Scour: A Social Search Engine

Scour is delivering search results that are nothing but combination of major search engines, Google, Yahoo and MSN. In addition, you can give thumbs up and comment on any search results. This makes it kind of a social search engine network.Though I had these thoughts that this might be a scam, it does not seem to be. I thought to give a try to Scour search engine. Why should you think positively to sign-up with Scour -

1. We don’t have anything to lose. We are just using scour to search but getting the results from our favorite search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN and fun commenting and recommending the search results.

2. We can research on how commenting and giving thumbs up contribute to certain results with Scour’s algorithm.

3. It has a great affiliate program that gives you 25% of what points your referrals earn, so you need not to do all the work.

4. We would get something to give away free to our readers - that would be the visa gift card that we might get from Scour. Scour will pay you $25 Visa credit card as gift if you accumulate 6500 points, $50 for 12500 and $100 for 25000 points.

Scour does not pay in cash, check or via paypal. Scour pays with Visa Gift cards. Visa gift cards are pretty much gift cards that can be used at any store, so it is pretty much just as good as cash. Scour pays you for searching, voting and commenting (Well get to voting and commenting in a sec). For doing any of those three things you are awarded points.

You will earn 1 point for every search you complete. You will earn two points for every search result you vote on. Lastly you can earn 3 points for every search result you comment on. But you are limited to 4 points each search, so you can not do one search and vote on every result to gain points super fast. This also cuts down from people just voting to vote and will hopefully help get constructive votes.

Microsoft Surface Computer

At the D: All Things Digital conference Wednesday, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will unveil Microsoft Surface, the first in a new category of surface computing products from Microsoft that will “break down traditional barriers between people and technology”.

A Surface computer is able to recognize physical objects from a paintbrush to a cell phone and allows hands-on, direct control of content such as photos, music and maps. Surface turns an ordinary tabletop into a dynamic surface that provides interaction with all forms of digital content through natural gestures, touch and physical objects.

The new product is aimed directly at hotels, retail establishments, restaurants and public entertainment venues and should be commercially available towards the end of the year.

It’s an interesting product in that it’s completely out of left field. Microsoft gives examples of ordering a beverage during a meal with just the tap of a finger and quickly browsing through music and dragging favorite songs onto a personal playlist by moving a finger across the screen. Build this into a bar and you’d get one-touch beer service although I’m not sure if they’ve found a way to work out when your beer glass is empty so replenishment becomes automatic, maybe in a later version.

Tata's Air Car

Tata Motors is taking giant strides and making history for itself. First the Landrover-Jaguar deal, then the world's cheapest car and now it is also set to introduce the car that runs on air, compressed air to be specific.

The Air Car, called the MiniCAT could cost around Rs. 3,50,000 ($ 8177) in India and would have a range of around 300 km between refuels.The cost of a refill would be about Rs. 85 ($ 2). Tata motors also plans to launch the world's cheapest car, Tata Nano priced famously at One lakh rupees by October.The MiniCAT which is a simple, light urban car, with a tubular chassis that is glued not welded and a body of fiberglass powered by compressed air. Microcontrollers are used in every device in the car, so one tiny radio transmitter sends instructions to the lights, indicators etc.

There are no keys - just an access card which can be read by the car from your pocket. According to the designers, it costs less than 50 rupees per 100Km (about a tenth that of a petrol car). Its mileage is about double that of the most advanced electric car (200 to 300 km or 10 hours of driving), a factor which makes a perfect choice in cities where the 80% of motorists drive at less than 60Km. The car has a top speed of 105 kmph. Refilling the car will, once the market develops, take place at adapted petrol stations to administer compressed air. In two or three minutes, and at a cost of approximately 100 rupees, the car will be ready to go another 200-300 kilometers.

As a viable alternative, the car carries a small compressor which can be connected to the mains (220V or 380V) and refill the tank in 3-4 hours. Due to the absence of combustion and, consequently, of residues, changing the oil (1 litre of vegetable oil) is necessary only every 50,000Km.] The temperature of the clean air expelled by the exhaust pipe is between 0-15 degrees below zero, which makes it suitable for use by the internal air conditioning system with no need for gases or loss of power.