octopus

Robotic octopus tentacle will make us all suckers

Octobots are now a reality. Well, at least one-eighth of an octobot is now a reality. The team at the European Union's Italian-led Octopus Project is determined to make a soft-bodied robotic Octopus, and they're already one tentacle toward success. That's solid progress since we first reported on the four-year project back in 2009.

Although the notion of a robotic octopus has unlimited potential for Hollywood and epic practical joke applications, the project team is more interested in the scientific value. Turns out that's pretty cool, too.

The tentacles of an octopus can move in any direction and have the ability to go limp or stiffen on demand. That gives octopi some pretty unparalleled ambulatory abilities, and yes, makes them great nightmare fodder, too. … Read more

The 404 620: Where Wilson got beaten by an octopus (podcast)

Paul the German Octopus is officially more powerful than our own Wilson G. Tang at predicting the future. The mollusk in Oberhausen is 8 for 8 in forecasting the winning teams in this year's World Cup, including yesterday's triumphant victory for Spain over the Netherlands.

In fact, we already planned to invite Paul into the studio this Friday to tell us about the iPhone 5, but recent news tells us that the eight-legged wonder is already planning his retirement from the soccer prediction industry.

If you haven't figured it out by now, The 404 crew is complete … Read more

Will Facebook threats destroy psychic octopus?

Facebook has always struggled with hate groups.

It defines the hate emotion so subjectively that one hardly knows what it is permissible to hate--semolina, perhaps--and what is entirely verboten. (Not Holocaust denial, it seems.)

So I will be very curious how the peak players at Facebook will react to the news that certain Facebook members and groups are demanding the death of a very sensitive creature, Paul the psychic octopus.

Should you have recently been buried by youths on a secluded beach, you might not know that Paul is an octopus who lives in a tank in Oberhausen, Germany, and … Read more

The 404 619: Where we're nothing but a pyramid scheme (podcast)

To help celebrate Friday, we bring in our good buddy Tim Geisenheimer to end the week on a good note. Of course the big news we talk about right at the top of the show is the unprecedented announcement of LeBron James' decision to sign with the Miami Heat.

Being an actual fan of the NBA, Tim helps us break down what this means for basketball and how technology played a role in the ultimate decision.

Staying in the vein of sports-related news, we'll watch an interesting video of Paul, the octopus who is current six-for-six at predicting World … Read more

iPod speakers from the deep

We almost passed over this weird-looking thing, at first mistaking it for one of those surrealistic wall-climbing power strips. But despite the creepy resemblance, it's actually an iPod dock.

The "Dragon I," as it's called (we think "Octopus" would be more appropriate), has bendable speakers masquerading as tentacles that appear poised to reach out of the screen and grab us at any moment. Maybe it's just our fear of deep-sea creatures, but the red-on-black color scheme makes it seem even more cephalopod-like in appearance.

We've still got to tip our hat to … Read more