Source: SPACE.com: All about our solar system, outer space and exploration

I can hardly believe that I let the 45th anniversary of Star Trek go unmentioned here, but as you can tell, I’ve been pretty busy at Lifehacker. Still, this infographic crossed my desk a while back and I still adore it – so much so that I wanted to post it anyway, especially for other Star Trek fans out there who find themselves missing the franchise, or missing Gene Roddenberry himself.

I know, I know, there’s been a reboot, it was a good action flick, but honestly, it didn’t feel or seem at all like a Star Trek movie. I could wax rhapsodic about my criticisms over the Star Trek movie, but I think they’re aligned pretty well with the reboot movie’s Wikipedia article. That said though, I take solace in the fact that both Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine are both on Netflix streaming and thus available to me instantly.

So it’s with nostalgic eyes that I looked this infographic over, and a little optimism for the future. You never know, Star Trek as a franchise is part of our global consciousness, and I think it always will be. It’ll be interesting to see where it goes from here.

[ Space.com :: The Evolution of Star Trek via The How-To Geek ]

This is totally the work of a PR firm, but the video is so entertaining that I figured it was worth a look. After all, while it’s not quite “the evolution and history of music,” it’s definitely a fun look back over formats, changes, and how far music and the way we enjoy it has come over the past 60+ years. But then, the PR firm that made the video is pimping its ability to make cool videos.

[ Mashable :: The Evolution of Music in 3 Minutes ]

If you were a fan of Reading Rainbow as a child, and miss having the opportunity to share it with your kids or with a new generation of young readers, you’re not alone. When Reading Rainbow officially stopped airing, LeVar Burton noted on Twitter that this wouldn’t be the end of the show (you can follow him, if you don’t already at @levarburton) and now he’s made good on the promise.

LeVar is rebooting the series as an iPad app and other tech-based resources, called RRKidz, along with a wealth of companion content that will get to young readers right where they are these days: on mobile devices like tablets. From an excellent article at FastCompany about this:

LeVar Burton, a children’s literacy advocate and a former star of Star Trek: The Next Generation, plans to make an ambitious comeback, giving the once-loved Reading Rainbow brand a 21st-century upgrade. Burton’s for-profit venture, RRKidz, plans to launch an educational iPad app that lets children explore topics of interest–such as, say space–in a multimedia-rich environment, with voice-over-enhanced children’s books, familiar videos of Burton at real-life places (like NASA), and, of course, games. Burton tells Fast Company he’s on a mission to “get kids hooked on books,” and says his company is “going to where kids are today; those devices that they love to spend time on.”

From the way that FastCompany explains it, this is just the beginning – the iPad app is only going to be one component in what will hopefully be a rich and long-lived educational venture, and with LeVar Burton behind it, I can’t see how it’ll be anything but wonderful.

[ Fast Company :: Reading Rainbow: The Next Generation ]

Following up their hilarious Mario with a Portal Gun video, this Link with a Portal Gun video form the folks at Dorkly simply takes the cake. After all, this is totally how I would have played Link to The Past if I had a portal gun on me at the time. Props to The How-To Geek for finding this!

[ Dorkly Bits: Link to The Past With a Portal Gun ]

Rumor has been flying for a long time now that the original Thundercats would see a reboot of some kind, and sure enough it’s coming true, over at Cartoon Network. The reboot isn’t coming in the shape of a movie, but instead in the form of a new original series where many of the characters names are the same but the situations are very very different.

If you’re not sure how you feel about it based on this short description, this leaked 9-minute video of the new cartoon may or may not help:

Now then, what do you think? For me, the jury is still out, and I’ll have to see it on television. I do like the touch of getting the original Lion-O to voice King Claudus, the new Lion-O’s father, but I’m not sure if I like the whole “coming of age in a family” story that we have going on here. But it could be a good thing. We’ll have to see.

For more information, head over to ScreenRant, they have a bigger breakdown on the new series, and more information about it:

[ Screenrant :: 9-Minute Preview of New ‘ThunderCats’ Cartoon Leaks ]

I’m a big fan of Danny Choo and the way he’s managed to let nothing stop him from making his passion his life and career, and one of the things he does regularly is work on a televison show called Culture Japan. On a recent episode, he went over to the development company called Kayac to meet with developer Makoto Hara, who said he’d always wanted to fly through cyberspace the way characters in the Ghost in the Shell universe do.

Well, with the help of the Microsoft Kinect, now they were able to! Using the motion sensitive controls of the Kinect and some programming knowhow, they managed to build a game that looks, behaves, and plays like it’s straight out of the Ghost in The Shell universe. Check out the video:

It’s really incredible, and something special to behold. I just wish I had something like this somewhere near me where I could try it and play with it. Danny has tons more photos available at his blog – check em out!

[ Danny Choo :: Ghost in the Shell Kinect ]

You know, I could get used to this.

And honestly, here’s hoping I have the opportunity. Apparently the weekend before last and the time before that were well enough received by the team at Lifehacker (and of course, the community,) that the crew there asked me back again, and I was more than happy to do it.

So I had the chance to take the reins again last Sunday and churn out content for Lifehacker, and I like to think this week was even better than the last. Here’s what you missed, if you weren’t paying attention:

• Simple Tips that Make Moving Easier

  It helps that I’ll be moving soon, but I had to share some great tips that I stumbled on around how to make the moving process a little easier. I mean, it sucks no matter which way you go about it, but you can make it easier on yourself by preparing properly, making sure you keep the most important things available and identified so you can unpack them first, and organize things the way you want them when you get to the new place. Minimizing a bit also helps. As for me, I’m in the middle of doing all of those things.

• Say No Without Wrecking Your Career

  If there’s anything I’ve learned in trying to navigate the corporate maze, it’s about how to let your supervisors and management know clearly that you’re pretty much tapped out – without, of course, being disrespectful and landing yourself in a position where someone questions your capability to work effectively. In this piece, I share how to go about doing it.

• Five Best Cheap Travel Booking Sites

  This post and its predecessor where I called upon the readers to let us know what their favorite sites to book cheap travel with are part of the Hive Five series. The sites that made it into the roundup are pretty much the ones I expected, but there were still a few surprises. The ITA/Matrix site is a new one to me, but I’ll tell you here’s one thing I didn’t realize until I saw the votes: Kayak clearly has a posse.

• Family-Friendly Spring Exercise Tips

  When I got the call to do another weekend, I knew I wanted to share an outdoors-y type exercise post. Sadly, they don’t seem to resonate quite so much with the LH readers, but I think it was well liked anyway – honestly, I think there’s still a strong “tech” element to the Lifehacker name, even if there have been more lifestyle posts lately. Still, I found a great article about how to encourage your friends and family to get out and get some exercise, and considering the weather is getting warmer, why not share it?

• Bridg.me Calls You When the Conference Starts

  I actually stumbled on this one a bit late: the download I was thinking about writing about on Thursday got snapped up by another writer on Friday, so I had to adjust at the last minute. No worries though, this new service promises to call you when your conference call is supposed to begin instead of forcing you and your call participants to join a bridge line. With some more detail, I think it can get some real traction.

• One-Line Tips to Stay Creative

  Sometimes, my friends are some of the best sources of inspiration for me, and I stumbled onto this piece at Tumblr thanks to one of my friends’ tweets. I took it to heart personally, seeing as I’m a writer by and large, and would like to be more of a writer if at all possible. Just because it’s my passion though doesn’t mean that I don’t have those times where I just can’t figure out what to write about. Now I have a little cheat sheet to help me stay motivated.

• Use Plasti Dip to Fix Stripped Headphone Wires

  I almost didn’t expect this one to get the traction it got, but it did – I mean, the makers of the product started following me on Twitter and expressed their appreciation. All I did was write about it guys, the guy over at Instructables that originally posted the tip deserves the credit! Still – it does look like an awesome product and an awesome idea. I’ve lost several great headphones to separated wires like this, and I’m definitely going to try it next time one of my pair starts to go this way.

That does it! Now all I have to do is see if anything else comes from this round of guest posts, and I certainly hope it does. I really enjoyed guest posting at LH, and I’m hoping they ask me back again soon!

PC Mag took your votes in multiple categories to come up with a definitive list of the most influential products of all time. From mobile devices to gaming to desktops to operating systems, they laid out the candidates and the public voted on which products have made the most impact in the technology world.

I wouldn’t have included the image of the Atari 2600 if it hadn’t won in the gaming category, but the original Nintendo Entertainment System was pretty close behind, nipping at its heels. The battle in the operating system category between Windows 3.1 and MacOS was pretty fierce, as was the battle between the Apple Macintosh and the Commodore 64 in the desktops category, but you’ll have to click through to see the results of that battle: I’m not about to spoil it for you.

[ PC Mag :: The Five Most Influential Tech Products of All Time ]

(image via Technabob)

I’m a bit of a fan for quirky, odd, and really strange and geeky things – this certainly qualifies.

I mean, it’s the Transformers – the Autobots specifically, doing the Thriller dance while the song plays in the background. Of course, the text in the whole thing is in Japanese, so I have no idea what’s being said, and the entire video is built using the MikuMikuDance application (don’t get me started on why I know what that is and why I think it’s pretty awesome it was the application of choice to do the rendering) but the end product is pretty impressive.

I mean, the Autobots there are a little less blocky and a little more flexible than their boxy frames would indicate, but hey – it’s all in good fun, right? Here’s the video:

My only beef? That Rodimus Prime was in the center. Pfft. Loser. Optimus fo’ life, yo!

[ Technabob :: Michael Jackson Meets the Transformers ]

See that up there? It’s a re-imagining of Marvel’s X-Men with anime style. I know, I know, who wants anime in their American comics? Well, I do. Frankly, I always thought – ever since the old Saturday morning X-Men cartoon back in the 90s – that the X-Men could do with some more dynamic and interesting animation treatment, and who better to bring that to the table than Japanese studio Madhouse, who’s putting the series together.

The show is currently on the air in Japan, so you can expect it’ll be a long while before it makes it to television screens in the US and comes full circle – but hopefully it’ll be easy to get licensing for the series when it’s time. And hopefully if they decide to dub, they can get the voice actors from the old Saturday morning version. Maybe I’m just being nostalgic now.

Regardless, you have to admit that it looks pretty good – and that MadHouse tries to stay relatively close to some of its American comic standard roots. Check out the opening sequence:

[ Sneak Peep At The New X-Men Anime Series ]