I was watching the Discovery Channel today, watching something about fishing, and I saw these two fishermen resting on a pile of rope. What a great, environmentally cool thing if someone came up with a seat like that, recycling used rope for resting tired butts. Turns out, someone already did.

this chair is created by heating and pressing a seat-shaped former into a ball of polypropylene rope. The rope begins to liquefy as it comes into contact with the heated former and, as it cools, it sets in the shape of a seat creating a contrast in form and texture to the remaining rope. No additional material has been added to make the seat – it is all made from melted rope.

No word yet on production or cost, but cool idea.

This “Interactive Brainstorming Table” allows its users to resize, move, and copy objects. No word yet on if this will go into commercial production.

This is by far one of the coolest inventions I’ve seen in a long time. Once they can move this into the 3-D world, and then move the work onto the Internet in 3-D, then we’ve got something really special here.

Click below to see the absolutely amazing video of the Interactive Brainstorming Table in action…

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You’d think an invention like Velcro couldn’t be redesigned, but don’t tell that to Leonard Duffy. The 66-year-old architect has created a new Velcro he dubs "slidingly engaging fasteners." The fasteners don’t make that tearing noise when you unfasten them, they don’t wear down, and they can support 8x more weight than today’s Velcro.

They can be used on anything from sneakers to ski gloves to a waterproof cast (shown above) that Duffy calls the Unitary Wrap. I’ve used velcro for a lot of things, even to keep a shower curtain in place that would blow against me while showering. What have you used velcro for, and what would you use this velcro for?

The New Velcro [Pop Sci]