Chumby rasa

The question at this point is whether the name Chumby will come to stand for every other hackable pillow-like device. (Such was the fate of Kleenex and Escalator.) If all goes according to plan, Chumbys should be on the market by now. Prototypes and development versions have been circulating for about a year, and a sizeable development community has grown around it. Given how much it's grown and changed in the public womb, there's no telling how it'll evolve out in meet space.

"Chumby Industries was formed by hackers who wanted to create something interesting, useful and different. The starting point was the humble clock radio." its creators explain. Since then Chumby has evolved from a clock in a cushion into an Any-purpose Net-native Linux device. That's any with a capital A, because the Chumby is built to be hackable at every level, including the physical. Not only does it sense motions and squeezings, but it hosts an assortment of charms, though its "outerware API". The charms and much more about the Chumber were designed by Susan Kare (who designed the orignal desktop icons for the Macintosh and Windows, among too many other things to mention). Susan is Creative Director for Chumby. The company might be cuddly, but it means business, too.

Tech details: 3.5" LCD color touchscreen, two external USB 2.0 full-speed ports, 350 MHz ARM controller, 64 MB SDRAM, 64 MB NAND flash ROM, 2 watt amp with stereo speakers, headphone output. squeeze sensor, accelerometer, wi-fi connectivity, microphone. Plus whatever you can do with it. For more, visit Chumby.com.

- Doc Searls