It's all about planned obsolescence….

"Gizmodo’s Brian Lam told us that the original Dyson vacuum cleaner was initially crippled in the U.S. market because manufacturers were worried it would cannibalize the multimillion-dollar market for replacement vacuum bags. "

NEW YORK – Popular technology blog Gizmodo has set up shop in a Manhattan art gallery to showcase some of the rarest and most intriguing gadgets from the past hundred years or so, including never-released Apple prototypes, the first Sony Walkman, a flying aerial surveillance camera and more.

The Gizmodo Gallery opened Thursday at the Reed Annex (151 Orchard St.), but we snuck in Wednesday night to photograph the most fascinating stuff on display here. The show runs through Sunday afternoon, giving New Yorkers, tourists and gadget freaks a chance to gaze upon important pieces of our technological history, and interact with some more recent gadgets.

That industry is known to insiders as real-money trading, or RMT, and if I tell you now that I've made some money in it myself, that's not because I expect you to take it on my say-so that there are people who might pay as much as $1,800 for an eight-piece suit of Skyshatter chain mail made entirely of fiction and code. Or that there are millions more—players of World of Warcraft, Age of Conan, EverQuest, EVE Online, and other massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs, or MMOs)—who have given other players real money in exchange for the virtual weapons, armor, currencies, and other sought-after items around which these games revolve. Or that despite the game companies' widespread prohibition of such transactions, their number has grown to support an estimated $2 billion annual trade, a half dozen multimillion-dollar online retail businesses, and an enormous Chinese workforce earning 30 cents an hour playing MMOs and harvesting treasure to supply the major retailers.

Privacy? What privacy??!

"Facebook Connect is representative of some surprising new thinking in Silicon Valley. Instead of trying to hoard information about their users, the Internet giants have all announced plans to share at least some of that data so people do not have to enter the same identifying information again and again on different sites. "

(Some part of) China goes green.

"Located in Shanghai’s trendy Tianzifang area is a boutique that may change your impression of design and manufacturing in China. The NEST design collective and store “is dedicated to contemporary product design, high quality craftsmanship, and responsible manufacturing."

Can't say it reallly gives a good perception of graffiti artist in Sao Paulo …

"Choque Cultural art gallery in São Paulo is a gallery renowned for its street art exhibits, including graffiti. But in September the gallery was subject to an “intervention”: about 30 pixadores (graffiti artists) invaded the gallery with their paint buckets and brushes and in less than five minutes, painted graffiti over all walls and art pieces exposed. The attack was a demonstration against what they called the “domestication of street art” and was led by 24 year-old Rafael Augustaitiz, also known as Rafael Pixobomb. Ironically enough, Choque Cultural translates to “cultural shock”, since the gallery aims to change peoples’ vision about what is art, even though some say that cultural shock is not what is being exhibited in the gallery, but what these pixadores actually did."

Crazy stop motion video; 45 000 photographs; enjoy!

Bill seems to be going through his own unique midlife crisis. He's not a boozy, sweaty party hound who gets caught on camera cheesing it up with pretty young girls (see: Mel Gibson, Bono); rather, he's more like a ghost in the night, who shows up out of nowhere, engages in utterly random conversations and then exits gracefully—leaving witnesses to wonder what the hell just happened. Deadpan, detached and seeming a bit lonely, Bill Murray is NYC's most unlikely new party guy.