Fish-skin bikinis?

November 12, 2003 3:57 AM

Time mag lists this year's 'coolest' inventions, in their humble opinion. For archival fun check out their lists for 2001 and 2002.

Fish-skin bikinis?
posted by moonbird (18 comments total)

Way to sneak yet another AppleFilter post in under the radar, nice one ;)

/obligatory.
posted by Space Coyote at 4:41 AM on November 12, 2003

hey, i have a fish skin wallet, made of salmon. and contrary to what it says in moonbirds link, it does smell of fish. It reeks. i had to soak it in aftershave for days after i got it.

As for the camera phones, i have to say that they suck. After a few weeks you just stop caring.
posted by kev23f at 5:10 AM on November 12, 2003

I would like to hear a lot more about the Dean Kamen water purifier (brief comments here, from last year, make me curious/puzzled). What I haven't found after a very brief googling is the number of people that a single unit could potentially serve. At any rate, the possibility of inexpensively (?) providing clean drinking water to those who don't have it seems more important to me than most of the other nifty gadgets.

(Also, camera phones are only 2003? Really? Really? It seems like a lot longer...)
posted by taz at 5:16 AM on November 12, 2003

Wheres my flying car, damn it.

Seriously though, the invisibility suit is pretty cool.
posted by MintSauce at 5:44 AM on November 12, 2003

I got yer flying car right here.
posted by bkdelong at 6:03 AM on November 12, 2003

Yeah, camera phones are a lot older than that. I got one for free when I got off the plane in Japan over 15 months ago, so they were already old hat here by that point. I imagine the criteria being applied here is not necessarily when something was actually invented or released so much as when it became familar to the editors of Time Magazine.
posted by donkeymon at 6:26 AM on November 12, 2003

Seems like the Dean Kamen hype-machine targeted the wrong product. The water-purifier sounds like it could genuinely make a difference to a lot of people's lives, if it can get some proper publicity and some proper funding behind it. Too bad the Apple Gang got to the poll first.
posted by Hogshead at 6:33 AM on November 12, 2003

NSFW in the rather uptight sorts of places I've worked where a pretty girl in a bikini is enough to violate the "ethics guidelines" of Internet use in the workplace.
posted by alumshubby at 8:13 AM on November 12, 2003

Though TIME doesn't mention it, I thought the thermal depolymerization process that turns any waste product into oil was a pretty damn impressive invention. (MeFi thread) But then I've never owned a robotic cat, either.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 8:21 AM on November 12, 2003

I must have missed the memo that said Golf was officially considered an "extreme" sport. Perhaps to the readers of Time it is an extreme activity.
posted by mathowie at 8:57 AM on November 12, 2003

well... when you consider the clothes... yeah; I could see it as extreme.
posted by taz at 9:10 AM on November 12, 2003

I know it is covetous of me, but I must hear those B+O speakers.
posted by spartacusroosevelt at 9:38 AM on November 12, 2003

I, for one, welcome our new salmon-clad masters.
posted by atbash at 9:46 AM on November 12, 2003

I think B&O is just all about style, but if I was going to spend that much money, I'd rather go for B&W.
posted by riffola at 9:49 AM on November 12, 2003

$335? for dead fish? small sections of dead fish?
posted by Hackworth at 9:53 AM on November 12, 2003

Here's an earlier thread on one of the inventions from 2002, the solar tower.
posted by homunculus at 9:59 AM on November 12, 2003

I dunno if those are so much "inventions" as they are products. For sale.
posted by wfrgms at 10:33 AM on November 12, 2003

Introvertster made TIME magazine! Whoot!
posted by Brilliantcrank at 3:46 PM on November 12, 2003