble that has been rounded over the centuries by the gentle splashing of the ocean waves, ‘Halo 3′ has become the perfect hardcore first-person combat simulator,” said Time in their idol worship of the Xbox 360 killer app. “By dint of painstaking labor on the part of its developer, Bungie, it has been refined over three installments to the point where it delivers only pure, unadulterated gaming bliss.” Who knew that the editors at Time were down with playing some Master Chief deathmatches?

Of the titles that made Time’s best of 2007 list six are exclusive to one videogame system, of which three are for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and one each for Sony’s PlayStation 2, Nintendo’s DS and Wii console systems. Why didn’t at least one PlayStation 3 exclusive title make it on Time’s list? And no “Guitar Hero III” (or is that game now redundant that “Rock Band” is out and lets you play drums as well as guitar?)

Litrospheres are a self-luminous micro-particle that can be painted on any object allowing it to glow without the need of any electric current. The paint was designed by MPK and is said to be non-toxic even though the betavoltaic technology that’s used for Litrospheres is derived from a radioactive gas (the company rep says that the radiation can’t escape from the paint molecules so you don’t need to worry about glowing yourself.)

It can be produced in a variety of colors. Do you want blue walls that glow? Done. Some pink trim on your house so you can see it off in the distance when night falls? Not a problem but your neighbors may think otherwise. If you think about it the practical applications extend a lot further than tripping out your bike or car. Liferafts, safety vests, hazard signs, even the lines on the road could be painted using Litrospheres and be more easily seen at night.

When organic light-emitting diode (OLED) televisions were first put on display people were immediately grabbed by the stunning resolution and bright color capabilities possible. Place an OLED TV beside a plasma or LED TV and the difference is immediate. That is also true if you place the price tag of the OLED beside the plasma/LED. Because OLED technology is still new the price range for these kinds of TVs are astronomical. The first commercial OLED TV is Sony’s XEL-1 and its 11-inch display will set you back about $1,800 if you can find one (they are only available in Japan right now.)

Today the chairman of Sony said that the company will begin to sell OLED televisions in America starting next year. “When you look at OLED, your impulse is to say ‘wow’. We need that reaction from people at Sony … it’s a statement of confidence, that there is a path to somewhere else,” said Howard Stringer at a Sony vision seminar held in Tokyo.

After being banned from Britain twice the makers of the controversial video game “Manhunt 2″ have won their appeal to have the game put on sale. The British Board of Film Classification voted twice on not allowing the bloody title by Rockstar Games to go on sale on the grounds that the material contained in the game focused too much on showing too graphic scenes of murder and sadism. “Manhunt 2″ lets you play as an inmate incarcerated in an insane asylum where bedlam and violence rules.

After the second ban by the BBFC in October Rockstar filed an appeal with the Video Appeals Committee. In a ruling issued on Monday the VAC determined that the game should be allowed to go on sale in the United Kingdom. The specific reasons for the VAC’s decision won’t be published until later in the week. “We are pleased that the decision of the Video Appeals Committee has recognized that ‘Manhunt 2′ is well within the bounds established by other 18+ rated entertainment,” said Rockstar Games in a statement released shortly after the decision was made.

It’s the season to be gobbling up power pellets and chasing flashing blue ghosts for the residents of Madrid, Spain. That is where this giant Pac-Man inspired Christmas tree can be found in all of its LED glory. Situated in the Nuevos Ministerios part of downtown, photos of the tree have appeared online but unfortunately we don’t know much else about who made it, how tall it is, how many lights were used in its making or if it’s three or four-sided like the photos seem to suggest. It is partially animated and some of the ghosts and Pac-Man dash back and forth. We give props to the faithfulness of the colors and light placement. All that is missing are joysticks and the ability to play the game while standing in front of the tree. Oh well, there is always next year to unveil the upgrade. Follow the link below to see a video that someone took of the tree.