Equipment

On the balmy autumn evening of March 28th in Sydney, the fine fellows of Mecca Coffee hosted and roasted festivities for the 2015 Australian AeroPress Championships. Amidst a sea of Mahlkönig EK 43 grinders, Mecca’s newly refurbished roastery space (henceforth dubbed the “Brew-O-Drome”) housed the lucky 100 ticketed audience members as well as the 27 competitors and their support staff/cheer squads. Ben Richardson of Pablo and Rusty’s Coffee Roasters in Sydney was crowned champion, steeping and pressing his way through multiple rounds on his way to victory. He’ll move on to represent Australia at the 2015 World AeroPress Championship in Seattle, happening April 9th.

A fine menu of fresh hot food was provided for the revelers, alongside beers from Gang of Four and juice and cocktail mixes from Botanica. Disco tunes were played all night long by DJ Good Brew, a.k.a. Simon Cancio of Brickfields Bakery. Sam Sgambellone provided additional entertainment throughout the night, at one stage extending himself beyond the usual MC duties by offering an impromptu karaoke session covering Blue Boy’s “Remember Me”. It was definitely memorable.

Judges were Paul Geshos (Mecca), Wendy De Jong (Single Origin Roasters) and Dylan Johnson (Paramount Coffee Project, 2014 Australian AeroPress Champion) alongside the World AeroPress Championship founder/presenter/ man-about-brew himself, Tim Varney, who served as Head Judge and director of competitor profile pictures.

A special mention must also go to Cameron Stephens, who in partnership with Mitchell Road Auction House kitted out the roastery with fabulous kitsch and décor, as well as arranging the must-have giant novelty check, Aero-trophies and Aerobie discs. The coffee selected for the competition was Ethiopia Duromina, a coffee from a cooperative in the Oromia region that’s named for “improving lives.”

Here are the recipes from the top three competitors, each of whom had to compete a minimum of three times throughout the night! Winning brews for sure, delicious and diverse.

First Place: Ben Richardson, Pablo & Rusty’s

Reverse osmosis water at 74 degrees Celsius
20 grams of sorted coffee, placed in the AeroPress in standard position
50 grams water poured, creating a 30 second bloom
Add 110 grams water after 30 second bloom
Plunge slowly at the 55 second mark for 1:15…

The second of four scheduled U.S. Regional AeroPress competitions was held March 11, 2016, in and around the glorious 360-degree bar at G&B Coffee in downtown Los Angeles. A vibe of anticipation buzzed in the basement of bustling Grand Central Market, where Glanville and company provided an afternoon practice area for the whopping 36-spot bracket of Los Angelean coffee brewing hopefuls. There they prepared coffee brewing recipes and mingled together while the sun set outside and the bar upstairs was cleared to make room for the brewmania and crowd of hundreds that would invade the market that night.

Judges on the scene in the first wave of brews were Jaymie Lao (Go Get Em Tiger), Tony/Tonx Konecny (LocoL, Tonx Coffee), and Mark Dundon (Paramount Coffee Project Fairfax). Once Dundon’s palate was worn out, his seat was filled by 17-year old teen-chef celeb, Flynn McGarry; and later in the evening with Finnish Barista Champ-turned-instant-spro-inventor-founder, Kalle Freese, who was pulled from the crowd of spectators to slurp the final rounds of pressed brews. G&B Coffee co-owner, Charles Babinski’s absence from the event was explained with rumors about “cold brew in Korea.” Babinski himself has made it very clear his cold brew endeavors in Korea do not involve Photoshop in any way.

To accommodate the massive lineup of AeroPressers and eliminate downtime between rounds, each trio of competitors was staggered with another round close after it. Winners Jon Dail (1st Place, Hidden House Coffee Roasters), Blair Smith (2nd Place, Augie’s Coffee Roasters), and Sean White (3rd Place, ACRE Coffee) advanced through two rounds into a final, third round which included four AeroPressed brews. Judges carefully selected the winners, knocking Jeff Courson (Bodhi Leaf Coffee Traders) into 4th place. The winners were announced with much fanfare, by AeroPress-Emcee-Vet, Ben Kaminsky (“Consultant”) who insisted the two finalists climb onto G&B’s glossy marble bar with him, so he could raise the victor’s fist into the air and celebrate his grand prize of a trip to Atlanta to compete at the U.S. AeroPress Championship in April.

After the winning announcement, the crowd stuck around for an after party, spilling into the market’s neighboring courtyard to partake in Southern-style BBQ at Horse Thief Barbecue and bottomless-beer generously provided by contributions from Viora Lid and G&B Coffee. Additional event sponsors were 49th Parallel Coffee…

On Saturday, April 16th, some forty competitors pressed for the title of 2016 US AeroPress Champion at Chattahoochee Coffee in Atlanta, Georgia. Engaged spectators and dazed passers-by both donned Aerobie flying discs worn like halos and took photos as MCs Chris Baca and Jared Truby (Cat & Cloud Coffee) dazzled the crowd with their hilarious banter. For five hours, some competitors advanced while others did not, until there were just one. And that one was Ben Jones of Ristretto Roasters in Portland, Oregon.

The competition was judged by a truly prestigious crew of coffee professionals. Past US Cup Tasters champion Amanda Juris (Verve Coffee Roasters), Australia Barista Champion Matt Perger (St. Ali), and World Barista Champion Mike Phillips (Blue Bottle Coffee) tasted, slurped, and pointed all evening, with special guest cameo judges Ben Kaminsky (Kaminsky Consulting), David LaTourelle (BKON Brewer), and Kalle Freese (Sudden Coffee).

The crowd ate cotton candy, snow cones, and hot dogs in this carnival-themed affair. Carnival games were set up throughout the event for attendees. Winners were given raffle tickets good for skateboard decks, t-shirts, brewing equipment, and coffee. All the while, tattoo artist Ryan Weaver gave away free tattoos inside the bustling Chattahoochee cafe. To ensure that as many people were given the opportunity to commemorate the event permanently on their body, UNIC Espresso sponsored a second tattoo artist to double-up.

The international AeroPress circuit, once a guerilla-style unofficial afterthought of an event is now a fully fledged sponsored and licensed coffee sport. National AeroPress competitions like these are taking place all over the world, and national winners will compete on the world stage in Dublin in June. During last night’s affair, one spectator asked the sky, “Didn’t this used to be on the trade show floor?” Just then, Jared Truby took a face swap selfie with Mike Phillips while declaring, “This coffee be banging!”

All competitors competed with a truly banging Colombia Los Naranjos from Cafe Imports. In the end, three talented coffee professionals took home custom AeroPress brewers/trophies to display and/or brew with. It was a Pacific Northwest heavy finals, with Nelson Icenhower (Slayer Espresso, Seattle, WA) taking the bronze prize, Mike Cannon (Velton’s Coffee, Everett, WA) taking silver, and Ben Jones (Ristretto Roasters, Portland, OR) with the coveted golden AeroPress.

Here…

You can find pretty much anything on Amazon. Have you been searching high and low for a ? Sure you have! How about a? No, not polenta — placenta. If so, just head on over to Amazon and download it for your Kindle Oasis! The online marketplace is full of amazing items you never knew you needed until now. Still, buying stuff online can be risky — after all, it’s difficult to trust strangers on the internet. That’s why Amazon allows customers to review items on the website, giving prospective buyers a way to learn about the item they’re purchasing. Unsurprisingly, the funniest Amazon reviews often get pretty ridiculous.

For years, the reviews section has been a place to post honest feedback, product photos, and hilarious reviews. In fact, so often were users posting parodical accounts of their experiences with products that Amazon decided to go ahead and create an entire page dedicated to humorous reviews. We loved the idea, so we scoured the depths of Amazon to bring you the reviews below. If you like these, we’ve also got some similar stuff you can check out:

Note: These reviews have been copied verbatim, without edits to content. There may be typos or grammatical inaccuracies, as well as offensive content. Read at your own risk.

“I didn’t hear a thing.” — Adam

Product reviewed:

Apparently, Amazon reviewer Adam lives in a dangerous neighborhood. We’re not sure how much truth there is to his story, but it’s a glowing recommendation for the headset nonetheless.

“So, not so funny story: Someone in the apartment unit above us got STABBED. According to the cop who interviewed us, the attacker rang the upstairs doorbell, and when the guy answered the attacker forced his way in and stabbed the guy. You want to know what scary part is? I didn’t hear a thing, thanks to my amazing HyperX Cloud 2 headphones. I got them on Amazon for $99.99 (free shipping). These things work as advertised! Probably the best noise cancelling headphones I’ve ever owned. 10/10 would buy again.”

“May have hatched. Don’t know what came out.” — A Trustworthy Human

Product reviewed:

Ostensibly, the Guardian Angel is some sort of acupuncture device designed to relieve pain via pressure points in your hands. It’s definitely got a creepy, ominous look about it, though, which reviewer A Trustworthy Human picked up on, and ran with.

“It’s in here somewhere. With me.

Woke up this morning to find that my Guardian Angel had shattered. The…

At CES 2023, Folio Photonics will reveal an enterprise-grade optical data storage solution. Here’s what we know about it so far.

Folio Photonics has announced that it will reveal the first-ever enterprise-scale, optical disc data storage solution during CES 2023, on Jan. 5–8, in Las Vegas. The new technology is designed to drastically reduce upfront costs and the total cost of ownership of data storage and backup while making data archives accessible, active, digitally secure and sustainable.

SEE: Checklist: Cloud storage management (TechRepublic Premium)

Currently, companies worldwide store and back up their data in massive cloud data warehouses, data centers, edge centers, and on tape and discs. But from energy usage to accessibility, reliability and costs, each storage system has its unique pros and cons. In this report, we’ll cover Folio Photonics’ latest release and what it could offer to people looking for new storage alternatives.

Optical multilayer enterprise disc storage solution

Folio Photonics, a company that focuses on data storage innovation, will present the first enterprise-scale optical data storage system during CES 2023. The company claims to have created a system that exceeds traditional disc storage by leveraging game-changing advancements in materials.

The new Folio Photonics storage system is a licensed technology that spun off from Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) and its National Science Foundation Center for Layered Polymeric Systems by professor Kenneth Singer.

The company explains that the system is a high-capacity optical storage solution with improved write/read capabilities. The single Folio disc has the same storage capacity as more than 100 DVDs, with a long-term roadmap to 10TB on a single disc.

“The high cost of storage is untenable with exploding data growth, cyber threats continuing to escalate, and data centers being one of the top contributors to energy and water usage and CO2 emissions,” said Steven Santamaria, CEO of Folio Photonics. “We look forward to CES and the opportunity to show how Folio Photonics has achieved a significant breakthrough in multilayer optical storage disc technology that will enable an unprecedented level of cost, security, performance and sustainability advantage.”

The benefits of Folio Photonics’ newest solution

Folio Photonics’ technology overcomes historical optical constraints to…

The Double-A Team is a new feature series honouring the unpretentious, mid-budget, gimmicky commercial action games that no-one seems to make any more.

Last week, Christian Donlan went out on a limb with Bionic Commando. This week, we’re taking Dark Sector for a spin.

If Double-A games tend to be aimed at the sort of audiences who appreciate disreputable B-movies then Dark Sector scratches a very particular itch, using a very particular implement. Originally released in 2008, it is a perpetually overcast urban shooter with a luminescent sprinkling of sci-fi that clearly evolved in the broad-shouldered shadow of Gears of War, the chunky, in-yer-face triple-A champ of the era.

That explains why your screen surrogate Hayden Tenno – otherwise a physically svelte CIA neck-snapper with a surprisingly graceful diving dodge – has a barging roadie run complete with wobbly camera. It is hardly the best way to navigate the gulags, sewers and graveyards of Lasria, Dark Sector’s stereotypically blighted Soviet setting. Tenno is there to track down a rogue scientist and assess a mysterious techno-organic viral outbreak. While operating in the same grubby but cinematic milieu of Gears, Dark Sector has an extra trick up its sleeve. Or, more accurately, a tungsten death frisbee welded to the end of your infected arm.

If you want to put it this way – and, I really, really, really do – the relationship between the player and Tenno is weirdly comparable to that between Rihanna and Calvin Harris: they found glaive in a hopeless place. This spangly weapon – a killer disc formed of three wickedly sharp scythes, like the world’s most lethal 45rpm record adapter – is catnip for anyone who loved the feral kid’s killer silver boomerang in Mad Max 2 or was exposed to shonky sci-fi fairytale Krull at such an impressionable age they thought a gigantic homing throwing star was the coolest thing ever.

A Krull-style glaive is the sort of daft weapon that only really works in movies or games. In Dark Sector, it is a hungry sharpened Aerobie that you fling out into the world at enemy soldiers and mutated monsters only for it to unerringly snap back to your (thankfully now fortified) palm after completing its mutilating flightpath. There is a deeply satisfying snap and flex to the action, bolstered by a whirring sound effect and a squelchy clang on retrieval. You can even use it to hoover up ammo and items if you…