Phil Torrone and a number of web ninjas will be meeting in Second Life tonight to partay like it's the Cheap Hotel. Phil will be wearing his "wearable computer" and there is a live music feed and all sorts of coolness.

If you're staying in tonight come join MAKE and Eric Rice in the virtual world, Second Life. The party will be at Spin Martin's place (Eric Rice) - at the Spin Martin Estate in Palulop (117/231). Eric has set up numbers to call 1-818-237-5533 or toll free 1-800-978-KSSX and will be streaming music in world.

New Year's Eve - Virtually! [MakeZine]

For those of you hunting for the coolness I showed on the Montel Williams show yesterday (I know! THE Montel Williams!) here we go:

Nokia 770 - www.nokia.com - It's a tiny web tablet for email and web-browsing. About $350.
ScottEVest Tactical v4.0 Solar - www.scottevest.com - A cool jacket with loads of pockets and a solar panel on the back. About $795. Check out the leather Milan as well.
Nooka Watches - www.nookawatch.com - Designer Matthew Waldman is a Gizmodo favorite and these watches will drive your sig. other crazy until they figure out the secret code. $250.
Plantronics Pulsar 590A - www.plantronics.com - Wireless Bluetooth headphones/headset. It works with any MP3 player and any Bluetooth compatible phone. Completely wireless. About $150.
BrightFeet - www.comforthouse.com - Light-up LED slippers. $39.95.
Battery Cellphone Charger - I can't find the website, but these are available at convenience and electronic stores everywhere.

John here. Just getting over our own hangover—a BABY hangover—and thought I'd wish you all a Happy New Year and talk about some of our upcoming coverage. The A-Team: Intern Travis, VV, Tobey, and Noah will be hitting CES this week for some boozing and schmoozing—all in your name. If there's something SPECIFIC you'd like to hear about—HDTVs, car audio, or the length of Ron Jeremy's "beige beauty" (CES usually coincides with the Adult Video Awards or whatever they're called, which allows thousands of geeks to say that they "dated" a porn star (sorry, boys, sitting across from one in the Palms while you and your buddies nebbishly titter doesn't count)—please let us know. CES is a big show and if there's something that you'd like to hear about, we can send our warrior monkeys in to get the info.

Also, any CES attendees are more than welcome to drop tips @ gizmodo dot com an email with your impressions and even some photos. Please add "ROCKING CES" to the subject line and make all photos about 520 pixels on the top side. All submissions will get a comments invite and you will be considered a monster of rock, up there with Joe Satriani and Peter Buck.

We'll also be taking Monday off for travel and recuperation, but keep us posted if you find something cool. I'll be on all week.

Now, let's all curl up with a bottle of Jack and a revolver with one bullet in the chamber and watch Dick Clark shamble up to Ryan Seacrest and eat his brains.

BTW - This will be the last baby picture of Kasper, but he makes a perfect Baby New Year—bleary eyed, squalling, occasionally cute, but stinky as all get out.

Filed under: Digital Cameras

Looks like the folks over at DigitalCameraInfo have the first review up of the hotly anticipated Nikon D200. You remember the $1,700 green, 10.2 megapixel D-SLR followup to their own D100 and squeezed somewhere in between rival Canon's EOS 5D and EOS 20D shooters. They found the D200's "excellent interface" "easy" to operate for an experienced photographer delivering "excellent images" with high marks for the "big improvement" in autofocus performance. On the other hand, they had few minor issues with the "lousy" RAW conversion software and were disappointed that the viewfinder only shows 95 percent of the final image instead of 100 percent like "the top cameras" do. Bottom line: this is an "excellent camera" for the pro or serious hobbyist especially as a step up from the D100 or for an experienced film user looking to finally switch. Thanks Bill and Ted for the most excellent review.

[Thanks, Robin]

Filed under: Household

In a world gone mad with the expectation of instantly contacting anyone, anywhere -- it's nice to see a product come along to remind us that always-on is a choice: the Home Phone Control. With a simple button push you can quickly and easily shut off all the (landline) phones in the house blocking both inbound and outbound calls.  So don't go hiding the device from the kids while trying to control their outbound calling hours 'cause they just might need to make a call to 911 on your behalf, dig? The process is entirely manual so don't expect to set up automatic do-not-disturb time blocks a la the LineLok, but then what do you expect for a $19.99 device with line-splitter? Their site says "available soon" with the expectation of taking orders "before the end of 2005" giving them, oh, about a dozen hours to get their shiznit together.

 [Thanks, Brent]

Sky TV over in United Kingdomland will be launching the UK's very first HD service in early 2006. It will be available in 720p and 1080i for sexy goodness. The HD box will contain both the Sky service and include a PVR to record all of that trashy British television. Initially Sky will only be offering a limited number of channels in HD, including Sky Sports, Sky One, Sky Movies and up to ten HD movies a week from Sky Box Office. Is this one step closer to my dreams of finally being able to watch the BBC in HD? I hope.

Sky HD TV Is Upon us [Gadgetspy_]

It seems that Dell and Microsoft may be having a falling out as of late. For the past decade Dell and Gates have been closer than Bert and Ernie, but things are beginning to drift apart after two recent changes that Dell made. First, the company began shipping desktop and notebooks over in the UK with Firefox installed as the default browser, and that's a big Microsoft no-no. Second, today we learned that Dell will not be supporting HD-DVD even though there are reported incentives that swayed HP happily over to the HD-DVD side. Is a more mainstream option to buy a computer without an operating system coming soon? Please say it's so, Dell.

Is the Dell/Microsoft Alliance Fracturing? [Digital Media Thoughts]

Yesterday we speculated on the new Intel logo. Today the confirmed news came and we were correct in our speculation. The official rebranding will take place at CES, which is less than a week away. They will be scrapping the cliché and over-parodied "Intel Inside" logo for a new design that properly reflects Intel's latest swing into the more general consumer market. The "Intel Inside" catch line will be replaced with the new "Leap Ahead," and as we mentioned yesterday, the individual tags placed on computers will reflect what kind of processor is being used within.

Intel Launches New Logo and Brand Renewal [DesignTechnica]

Overheating overschmeating is what Cool IT Systems has to say about the Xbox 360. From day 1 of the Xbox 360 release there have been complaints and issues that ultimately go back to overheating, Cool IT has done something about this by installing a water cooling system in an Xbox 360 that will get unveiled at CES 2006. Expect some very pictorial coverage of this next week from CES 2006.

Press Release

Our half-brother twice-related through marriage, Kotaku, has some juicy information coming out of the rumor mill regarding the PS3 and stability. Their insider, Fishie, unlike most tippers, actually has some credibility when he reported dead-on facts about the Xbox 360 prior to E3 has a little info about the PS3. Here is what he has to say:

PS3 Info Before I Head Out Of Japan Friday Towards Noon, Thats Tokyo time. Have fun waiting a while longer boys. No way that thing is coming out in March. The games just arent there and lots of other isseus I cant delve into right now.

Rumor: PS3 Riddled With Issues, Delay Likely? [Kotaku]

Who want $500? Well then click here and vote for which gizmo you think should be the top dog of 2005. With the submissions you have the option to submit an email address that will be entered into a drawing to win a $500 Circuit City gift card.

Our last two contestants are the PSP, a mobile media and gaming powerhouse, and the Treo 650, a smartphone that has revolutionized mobile communication. Same old contest rules apply so get your vote on by clicking the linkage below. Polls will close on Saturday so hurry up you money-grubbing sheep.

Best of Gizmodo – Final Thunderdome Battle

Filed under: Cellphones

We here at Engadget pass no judgements on those who might find cellphone based tsunami alerts to be a needed safety feature and not just some gimmicky cash-in on public paranoia, but seriously guys. The Mobile Tsunami Detector 1.0 relies on real-time earthquake readings to create tsunami warnings for all countries along the Indian Ocean and is a free download for Series 60 phones. So there. Now don't come whining to us when you're last on the block to know.

[Via MobileMag]

eBay is being used to fight crime? Well it was, in a way, for a 44-year-old German whose digital camera was recently stolen. What did this guy do post-theft? Naturally he tried to repurchase the same model camera to match all of his accessories, then things got a little fishy when the eBay seller whom he bought the camera from happened to be from the same town as him. Police are now questioning the seller who claims he puchased the camera at a flea market.

German buys back stolen camera on eBay [Reuters]

Just how different are the traditional music hardware manufacturers from, say, Apple? Here's an example: while Apple sues and subpoenas bloggers for repeating an internal leak about a product that never shipped, legendary music synth maker Dave Smith Instruments casually throws a description, price, and color photo of its upcoming mono keyboard on a heavily-trafficked user forum. At least, we think they're different; haven't checked the fax machine for legal documents yet today. Expect a phat, real analog sound, mono operation (we don't need no stinkin' polyphony for our synth leads), and a street price somewhere around $1000.

Rumor Mill: Dave Smith Mono Evolver Keyboard, Revealed? [Create Digital Music]

Filed under: HDTV

Taiwan's Proton will roll out a series of HD LCDs at CES next week, in sizes ranging from 37 to 55 inches. The displays will support both 1080p and 1080i, and will come equipped with both digital and analog tuners. Sure, 55 inches may not be all that big anymore (though most of the affordable sets in that size tend to be either rear-projection or DLP), but we're banking on continued competition from companies like Proton to keep driving prices down, to the point where we can actually put one of these on the wall of every room in the Engadget mansion. We'll try to grill these guys for some pricing info (the 37-incher has an MSRP of $2,799, but we don't really care about that) when we're at CES.

[Via TG Daily]