Besides ‘Wow’, I’m having trouble finding words to describe the new McLaren SLR Stirling Moss car that was just announced by Mercedes-Benz.
The car takes the standard SRL chassis, wraps it in a full carbon fiber bodywork, and then transplants in the 650 hp supercharged 5.5-liger V8 and five-speed transmission from the SLR 722.
There’s no roof or windscreen, but throw a pair of driving goggles on and you can pretend like you’re driving in the early 1900s. Until of course you test out the specs and find yourself getting to 62 mph in just 3.5 seconds on your way to a top speed of 217 mph of course!
Other features include the drop-dead sexy side exhaust, “Swing-Wing” doors, a retractable air brake that can be manually operated, and a two-piece tonneau cover that covers the whole cockpit, or just the passenger seat if you’re flying solo.
With just 75 of the Stirling Moss being produced, and with a price tag of over a million dollars, it’s definitely sending the SLR out with a bang, and I doubt they’ll have any trouble selling the cars despite an economy that’s dropping faster than the SLR’s laptimes. (Plus, it’s designed to be “a very special thank you to the most loyal of SLR customers, for they are the only ones able to acquire a Stirling Moss”, so you’ve already got to have a $400,000 car in your garage to begin with before even being considered!)
This year, gift cards go beyond just plastic as companies add features to lure you into buying the profit-filled gifts.
New card ideas include Target, which has added a small digital camera to their card, and Best Buy, which chose to go with a speaker that can connect to any MP3 player and play music through the included mini headphone jack.
While the Target card makes sense, because you can use it to capture holiday memories, send thank you pics to the gift giver, and even use it as a camera stand-in on your way to buying a real digital camera of your choice, the Best Buy one seems a little strange, since I can’t imagine the tiny speaker sounding any good as it attempts to keep up with the enthusiastic gift recipient.
Either way though, it’s an interesting idea, and it will be interesting to see what gets attached to a gift card next.
Misu is a new iPod music transfer utility for Macs that makes it easy to transfer music between two iPods.
Simply select the source and the destination and let Misu go to work. It then compares the two iPods, figures out what’s missing, and syncs them together.
Currently it’s only in super-secret private beta mode, but courtesy of TUAW, the super-secret code that you’ll need to get a copy is 48372.
Plus, if you try out Misu during the beta phase, they’ll give you a free and licensed copy of the final version as a thank you. (This code is only good for today, but if you miss out, you can still get a free copy of Misu by becoming a fan of the Misu Facebook Page by the end of March.)
Phil Lu’s QuickOrder is an “iPhone/iPod Touch application that allows the users to purchase their favorite Starbucks drink without waiting in line”. It’s also a great example of what will be possible when the entire world lives in your cell phone.
Instead of actually interacting with a real live person, you simply point and click in your order, complete with customization and a kind little thank you area to remind your barista that someone actually cares about what they’re doing.
There is even a semacode system in place to verify your order.
Will this be the future of customer service? Considering the fact that this goes one step further towards a world where we cease to interact directly (and despite how beautiful and simplistic this looks), I sure hope not.
I’ve reached an epic milestone in my journey to make DidntYouHear everything I want it to be today with the writing of this, my 1,000th post. I can’t believe it. I’ve done the impossible. One thousand little tidbits of information that I hope you found enjoyable, enlighting, or at least entertaining. Though DYH is still [...]
