James Bond Gadgets

whencanistop writes "Given that the new James Bond film is just about to be released, this is quite a nice summary of James Bond gadgets from past films. Tomorrow Never Dies was on telly last night and I was commenting on how the mobile phone that controlled the BMW was awesome, why they haven't done it in real life is beyond me (although there would probably be a few accidents if they ever did). Ridiculous to think that in 1963 the gadget of choice for Bond was a pager though." Of course, the best gadget in the Bond universe wasn't even 007's ... Jaws' teeth were the envy of every kid with braces.

Comments

No problem

[ceoyoyo]

Myth Busters build a remote controlled car every other episode (they always seem to build it from scratch... odd).

Here's a toy car retrofitted to be controlled by an iPhone: http://www.walyou.com/blog/2008/09/10/how-to-remote-control-rc-cars-using-the-iphone/

Put the two together (no problem), stick in a camera (also no problem) and you've got your own accident waiting to happen.

Why does nobody do it? Most people have enough trouble driving a car with pedals and a big wheel while sitting in the driver's seat looking out the window, never mind trying to drive it with little buttons and a tiny screen from outside.

It's cool that Bond films at least partially stick close enough to the near future that the gadgets are cool but we can look back 40 years and yawn.

Re:No problem

[Ethanol-fueled]

When I watched the original Bond films I never noticed all the gadgetry as I was too busy looking at all the Pussy Galore.

Re:No problem

[danwesnor]

Myth Busters build a remote controlled car every other episode (they always seem to build it from scratch... odd).

Have you never noticed that everything they build on the show is completely destroyed at the end?

Re:No problem

[snspdaarf]

Honor Blackman was my least favorite of all the Bond girls. Now, her Flying Circus pilots were another story!

Re:No problem

[gnick]

Myth Busters build a remote controlled car every other episode (they always seem to build it from scratch... odd).

Here's something that's bugged me for years (morbid though alert). You can easily add a couple of servos to a car's control system and control it via remote (although long range trips would be tricky even with long-range communications and a camera).

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people. Why do we still have suicide bombers?

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Suicide bombers require significantly less technical expertise.

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps, but 1 RC nerd could potentially replace 100's of suicide bombers.

Re:No problem

[SQLGuru]

You only need one guy with the right expertise......

Layne

Re:No problem

[mr_josh]

It's not so much that it's destroyed, it just falls apart. :)

Re:No problem

[russotto]

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people. Why do we still have suicide bombers?

The minor reason would be that a car driven by a dummy (or no driver at all) is likely to be noticed.

The major reason is probably that your premise is false, at least where we have suicide bombers. Getting a car rigged to run by remote costs more than getting a <strike>sucker</strike>martyr to drive it there.

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously check the prices!

Re:No problem

[laddiebuck]

Top Gear have done it a few times now too (and probably also from scratch, but they never dwell on it for more than a sentence).

Re:No problem

[ChrisA90278]

"It's cool that Bond films at least partially stick close enough to the near future that the gadgets are cool but we can look back 40 years and yawn."

From a story/plot point of view the trchnology has to be very close to what we have but just a little bit past it. Because the viewers do have to understand what the gadget does and also if the gadget was to "powerful" then 007's job would be to easy. For example we can't give hiom a gadget that can read minds that are on the other side of the earth and then teleport the bad guys into jail. No, the gadgets can only operate within a small range or it kind of ruins the story.

Re:No problem

[xaxa]

Why do we still have suicide bombers?

For the glory of Islam? Anyway, why would they want to wait around here before collecting the virgins?

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

If we're talking original Bond films, as in the first 4, only one had any gadgets to begin with, being the suitcase in From Russia With Love.

They all had girls, though.

Re:No problem

[interstellar_donkey]

Or just use small RC cars rigged with explosives. Perhaps none of the terrorfolk have seen The Dead Pool.

Re:No problem

[Gulthek]

It's cool that Bond films at least partially stick close enough to the near future that the gadgets are coolâ¦

Like cars that bend light around them?

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Technology divide.

In the US or UK your average high school geek could build a guided missile or remote controlled car. My 8th grade science class did both.

However, I'm sure that in other parts of the world, the knowledge, and more importantly the component parts aren't available easily. Besides, there is an ideological problem too. You don't get to go to heaven and get a pile of virgins if you use a remote bomb.

Re:No problem

[sdsucks]

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people.

That may not be true in some parts of the world.

Re:No problem

[jollyreaper]

Here's something that's bugged me for years (morbid though alert). You can easily add a couple of servos to a car's control system and control it via remote (although long range trips would be tricky even with long-range communications and a camera).

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people. Why do we still have suicide bombers?

Because a driverless car downtown might draw some attention? No, seriously. Aside from the difficulty of a remote driver having good situational awareness in crappy Iraqi traffic, there's also the matter of camouflaging intent. Some suicide missions involve multiple people. Understandable if there's three separate bombers hitting one location but why have two people with one bomb? Why not have the second guy drive another bomb vehicle or hold back for another mission? Camouflage.

Two guys are driving a delivery truck. You wouldn't think suicide bomber, that's only a loner. Now you've got a delivery driver arguing with the compound guard. C'mon, I got a delivery, I need inside. The guard would already be shooting at a driverless truck coming at him but this delivery looks like every other delivery coming through the gate.

Right before we went into Afghanistan, a popular leader of the Northern Alliance gave an interview to a foreign television crew. This was a multi-man crew, the journalist, cameraman, and soundman. The bomb was in the camera. Interview starts, the television crew, their target, and several bystanders are killed. No single person could have gotten that close but several people posing as a film crew? That seems reasonable.

I've also heard stories about kids included in suicide vehicles. They're probably not the driver's kids, who knows how they were abducted. But they're in the car making it look eminently civilian when the driver pulls up and hits the detonator.

This sort of thing has two benefits for the terrorist. One, he gets to destroy his target. Two, now the GI's are all jumpy and no longer willing to discount kids as a sign the car is safe, they'll end up shooting up more innocent civilians, raising the terror level, and making the people more enraged with America.

Re:No problem

[OldFish]

Careful, Dude! I think one of Pussy's team was a guy in another life!

Re:No problem

[snspdaarf]

Google this: invisibility suit wiki

It works, but not nearly as well as in the Bond movie. But, that's the point, isn't it?

Re:No problem

[symes]

This is posibly some of the best fun I've seen people having with remote controlled cars.

Re:No problem

[khellendros1984]

IslamAfterlife::IslamAfterlife:Afterlife() {
virgins reward=new virgins[72];
....
}
....or something like that, anyhow =p

Re:No problem

[gnick]

Virgins? You want virgins? Log into slashdot - This place is full of them! I'm hoping that for my 30th birthday, mom will send a friendly prostitute down to the basement with a cake.

Re:No problem

[konigstein]

Well for one their bombers have been at it for quite a few years, and so making simple effective bombs are straightforward. Next is that that way of jihad would have to be signed off by an imam (religious leader), and if the choice was letting a good muslim into heaven by way of jihad or blowing up some infidels, it's no easy choice. Finally, remote control requires using some sort of transmission. Any jamming device or malfunctioning transmitter just rendered your bomb ineffective except by local detonation. Also, jamming cell phones, radio frequencies, and all other means of communication is pretty rude and tends to piss off the locals.

Re:No problem

[Rosy At Random]

Don't tell me you've never eaten cake before, you dirty boy

Re:No problem

[snspdaarf]

I think the only thing that was not as it seems in "Goldfinger" was Gert Frobe's voice. I believe it was a later movie where there was a transsexual; a Roger Moore movie.

Re:No problem

[Jbcarpen]

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people. Why do we still have suicide bombers?

Servos and remotes are usually cheaper than people, that part is true. But they are not cheaper than volunteers, who are free. Also, (more importantly) remotes can be jammed, people can't. (well, they can, but not in any useful way.)

Re:No problem

[ceoyoyo]

Guess you missed the sarcasm.

Although, taking it seriously, I remember an episode where they tested the chain-around-the-rear-axel-of-the-cop-car myth. True, the car probably wasn't usable again, but the remote steering mechanism should have been.

I can definitely see the remote being broken after the car jumping off the ramp episode though.

Re:No problem

[ceoyoyo]

Most of the most interesting targets are hardened against cars. For the rest, it would be just as easy to drive a car up, park in front and walk away (a la Timothy McVeigh).

Re:No problem

[ceoyoyo]

Some of the books (and perhaps some of the earlier movies) had Bond's car practically indestructible. I notice they've dropped that. I don't think the cars have even been particularly bullet proof lately.

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

They were VERY aerodynamic!

Re:No problem

[habbi]

... because in middle east people is cheaper than tech?

Re:No problem

[myth_of_sisyphus]

I know, what's the big deal with virgins? The awkwardness, the teeth scraping, the bleeding and the guilt....

I want a slutty girl. Or I'd want a couple adventurous ones and then a really slutty one to show them how to do things and be kind of like the captain. Damn. I gotta go...

Re:No problem

[scrod98]

Agreed, give me a couple of trashy blondes with no gag reflex and low tolerance for alcohol. I'd blow something up for that.

Re:No problem

[ozmanjusri]

Scrapheap Challenge has done it several times too, including once where they built battle cars to fight in a sumo/jousting style contest.

Re:No problem

[mattmatt]

Or mice, ala that movie... what was that movie called? You know, with the magic loom. I always thought the mice-strapped-with-explosives thing was a bit awesome.

Re:No problem

[NateTech]

Welcome to the U.S. Chairforce, er Airforce.

They announced last week that they expect 50% of their aircraft purchases going forward will be remotely-piloted vehicles.

Re:No problem

[darkmeridian]

Terrorists in Iraq have also planted a bomb in the wheelchair of a mentally-retarded child. It's pretty fucking despicable shit they're doing over there. (And the turds who say, "oh, the Americans are making that shit up" look at Al Qaeda running around cutting people's heads off and then bragging about it. Do you think these people wouldn't use a child's wheelchair as a bomb platform?)

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do we still have suicide bombers?

Because people are dumb.

If you can convince a guy that he'll get to go to paradise for murder/suicide he's probably not thinking too hard about how to create an RC bomb that'll keep him alive.

Re:No problem

[Krishnoid]

I've also heard stories about kids included in suicide vehicles. They're probably not the driver's kids, who knows how they were abducted. But they're in the car making it look eminently civilian when the driver pulls up and hits the detonator.

I -- and I'm certain, you, judging from your signature -- am reminded of how the left-behind fremen used their even younger children to fight the Sardaukar. If it wasn't true before, I guess it is now.

Re:No problem

[Askmum]

Trucks for certain particular uses have been fitted with remote control. I've seen it fitted in a truck that delivers steel plates that you put in worksites to drive on. Of course it would be either very timeconsuming, laying down a plate, then driving the length of the plate to lay down the second, or would be a two-man job to do it otherwise.
So they created a truck that can be driven remotely. It doesn't do 50 mph of course, and has no camera in the RC.

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Servos and remotes are cheaper than people. Why do we still have suicide bombers?

Therein lies the problem. In the environment where suicide bombers are most prevalent, people are a lot cheaper than technology.

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm going to assume the Scrapheap Challenge you're talking about isn't an eve-online forum.

Re:No problem

[Doggabone]

They also destroy a lot that would have fallen apart without interference - like when I dump a girlfriend on the realization that she's into surface dwellers, after all.

Re:No problem

[laddiebuck]

The show was broadcast in the US under the name Junkyard Wars. I guess it's true that America is militaristic? ;)

Re:No problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Wanted

The modern bond films

[sakdoctor]

are just car/gadget ads.

Re:The modern bond films

[sc4ry4nt]

I agree, though the last two (of the new revolution) contain considerably fewer gadgets and of those that are found, they're far from the "creative" gagets that came before...

Re:The modern bond films

[electrictroy]

>>> Ridiculous to think that in 1963 the gadget of choice for Bond was a pager

Not really. I was watching an old 60s "The Avengers" episode where some businessman was bragging about his new "electronic secretary" that went beep. That's all it did; just beep. So seeing Bond carrying a pager that not only beeps, but gives a little message on top of that is utterly amazing.

Remember this was in the age of 0.1 kbit/s modems. Sloooow. Primitive. Barely-worked.

Re:The modern bond films

[Anonymous Coward]

You clearly haven't seen the latest ones. Clearly neither have the people who modded you insightful.

Re:The modern bond films

[v1]

I used that exact model of pager in the article. Actually we shared a pager for whoever was on call.

Scott had the pager when he headed to the rest room. It had a small two line text display. We TM'd him Don't Forget To Wipe.

He was quite embarrassed when the pager went off in the bathroom. (pagers and cell phones ringing were total attention getters back then, no matter where, because almost nobody had them)

Re:The modern bond films

[UncleWilly]

In the first Bond book, Casino Royal, the only high tech is that J Bond has oversized headlights on his car. He is more a international detective, smoking two packs a day, and drinking hard liquor.

Re:The modern bond films

[electrictroy]

P.S.

>>>0.1 kbit/s modems

That's 10 characters per second, or approximately one-third reading speed.

Re:The modern bond films

[ncc74656]

0.1 kbit/s modems

That's 10 characters per second, or approximately one-third reading speed.

...which is about the speed at which a teletype runs. (According to this, they usually sent/received at anywhere from 45.5 to 110 bps.)

Villains have the best toys

[Drakkenmensch]

What about Oddjob's razor-brimmed bowler hat? That's the one I always wanted! Mythbusters tried to make one, and managed to knock off the head of a concrete statue (with Kari throwing no less) even though it was a hollow core molded statue. Still, that hat put a new spin on the old "dressed to kill" standard!

Re:Villains have the best toys

[gEvil (beta)]

What about Oddjob's razor-brimmed bowler hat?

What about it? It's #9.

Re:Villains have the best toys

[Drakkenmensch]

Eh, that'll teach me to let myself be distracted by the outside world before I make it to the end of an article! Still, that one rates far higher than #9 in my book.

frickin laser...

[Anonymous Coward]

... to strap to his noggin in case he ever comes up against any similarly equipped sharks.

Re:frickin laser...

[Quantos]

There was the wrist watch with a laser... My favorite was the wrist watch with the electro magnet.

Re:frickin laser...

[Abreu]

There was the wrist watch with a laser...

My favorite was the wrist watch with the electro magnet.

There was also the garrote wire watch used in From Russia With Love... and also used by George H. W. Bush in the Simpsons!

Best of the bunch

[Smivs]

Two words...Little Nellie! Can I have one please?

Re:Best of the bunch

[Pope]

If it's good enough for the world of Mad Max, it's good enough for Bond.

Re:Best of the bunch

[hierophanta]

FTW! - from the link it was a little helicopter assembled out of 4 suitcases and had:

"Loaded with gadgetry, Little Nellie sported two rear flame guns, aerial mines, front-mounted machine guns, two rocket launchers, smoke ejectors and two heat seeking air-to-air missiles"

If you're interested...

[sc4ry4nt]

... there is a more (er, very!) comprehensive list on Wikipedia (of course, where else!) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_James_Bond_gadgets

If you are smart, phone control of a car works

[pimpsoftcom]

I know this because I designed/created a system to do it a few years back.

Its actually not very hard, I did this with a app on my then-new smart phone, using its internet access to connect car based computer I also gave internet access and configured to use a static host name using a dy-dns like setup on the car based computer system.

The hardest problem I had was calibration of the electronics to interface with the actual driving of the car; I never realized how much we as humans compensate for a slight directional drift on the steering wheel, or how refined our ability to break slowly is. Also, the brakes are an issue as the correct leverage for the breaks can be broken easily if you don't set it up correctly; Get it wrong and you cant actually use the car outside of the remote control because the assembly to drive it is in the way.

In general, The older the car, the more issues you will have. Also, the power and electrical systems are the picture of inadequacy if you are looking to build your own 'Kit'. I actually may try to dig out my old notes, many of my ideas for additions may be possible now.

Re:If you are smart, phone control of a car works

[Janeshat]

Yes, Dr. Horrible had a little issue with the stopping of the van as well. Of course Captain Hammer had smashed his magnetic control transciever.

how is a pager ridiculous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Back then a pager was a big thing. Consumer electronics of that type were still kind of new back then.

Honestly, some people seem to think the world began with episode 1 of star wars.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[eln]

Honestly, some people seem to think the world began with episode 1 of star wars.

No, that was the beginning of the end of the world.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[genner]

Honestly, some people seem to think the world began with episode 1 of star wars.

No, that was the beginning of the end of the world.

Then the Matrix sequels came out and the world actually ended.

Welcome to Earth 2.0

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[peragrin]

earth 2 came out and bombed. Personally I want earth 3. SP 2

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[arth1]

Then the Matrix sequels came out and the world actually ended.

This will blow your mind, but there are no Matrix sequels...

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[homer_ca]

It was a different world of communications back then. Most homes didn't even have answering machines until the late 70's/early 80's. Businesses paid for answering services with live operators. If you weren't home to answer the phone, you didn't get the message.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[Drooling Iguana]

Do not try to enjoy the sequels, that's impossible. Instead, only try to know the truth.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[halcyon1234]

Since none of us will ever agree on which version of Earth we want, how about we just go the Slider's method? Fork the Earth, and to each their own!

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[SimonGhent]

This will blow your mind, but there are no Matrix sequels...

I keep telling myself that. Generally it works, but sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I know the truth.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[megamerican]

Langly: "You look down, Mulder. Tell you what, you're welcome to come over Saturday night. We're all hopping on the Internet to nitpick the scientific inaccuracies of Earth 2."

Oh how times have changed.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[xaxa]

This will blow your mind, but there are no Matrix sequels...

I keep telling myself that. Generally it works, but sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I know the truth.

For me, the truth generally comes the morning after.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[Loibisch]

This will blow your mind, but there are no Matrix sequels...

Don't we all wish that were true...

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[pngmangi42]

Your Jedi mind tricks won't work on me.

Re:how is a pager ridiculous?

[Walter Carver]

What do you mean? There are two sequels to Matrix, Reloaded and Revolutions. Unless you mean they they weren't worthy.

The Bensen Gyrocopter

[Animats]

They didn't mention the Bensen Gyrocopter from "You Only Live Twice". That was a real, flyable aircraft, although the version that came in four big suitcases (a scene stolen from "Thief of Baghdad") was a dummy.

Re:The Bensen Gyrocopter

[Anonymous Coward]

The Wallis Autogyro you mean surely? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Wallis Bit of a local hero round these parts.

Re:The Bensen Gyrocopter

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be a Wallis autogyro, just for the record.

http://www.kenwallisautogyro.com/

Bra with machine gun?

[Qwrk]

Err..., or was that Austin Powers?

Re:Bra with machine gun?

[Anonymous Coward]

Machine gun jublies! How did I miss those?

Re:Bra with machine gun?

[AJWM]

Ursula Andress did it first (single shot, not machine gun) in The Tenth Victim.

Re:Bra with machine gun?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds more like Matt Helm.

Eddie Izzard's view

[icke]

Of course there is the Eddie Izzard sketch brilliantly animated without the help of Daniel Craig.

Pictures

[tsa]

Can someone tell me from which server the pictures in the fine article come? I seem to have adblocked them or something, because I don't see them.

Re:Pictures

[Kandenshi]

Image Properties:
Location: http://www.computerweekly.com/PhotoGalleries/232923/19_20_Jet-pack-Thunderball-1965-Sean-Connery.jpg
Location: http://www.computerweekly.com/PhotoGalleries/232923/34_20_Mini-speedboat-The-World-is-Not-Enough-1999-Pierce-Brosnan.jpg
etc...

Re:Pictures

[tsa]

Thanks! Weird that I don't see them on the site.

Re:Pictures

[Anonymous Coward]

Maximize your browser and you might see a portion of the left side of the image on the right-middle side of the page. Something about the page is completely screwed up. It doesn't render correctly for me either.

Re:Pictures

[antdude]

I didn't see any on my side too.

I reported the problem to AdBlock Plus people in http://adblockplus.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=21432 ... Other ComputerWeekly's image galleries have the same problem from http://www.computerweekly.com/Home/GalleryListingPage.aspx ...

Re:Pictures

[antdude]

I turned off ABP and still don't see the images. I also renamed my hosts file. Same results. I wonder what the heck. IE6.0 SP2 showed them fine.

Re:Pictures

[tsa]

Firefox almost never does that to me. Strange.

Re:Pictures

[antdude]

Do you have a mininum font size at 12 or higher? That is messing it up. :(

Re:Pictures

[Bex-ComputerWeekly]

Hiya, Thanks for spotting this. The photo gallery's a brand new feature for us, so we do want it to offer the best experience it can. We'll delve back into our stylesheets and so on to see if we can get it fixed. If you could let us know which browsers you're using when you hit this problem, and whether you've got any custom settings on (e.g. it only happens with large text, or adblockers on etc) that'd be really good, as we can't reproduce on our in-house systems yet. Thanks! Rebecca Froley @ ComputerWeekly.com

Cell phone

[hypersql]

From what I read, the only gadget in the next 007 movie will be a cell phone. Could have been at least a Swiss army knife :-)

Aston Martin + Champagne refrigerator

[jbeaupre]

May I direct you attention to the one gadget we all really want: the Aston Martin with champagne refrigerator. You might want some of the other features http://www.aston-martin.us/007/goldfinger.html but I submit that the combination of the two were the most useful for defeating the other side. Really, how often will you ever "retractable tyre slashers" to impress a woman? And even for guys here on Slashdot, you're 1000 times more likely to need an advantage when dealing with women than ever have to douse flame throwing motorcycles.

Car-sub!

[Candid88]

The underwater car, gadget 2 in TFA, was the one I always wanted. Unfortunately I do not know of such a car ever being made, there's been a few amphibious cars but I've never heard of a car which can actually turn into a mini-sub underwater.

I guess the lack of oxygen would be a slight problem for any combustion-based vehicle, maybe Bond's car was electric?

Re:Car-sub!

[internerdj]

Agreed and good luck ever getting an electric car in the US...

Re:Car-sub!

[jo_ham]

The tested one on a British car show on here a year or so ago. It's not an enclosed sub - you need to wear diving gear to use it underwater, but it does work as a submarine and can move from land, into water then submerge itself when you're in a suitable place.

Re:Car-sub!

[netsavior]

yes, yes they have had a sub-car
Rinspeed sQuba

Re:Car-sub!

[Candid88]

That car is crazy!

Re:Car-sub!

[steveha]

Fascinating. Here's a link to the text explaining the car:

http://www.rinspeed.com/pages/cars/squba/pre-squba.htm

This is an actual car, but the Bond version remains sheer fantasy. The Rinspeed's passenger compartment is not pressurized; it's designed to let the water in. According to the above cited text:

With an enclosed volume of just two cubic meters of air the vehicle weight would have to increase by two tons (!) to counteract the unwanted buoyancy, giving the "sQuba" the land mobility of a turtle.

The James Bond movie car drove fast on land, and shot wet cement onto the windscreen of a pursuing car, before driving into the sea and then firing a missile to shoot down a helicopter. This is cooler, though, because it actually exists.

steveha

My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's shoe

[fprintf]

My favorite, I think perhaps from one of the Roger Moore Bond films, was the Soviet agents knife in the shoe. It was hilarious watching her try to kick Bond, swinging the leg around trying to 'git im'

Ahem

[RiffRafff]

I work for a WELL-known IT hardware/software giant that goes by a TLA. They just issued me a new 1-way pager.

So there, ha!

Re:Ahem

[Anonymous Coward]

That's either IBM... or?

Sure you can ....

[Fallen Andy]

See the wikipedia entries here and here.

Andy

There's my flying car!

[EmbeddedJanitor]

For all the talk of roadable planes etc, Little Nellie style flying machines are pretty close.

Small autogyros are very maneuverable, have short take off/landing and are potentially a lot safer too. A small auto gyro gives reasonable speed and mileage. Landed, the rotor can be folded away quite easily and the autogyro could be easily powered by its own engine (as a simple motor trike).

remote control car?

[girlintraining]

The reason a remote control car is a bad idea is because there's no way for you to get any feedback on your steering and acceleration/braking decisions. When you're in a car, you can feel what it is doing and know where the limits are. A joystick doesn't have that kind of responsiveness and it's inevitable that you'll lose control of the vehicle when doing much more than driving it in an oval or in a straight line. And you'd need more than 1 camera to effectively navigate; I'm sorry, but the idea of using an iPhone, with it's limited screen size, to display several video feeds, is not practical. That said, having invoked the "that's impossible!" phrase with a bunch of engineers... I've pretty much doomed the world to having one created...

Re:remote control car?

[SimonGhent]

Top Gear did a feature a couple of years back with real r/c cars. Three of them in a quarry. James May and Richard Hammond vs. a 14 year old girl who was the national junior r/c car racing champion (or something similar).

She did a pretty good job.

Re:My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's sho

[gregg]

Actually, that was Sean Connery in 'From Russia with Love'.

just don't stop to ask where the energy comes from

[petes_PoV]

super-strong electromagnets built into wristwatches, finger-sized lasers that can cut through metal, electric saws in you watch (again). If we had the technology to supply these things with the power they need, we'd never need to switch off our laptops, as the batteries would never run out. However, they'd have far too much stored energy to ever be let through airport security.

I had Jaws' teeth

[Inda]

Short story as I want to go home in a minute...

Broke both my jaws 20 years ago, two metal gumshields were glued to my teeth, both of these had little hooks pointing up/down away from my mouth, on these hooks were elastic bands, these bands kept my nouth in the correct possition (and had to be cut if ever I puked).

When I'd healed, the elastic bands were removed and I looked just like Jaws. No white teeth, just metal.

If it wasn't for all the other metalwork screwed into my skull, I'd have been chewing through cables. :)

Liquid food for ten weeks... No pictures but I promise you it did happen.

Re:I had Jaws' teeth

[Anonymous Coward]

'Broke both my jaws ...'

So, you're an Alien?

Re:I had Jaws' teeth

[elysiana]

Why, how many do YOU have? Most of the humans I've known haven't been missing their maxilla or mandible. Maybe you're the alien?? :tinfoil:

Re:I had Jaws' teeth

[sam0737]

Looks like 20 years later the medic technology is improved...?

I have intentionally broken my jaw 3 years ago, or actually I was having my malocclusions conditions treated. 6 weeks of liquid food (if you still call that food...)

Besides the titanium screws that were blot on the jaw bone which were taken out in another operation later, there were a metal wrapping wires which wrap around the teeth. The hooks are glued to the teeth just like normal braces though, which is removable once done...

The metalwork used was just very similar to normal brace...nothing really special.

Not from Q ...

[fahrbot-bot]

Least known, but most used, Bond gadget: penis

Re:Not from Q ...

[hansamurai]

It also breaks down from all that use so they have to keep replacing the actor.

Re:Not from Q ...

[Haoie]

Are you implying that particular gadget has been enhanced by the tech guys?

DARPA challenge

[languagehacker]

Anything harder-core than driving on the highway is a non-trivial problem for current neural network models used to automatically drive a car. That being said, the phone interface would be easy to implement once a car can navigate the side streets of Budapest by itself.

Your "nouth"?

[Viol8]

I guess it didn't heal so well then?

Jaws' teeth where the only cool thing about him as

[Joe The Dragon]

Jaws' teeth where the only cool thing about him as he is very hard to kill as me was a space station crashing back to earth did not kill him.

Re:My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's sho

[Knara]

Yeah, that was in "From Russia With Love". It always seemed to me to be the most stupid "hidden" weapon I've seen. Good if you're in a crowd, massively ineffective in a 1on1 situation.

Re:My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's sho

[cthulu_mt]

The blades were poisoned. All she had to do was knick Bond and "that's all folks".

In the novel though its poisoned knitting needles.

The one we need...

[Troll14]

The Bond gadget that us geeks need the most, is the power to get women at our fingertips. On a Friday night when were all alone, it would help to have a little more excitement then programming ;)

L-pills always the scariest gadgets

[jollyreaper]

Suicide pills I've always found to be scary, even scarier are the people who employ them. There's just something unsettling to Western sensibilities when someone is willing to give their lives for a cause, not just in the "might not come back from this mission" context but "I'm biting down on a cyanide ampule and there's no coming back from--ACK!" To the western mind, the slight chance of survival from an apparently suicidal mission is completely different from an intentionally suicidal mission where success must include your death.

The first one of these scenes I ever saw as a kid was Dr. No where Bond is chasing the guy down from the airport and he kills himself with poisoned cigarettes. Really messed with my mind as a kid but now I think it could be hysterical if done with a bit of an Austin Powers mirth. Bond chases the guy down, he takes the L-pill and gives a look of defiance that gives way to shock when Bond says "Good man, I was just going to ask you the time, there was no need to run away." Then he croaks.

Re:L-pills always the scariest gadgets

[Alistar]

The point of the cyanide pill isn't to give your life for the cause.

They want to live. The point is to sacrifice yourself before they can question you.
That's why in "Tomorrow Never Dies" M chastises Bond for not using it when he was captured, because they think he was the one spilling secrets.

Re:L-pills always the scariest gadgets

[jollyreaper]

The point of the cyanide pill isn't to give your life for the cause.

I'm aware of that as an adult but as a child I always conflated the two. And it makes for a good point, anyone will break under torture. I know the Tamil Tigers make L-pill training a daily event so that the thought of taking the capsule from around your neck and biting down on it becomes second-nature, it will be the unthinking, unquestioning response when faced with capture. Pretty scary stuff.

Reliability And Press

[maz2331]

Humans are used because "true believers" are easily recruited and highly reliable, whereas electronics and the expertise to build a reliable remote control system isn't. Plus, any remote is subject to jamming and easily rendered ineffective. Plus, buying the servos and motion-control gear does leave a bit of a paper trail.

Plus, the press picks up far more readily on a suicide attack rather than a remote-controlled one. Suicide attacks give the impression of a "fighter" dying for a cause, wheras a remote attack is easily spun as "cowardly murdering bastards." (Note: even the suicide attackers are murdering bastards.) It's really hard to "spin" a remote-controlled attack on civillians as anything but cowardly murdering bastard type asshattery.

The "other" kind of parachute.

[Ostracus]

"Mini speedboat - The World is Not Enough (1999) Pierce Brosnan

I'm not sure that Pierce Brosnan's mini speedboat really qualifies as a gadget, but it was an electric opening sequence, and its bijou size means its almost small enough to fit in your pocket and qualify as a gadget.
"

Maybe with todays fashion you could fit them in your pants.

nope

[Pope]

James Bond is a virgin!

Using minimum font size?

[antdude]

I think I got it now. It's not ABP's fault.

If SeaMonkey's Minimum Font size is set to 12 or higher, then no images show up in Computer Weekly's Image Gallery: http://www.computerweekly.com/Home/GalleryListingPage.aspx ... Example: http://www.computerweekly.com/PhotoGalleries/232923/33_20_BMW-750-IL-Tomorrow-Never-Dies-1997-Pierce-Brosnan.jpg

Are you using that too in Firefox/SeaMonkey?

Re:Using minimum font size?

[tsa]

Yes, I have it switched on. Let me try without... (opens a new tab...)... What the...??!! You're right, it works now! Amazing. Cool, thanks!!

Re:Using minimum font size?

[antdude]

Yeah, I wonder if it is a bug in Mozilla's Web browser, site bug, or what. I posted this issue in Firefox and SeaMonkey newsgroups to see what others say.

Re:Using minimum font size?

[tsa]

I guess it has to do with the numbers 1 2 3 4 5 6 ... taking up more than one line when the font is too big.

Re:Using minimum font size?

[antdude]

I got a reply from Mozilla's newsgroup: "It is a problem of the website styles not accounting for this case - they should at least allow that much of font size variation (while I don't have problem reading even smaller than 12px font, it is extremely not comfortable to me, so I'm using the same minimum)."

I suggest we tell ComputerWeekly about this issue: http://www.computerweekly.com/StaticPages/ContactUs.htm ...

Re:Using minimum font size?

[tsa]

I just sent them a mail. Let's hope they change it before the article is 'old'.

Re:Using minimum font size?

[antdude]

I found another site with the same problem:

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/scoreboard/20081029.html (try higher 13)

Do you get the same results? It seems like more and more Web sites are doing this. :(

Funny how times change. . .

[Fantastic Lad]

But these days, in this world, the government secret agent is now the villain.

To hell with Bond. --He's the guy planting bombs on the 'tube' for Israel in order to blame on some young Arab patsies in a scam only the media sells and utter imbeciles believe in.

The 'Bond' of today is an emotionally unstable thug with learning disabilities in service to a corrupt government trying its formal best to enslave its population with a deliberately broken money system, drugs and lots and lots of cameras.

The hell with Bond. I can't believe we were all so damned naive in the Sixties and Seventies. Dr. No and all those other metaphors for power-lunacy were either working for the government or the government was working for them. No difference at the top. And we, the plebes, were eating that garbage up like candy.

How embarrassing!

-FL

Re:Funny how times change. . .

[geekoid]

Some of us can enjoy fiction without buying into it.
I pity your inability to use your brain.

Re:Funny how times change. . .

[GrahamCox]

The hell with Bond. I can't believe we were all so damned naive in the Sixties and Seventies. Dr. No and all those other metaphors for power-lunacy were either working for the government or the government was working for them. No difference at the top. And we, the plebes, were eating that garbage up like candy.

You have a point, but consider this. In 1960 WW2 had only been over 15 years, and that *was* all about defeating a megalomaniac bent on world domination. It's no coincidence that for the next twenty or more years so many films (Star Wars for example) followed a similar theme, as did children's cartoons - how many times did "Speed Buggy" defeat a german-sounding professor intent on ruling the world? This is how our parents' generation dealt with very real nightmare they lived through - you could argue that these films and other productions were a channeling of their collective traumas.

Re:Funny how times change. . .

[Fantastic Lad]

This is how our parents' generation dealt with very real nightmare they lived through - you could argue that these films and other productions were a channeling of their collective traumas.

That's fair enough. I suppose I'm more annoyed at myself. I was just a kid when I saw (and was deeply impressed with) my first Bond movie. I didn't have any post war trauma to deal with, so my only excuse was being young and ignorant, so I do rather feel like I was fed a line, even if it wasn't deliberate. I can certainly forgive my parents, but the message is still false.

As for Star Wars. . . That I see in a different light altogether; it wasn't about 'good' government agents versus the megalomaniac. It was about freedom fighters struggling against imperial tyranny. The Star Wars message, and that echoed more recently by Firefly, holds even more validity today than it did thirty years ago. Far more so than the Bond franchise.

-FL

Driverless car

[He who knows]

The DARPA urban challenge comes to mind.

The new Bond

[geekoid]

IS the gadget.

Re:just don't stop to ask where the energy comes f

[The Fun Guy]

If we had the technology to supply these things with the power they need,

Hey, wait a minute! Are you saying these things are... fictional?

Why didn't anybody tell me! My business model is shot! My Step 3 is dependent on these super-dense power supplies! Now I'll never get to Profit!

Choices

[Fantastic Lad]

Hey there, geekoid! How's the downward spiral treating you these days?

No need for pity. I certainly don't pity you. People like us have strong opinions and we are both intelligent and we're not likely to alter our views, (though I am open to altering mine should new information arise rather than fight to maintain faulty belief structures for reasons of ego etc., which is where I suspect we differ, but that's not the issue).

Sure, I happen to think you're 180 degrees south of correct on many points, but I also recognize that this is your business and your choice. People who make solid choices and act on those choices are not the ones who need pity. We both have courses which we intend to follow, and that's actually pretty awesome. We have direction, and we both like the directions we have chosen, so you know, 'go us'. The ones who are pitiable are those who have avoided looking or making any choices at all.

-FL

Re:My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's sho

[Knara]

I realize they're poisoned, which was why it was good to have them in a place where someone was unlikely to be able to retreat or stay out of legs' reach.

At least with poisoned knitting needles you could throw them or use them in some sort of traditional martial sense.

Because I hate multi-paged lists...

[insllvn]

Jet pack - Thunderball (1965) Sean Connery

Not really a gadget but one of the more memorable personal devices that Bond has possessed. After killing Colonel Jacques Bouvar at a chateau, Bond uses the jet pack to return to his car, an Aston Martin DB5. The pack used was developed by Bell Aerosystems as the Bell Rocket Belt which only had a 20 second flying time using a hydrogen peroxide fuel. The scenes in Thunderball were shot using two stuntmen and the shrill sound of the jets was overdubbed with the sound of a fire extinguisher. In 1984, a Rocket Belt was used in the opening ceremony for the Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Jet packs may not have taken over the world but a mild solution of hydrogen peroxide on cotton wool can be used to disinfect and clean keyboards.

Lotus Esprit - The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) Roger Moore

A deviation for Bond cars as it wasn't an Aston Martin, but it doubled as a submarine, so Bond could track down Karl STromberg's underwater lair.

BMW 750 IL - Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) Pierce Brosnan

Another great Bond car and again not an Aston Martin. This car was armed with an impressive array of gadgets - it's bullet proof, laden with sunroof fired mini-missiles, metal spike dispensers, grenades and a cutter hidden behind the BMW badge. The best thing was though that it was remote controlled by a mobile phone - how cool is that!

Mobile phone - Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) Pierce Brosnan

Brosnan was the first Bond to have a truly mobile phone, a concept design from Ericsson. A few years later the R380 production model appeared which had many of the features of the Bond original â" except for the stun gun, fingerprint scanner, lock pick and remote control for a BMW 750iL. In Quantum of Solace (2008), Daniel Craigâ(TM)s gadget-free Bond does possess a mobile and itâ(TM)s still a Sony Ericsson phone. This time its a titanium C902 which also lacks the first phoneâ(TM)s finer accessories â" itâ(TM)s not even a front-running smartphone. However, it does have a useful 5Mpixel camera to assist Bondâ(TM)s surveillance activities.

Aston Martin DB5 - Goldfinger (1964) Sean Connery

The most iconic car used by 007 is a silver Aston Martin which has appeared in Goldfinger, Thunderball (1965), GoldenEye (1995), Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), Casino Royale (2006) and is due to make a return appearance in Quantum of Solace (2008). Admittedly, it has not always been the same vehicle but it has always been a non-standard production model. The first car had revolving licence plates, tyre slashers, a bulletproof shield, machine guns behind the headlights and smoke and oil sprayers at the back. Most famous of all was the ejector seat on the passenger side. IT and sports cars have always been intertwined with many bosses of manufacturing firms favouring Porsche models. Maybe the return of the Aston Martin will spawn a new craze â" if anyone can afford anything larger than a bicycle during the recession.

Fingerprint identification device - Diamonds Are Forever (1971) Sean Connery

This projector-based system was not one of 007â(TM)s tools but was used by diamond smuggler Tiffany Case (Jill St. John). Compared to modern fingerprint identification systems, Tiffanyâ(TM)s device was extremely crude and immovable. To discover Bondâ(TM)s identity, she dusts a glass he has used, runs it through the device and compares it with a known example of his real fingerprint. Fingerprint identification is a much simpler operation these days with the proliferation computer-based fingerprint analysers that can skim through thousands of possible matches in seconds.

Aston Martin DBS - Casino Royale (2006) Daniel Craig It's hard to find a true gadget in the gritty Casino Royale, but Daniel Craig's sumptous Aston Martin DBS possibly qualifies. Daniel Craig nearly dies inside his car, but is brought back to life thanks to a mini portable defibrillator and some antidote.

TV wristwatch - Octopussy (1983) Roger Moore Watc

I still remember the car phone

[WillAffleckUW]

Man, that thing was bigger than a laptop!

There were only 14

[GallaherMike]

The last image is just a production still. There are only 14 in the article.

I know we have more than made up for that here, but still it is pretty bad when a computing site can't count to 15.

Re:There were only 14

[Pranab]

The 15th is Nellie the mini helicopter. It's given as a link in the text to the 15th image.

Re:My favorite... the knife in the KGB woman's sho

[cailith1970]

In the book she nicked him in the shin with the knife.

He survived it barely, but that's the reason he was in deep shit and had to change his gun at the beginning of Dr No (in the movie too). The Baretta with silencer got caught in the waistband of his pants, so he didn't manage to kill/hold off the KGB woman.