Remember the gadget vending machines we told you about in Macy’s? It seemed pretty obvious at the time that the trend would continue. Check out this Best Buy vending machine spotted in the Dallas/Forth Worth airport, keeping flyers in gadgets and sucking up money like a black hole in a square box.

Travelers are always forgetting their gadgets or breaking them, even losing them. Which is why these machines are a smart idea. The machines are in several terminals, insuring that an iPod leaves on every flight. Expensive spur of the moment purchase? Sure. Gadget addiction ain’t cheap.

We entered the Politically Correct or PC age sometime in the 90′s, and the effect that it has had on censorship, whether blatant or mild, continues in one form or another to this day. Take the above image for instance. Moronic as it may seem, the cigarette in the hand of the man in the Mad Men promotional image was digitally removed when it was placed on iTunes.

Apparently Apple thinks that anyone who sees (a rough poster outline) of a man smoking, will begin smoking a pack a day immediately. It proves one thing I’ve known for years: Consumers are not nearly as stupid as those in charge of making such idiotic decisions as whether to remove a cigarette from a TV character’s hand or not. Yeah, people have been having trouble getting their iPhone to work for like a week, but they have the cigarette until control, never you fear.

The supply is expected to be plentiful, nevertheless a line has already begun outside of Apple’s Fifth Avenue retail store to buy iPhone 3G a week before its release. These people are serious and have their supplies for camping. Wouldn’t it be nicer to stay at home with your families?

Part of the line is occupied by some activists known as “Waiting for Apples” who are hoping to set a Guinness World Record and spread the word about sustainable agriculture. They brought their own solar-power generator, yoga mats, a compost bin full of worms, and probably other hippie essentials. Personally, I can’t think of a better way to spend a week then sitting on my ass next to these guys. Yeah, that would just be awesome…

Genetic testing isn’t something you can do in a few minutes. It’s an involved process, requiring special chemicals and instruments that aren’t commonplace everywhere. But now some scientists at Berkeley have created a technique that uses electrostatic tech instead, which simplifies everything.

The DNA is prepared in a lab first and put on a microarray. Negatively charged microspheres are spread across the surface, which push themselves into clumps as they move away from the like-charged DNA areas. It’s an easier and simpler way as well as less costly than current techniques we use now. Apparently the resulting clumps are large enough to be recorded by simple imaging devices like your cellphone camera. It means that in the near future DNA testing could be super quick and accessible.

Researchers at Tohoku University have reportedly figured out a way to “multiply the amount of data that can be stored on a DVD or CD by 9.” Apparently, it works by shaping the pits on a DVD’s surface like Vs, essentially allowing you to get more out of the disc. The problem is that existing DVD & CD players won’t recognize the media made in this way, and for some reason the process can’t be applied to Blu-ray Discs. Still pretty cool though.

The ICT Graphics Lab at USC has created a low-cost volumetric 3-D display that brings Princess Leia one step closer to begging Obi-Wan for help. The system projects high-speed video onto a rapidly spinning mirror. As the mirror turns, it reflects a different and accurate image to each potential viewer.

The rendering algorithm can recreate virtual and real scenes with correct occlusion, horizontal and vertical perspective, and shading. Close to 5,000 individual images are reflected every second within the surface area and create a real-space three-dimensional object. Video below.

The Japanese have done a ton of wacky things they should be ashamed of gadget-wise and otherwise. Now they’re getting into politics to sell phones and the result is bizarre. This commercial for Japan’s EMobile cellular company has a monkey dressed up in a suit, at a podium in front of a crowd.

The crowd is holding signs that read “Change.” At the end, the monkey cries a tear, clearly ashamed as he should be. Bad monkey. Their intentions may or may not have been entirely innocent, but we all know that if this aired in America there would be hell to pay.

Some German scientists with a love of bad horror movies and some time on their hands, have come up with the nerdiest brain-computer interface yet. It’s from the Technical University of Braunschweig.

No placing electrodes on your head with this one. This one is all about wearing a large metal helmet full of sensors, that can detect your brain activity through your hair. They claim that the system is good enough to control an RC car and they’re hoping to use it in wheelchairs and prosthetics. Check out a video below.

I wondered where all the geeks had gone. Now I know. The exhibit started on Saturday at the San Diego Air and Space Museum. Needless to say this event is a geek magnet as they will showcase all kinds of Trek ships, technology, aliens, sets, costumes and props. You’ll be able to sit in a recreation of the original Enterprise bridge, experience motion simulators, and quote lines from all your favorite moments. In other words, it’s kinda like a typical day in the life for some of you, just held somewhere other then your mom’s living room. Chances are some of you won’t even know the event is happening, as you’re too busy arguing about whether Comic con or Dragon con was more kick-ass, but I wanted to mention it.

If you happen to be in Las Vegas this weekend, you might want to check out the 2008 USA Rock Paper Scissors League Championship on June 20 in Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. The Champion with the best hand skills will win a $50,000 prize and a ticket to compete in Beijing,China during the Summer Olympics, where they will represent the U.S. in the inaugural International Rock Paper Scissors Federation Championship.

I’ve never been entirely clear on the official rules. It always gets tricky with rock against paper. Paper can wrap around a rock and strangle it, but on the other hand, rock can beat paper to a pulp. Check out the video below. It’s strangely mesmerizing.

According to the latest NPD Group report for game sales in May, this is the fourth month in a row that Nintendo has come out on top for the number 1 AND number two spot for console sales. The Nintendo Wii and the handheld Nintendo DS were the two top-selling hardware units for May, 2008.

Nintendo sold over 675,000 Wii consoles in May and almost 453,000 Nintendo DS’s, which would probably explain all the new colors and designs they have been coming out with lately for the DS. Sony’s Playstation 3 followed with a little under 209,000 units sold and Microsoft sold 186,600 Xbox 360 units during the same period.

It’s that time of the week again, which means a look back at the week that was in our network of blogs. It’s been a busy week all around and as usual Poptherapy kept you abreast on all the latest geek news and popculture, while over at Wealthyreader it was all about ways to get wealthy or stay wealthy. Our health blog, Healthyreader focused on ways to stay healthy and enjoy it all. Health, wealth and geekiness is a great combination. Here’s some of what you may have missed.

In what surely has to be a perfect collaboration between McDonalds and Nintendo, McDonalds is making it easier then ever to order food that will have you working twice as hard on the Wii-Fit. hmmm. Then you’ll get hungry again. Let’s see, who makes it easiest to get a disc shaped hunk of grease on a sesame seed bun? And the circle is complete, my friends. McDonald’s will introduce a new system that’s currently testing in Japan.

It’s a payment application that’s downloaded into your phone and when you place your phone over an RFID reader, you can pay instantly or use coupons and the like.

Microsoft released a statement today that said it was “considering and has raised with Yahoo an alternative that would involve a transaction with Yahoo but not an acquisition of all of Yahoo.” Microsoft would not give details, but word is that sources at both companies agree that it involves Microsoft buying Yahoo’s search business as well as their ad business related to text-based ads. I hope Yahoo puts out soon, cuz I’m getting sick of hearing about it.

Google has announced that they will launch Friend Connect, a new service that will allow any site to be turned into a social network. No charge. Basically, Google wants to turn the internet into one huge, universal social profile. Google wanted to tap into the hundreds of millions of users that participate in social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

But when you’re Google, you don’t make a competing site and then see what happens, you launch a service that turns the internet itself into one humongous social networking platform which can be used by anyone, with no charge.