Dubai, that wonderful country city that gave us a private island paradise shaped like the world, and the world’s first underwater hotel, is now going to be host to a dinosaur theme-park, called "Restless Planet."  It will be home to the world’s largest collection of animatronic dinosaurs of various shapes and sizes. Ultimately, the park will be home to 109 robots and will cost $1.1 billion USD to construct.


The 11 acre park will be a central feature to the glitzy City of Arabia, and will provide education along with thrills. Special effect-laden rides will guide vistors through Earth’s past and the age of the dinosaurs. The project is being created with help from The Natural History Museum in London and prominent palaeontologists. The robots themselves are being created by the Kokoro Company in Japan and will have "life-like" motions and be able to track visitors with their eyes and heads. Some robots may even lunge at visitors scaring the mess out of them.

I’d also like to remind readers that "dinosaurs + theme park" idea has been tried before, with disasterous results. For now, I’ll stick to my cute-and-loving robot dino.


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By 2015 several oil drilling platforms off the coast of Norway will be remotely operated by human operators on land, and robots on the platform.

The project is being funded by StatoilHydro, a Norwegian company. The goal is to reduce costs and dangers to oil workers on the rig. Researchers at a new laboratory in Trondheim will spend the next several years developing the software to control the robots. Automating the platforms will allow small and mid-sized oil fields to be exploited due to the reduced costs.


There’s some more info at the ZDNet Emerging Technology Trends blog.

[Via Slashdot]
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 The Miami police force will begin experimenting with using Honeywell Micro Air Vehicles (MAVs) starting in 2008. They plan on using the drones in SWAT operations. These operation will be closely watched by the FAA to see if unmanned vehicles can be effectively (and safely) used in urban environments.


The article references an event two years ago where a police helicopter was shot by an armed suspect, and the pilot was forced to land in someone’s back yard. MAVs would be significantly smaller and ligher and would pose less risk if such an even were to be repeted. The police force only plans to use these vehicles in specific operations, which should reduce the privacy concerns that are raised by these "eys in the sky."



The Houston police force was also given permission by the FAA to use similar drones in their operations. Let’s hope that such operations prove successful and open up the US skies for unmanned vehicles.




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Last time we had a Design Goodness post, it was featuring the amazing Minimechadon creation of Mike Smyth, this time its the steampunkesc insect/clockwork creations of Mike Libby.

Libby takes insects and combines them with the insides of mechanical watches. The result is a strange, yet beautiful, piece of art. Libby sells his creations for $150 – $500 dollars. You can see the full gallery of his creations, from arachnids to bees on his website.

These would make perfect gifts for your creepy relatives who have everything else under the sun.

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