LG's new touchscreen phone is begging for your thumbgrease

We always say touchscreens are the future of cellphones, and here's proof that it isn't just a pie-in-the-sky idea. The LG KE850 is all screen, with whatever buttons you need coming up for you to press as needed.

There are certainly some drawbacks to touchscreen devices, such as their lack of tactile response, imperfect mapping making you press the wrong buttons, and their propensity to get greasy and disgusting really quickly. There's not much info on the KE850 at the moment, so who knows if LG has addressed any of these problems or is just releasing a phone to those people who've just gotta have a touchscreen phone, no matter what. We'll keep you updated when specs, availability, and price are announced.

Bluetooth watch shows you who's calling, the time

This Fossil FX6001 watch combines classic watch styling with Bluetooth technology, allowing you to see who's calling you without getting your phone out of your pocket. When you get a call the watch will vibrate and show you the name or number of who is getting in touch with you on a OLED screen. If you get a text, it'll let you know who's texting you. Unfortunately you can't actually read the text message on your watch, which would be a really nice feature. In any case it's a convenient way to screen your calls without pulling your phone out of your pocket. If they combined this with the Bluetooth headset watch you'd only have to take your phone out to dial. It's available for preorder now and will be released in November for $250. Thanks Falon for the tip!

Mad scientist creates robot version of himself

If you thought that lifelike female robot Korea was working on was creepy, get a load of this. Hiroshi Ishiguro, a senior researcher at ATR Intelligent Robotics and Communication Laboratories in Japan, has created a robot that looks exactly like himself. Created using casts of his body, his robot doppelganger sits and fidgets, looks around and taps his toe just like his creator. Ishiguro actually created this robot to, no joke, fill in for him in the classroom at Osaka University, where he's a professor. By sending his voice through the robot from his home an hour away while wearing lip-sensors so the robot can replicate what he says, Ishiguro can redefine telecommuting. But why stop there? The possibilities are endless. Oh robot self, you were supposed to pick up the dry cleaning, not strangle everyone at the cleaners with your deadly iron grip! Robot self, I thought you were going to prepare dinner for my wife, not impregnate her with your killer robot spawn. You so crazy!

BenQ Dog Tag MP3 player is for tough guys

You're a tough guy! Look at you, so big and strong. Why, if it wasn't for your crippling fear of both airplanes and dying in a foreign land, you'd surely be in the armed forces. Hey, don't worry, your phobias don't keep you from being a hero in my book!

You don't need real dog tags anyhow. Just snag some of BenQ's MusiQ Dog Tags. They might not have your personal info on them in case you get taken down by an IED, but they can hold music on them! That makes them better as far as I'm concerned. Furthermore, the headphones are incorporated into a chain that looks just like the real thing! How authentic.

The best part of all is the Chinese website for this product. I don't want to spoil anything, but it has something to do with exploiting the WTC wreckage to sell MP3 players. Oops, I spoiled it! Check out the insane screengrab after the jump.

Solar technology could keep beer cold longer

New thin-film solar-power technology could come in handy in a field that I personally have a lot of personal investment in: keeping beer cold. Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute are working on Active Building Envelope technology, a new science that shrinks solar panels to micrometer-thin sizes, allowing them to be stuck on walls, roofs, or, yes, beer bottles. Less exciting but perhaps more practical uses for the tech could potentially be replacing climate-control systems, such as air conditioning, with thin solar strips on all the windows in an office building. If efficient enough, the thin-film technology could prove revolutionary and move our energy consumption more towards renewable solar power; if not so efficient, it could at least keep my Brooklyn Lager cold for an extra 20 minutes on a summer day. Either way, sounds pretty sweet to me.

Toshiba's new transporter to face Segway in dork-off

Apparently the Segway is so dangerous and crappy that it's illegal to ride around on one on a Japanese road, leaving a huge gap in the human transporter market in that country. You know, cause you see them everywhere here where they're legal. Anyhow, Toshiba is swooping in to fill that gap with their own fuel-cell human transporter, one that comes with OMG LED lights on it to warn people that there's a dork approaching. Apparently it's safer than the Segway, although whether or not it can protect you from getting beat up for your lunch money is not clear. No word on when this will see the light of day or how much it'll cost, but we'll keep you updated.

Sony debuts standalone Blu-ray player, finally

We knew this was coming, but the company leading the charge of Blu-ray in the high-definition disc war no one cares about has finally come out with its own player. Sony, that renowned screwer-upper of formats, just started shipping its BDP-S1 player on Friday, trailing both Panasonic and Samsung, and way behind the HD DVD camp. Playing all your Blu-ray Disc (BD) flavors — including store-bought, write-once, and rewritable media — the shiny player has an HDMI output for feeding ultra-sharp HD images to your HDTV in 1080p format, the Dom Pérignon of high-def signals. And, yes, it'll play your no-longer-cool DVDs, too.

The kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours… as long as you're willing to drop a thousand bucks. Too much for you? You may want to turn your lonely eyes to the PlayStation 3, which happens to be a Blu-ray player, too. Unfortunately, your chances of finding one selling at the $600 retail price before Christmas (or $500 for the lower-powered, but still Blu-ray-enabled, version) are slim to none. But there are only about 125 actual titles available in the format, according to the Blu-ray Disc Association, so what's your hurry anyway?

Flexis 03 concept phone could save your life

The great thing about concept designs is that, generally speaking, there isn't much info provided. It's just a pretty picture, a neat idea someone had, and the nuts and bolts are left up to the readers imagination. So let's talk about this Pantech Flexus 03, shall we?

The Flexus … let's see. Oh, so you see that white nub thing? Well, when you put your thumb on that the phone can detect what kind of food you're in the mood for. Then the built-in GPS will point you towards the best restaurant for you, taking into account distance, price, and reviews. As you can see by the screen, it's a music phone, so let's say it can download whatever song you want from any of the major online music stores on a speedy 3G connection. Yeah, that'd be nice. Also, it cures cancer.

OK, so none of the above paragraph is true (I think… there's a chance it might actually cure cancer), but hopefully sooner or later Pantech will decide to release this thing and give us some, you know, real information about it.

Toshiba makes 100-GB iPod-size hard drive

For the two or three of you out there that have managed to pack your new 80-GB iPods to the gills, good news! Toshiba has just unveiled a 100-GB 1.8-inch drive, the same size and brand used in your favorite music player.

While Toshiba's people didn't mention Apple at all in their announcement of the drive, you know they're just being demure. Apple would have their heads on the proverbial platters if they jumped the gun on any type of product announcement and didn't give Papa Jobs a chance to unveil it in some fancy manner. But in any case, I'm sure there are loads of people out there that have just plum-filled up their insufficient 60- and 80-GB models, what with how much space all those Pixar and Pirate movies take up, and will be delighted to know that they can dump their relatively new purchase for a new, moderately upgraded one.