If you thought the ground-breaking work of Nikola Tesla and Paul Budnitz couldn’t possibly share any commonality, think again. California-based artist Dustin Cantrell has combined a plasma globe with a designer toy to create an ultra-limited run of Plasma Dunnys. Dustin’s creation is a rumination on the idea that Tesla’s toiling, which “at the time must have seemed like some kind of magic, has been reduced to cheap, Chinese-made novelty toys to be sold in malls at stores like Spencer’s Gifts.” Of course, designer toys have nothing in common with the kind of wares hocked at novelty shops, and Dustin’s Tesla-inspired figures will find fans in fine art connoisseurs and Burning Man attendees alike.

The metallic silver interactive Plasma Dunnys are limited to four pieces (valued at hundreds of dollars): three will be for sale later this month in ToyCyte’s new store for emerging artists, and one is being given away for free right now as part of ToyCyte’s custoMONDAY series. Dustin is looking for your favorite gadget (real or imagined), and will choose a winner based on all comments received here by February 15th.

Josh and I have been googly eyed over the TESLA Roadster for some time now (I think Josh sat by it during the entire TED Conference last week, and maybe even tried to hold hands with it), but we never knew we could expect to see these all-electric, gorgeous cars on the street in merely a few months. Word is, starting this coming Fall, you’ll be able to walk into one of five dealerships– NYC, Chicago, Florida, Nor Cal, and So Cal– and drive out with a TESLA. Who killed the electric car? Not TESLA! Mucho props to TESLA for making an all-electric, stunning car a production reality. Now let’s see who follows suit…

Via Gizmodo

TIME Magazine just released their picks for the Best Inventions of 2006. YouTube makes it to the top of the list (although technically I think they were founded in 2005), as well as the super-sexy, eco-friendly Tesla Roadster, the flesh sensing table saw, floating beds and the HugShirt– a shirt that stimulates the feeling of being embraced by a loved one. Go go gadget, to infinity and beyond!

We are still a couple of years away from electric cars totally catching on, but the Tesla Roadster is giving us something to look forward to. The folks at Tesla have shifted their focus beyond the gas-electric hybrid platform that we have seen in recent years, an have gone all out by designing a fully electric sports car. The Roadster will whisk from 0-60 in less than 4 seconds, is as quiet as a whisper (the motor only has one moving part!), and fully charges its batteries in 3.5 hours. The thing is fast, that’s for sure–I saw it road-tested on the Today Show this morning and it was pretty impressive to watch. The design is top-notch as well–especially the interior. The only thing that bothers me about the car — and this is definitely a catch 22 — is that it IS quiet. To me, there is something very special about the roar of a V-12 gas motor. The quietness of the Tesla Roadster is kind of emasculating, don’t you think? That said, I don’t want to judge the quiet ride until I have the chance to get into one and experience the ‘quiet flight’ myself. Tesla will be shipping its pre-orders in about a year, at the cost of about $120,000 (this is what I remember hearing, but if anyone knows this price figure to be false, let me know). I have to give props to Tesla for what it is doing–it designed a fast sports car that produces 1/10 of the pollution and is 6 times as efficient as top sports cars–the quiet ride notwithstanding.