Selfies

Ah, the selfie stick ... perhaps one of the most made-fun-of inventions of the past few years. The SoloCam takes the basic idea and adds to it, however, creating a tool that could actually be useful to video bloggers or even serious journalists.

People out and about in Dubai can now use palm trees to get online and recharge their phones. The Smart Palm is hi-tech version of the date palm tree and is being rolled out by D-Idea Media. In addition to Wi-Fi and device charging, it provides local info, directions, seating and shade.

Looking to fill another slot in the selfie aficionado's toolkit is the team behind Podo, a small wireless camera that can be slapped on any surface and controlled remotely with your smartphone.

NASA has released a self-portrait of Curiosity, showing a full view of the Pahrump Hills sites where the rover has been working for the last five months. The view includes a look at the Telegraph Peak site where the rover has just begun drilling, analyzing the chemistry of the rocks and soil.

If you're anything like me, the mere mention of "selfie phone" will be enough to make you run for the hills. But HTC's new Desire Eye is the rare novelty phone that backs up its niche focus with a damn good overall experience. Read on, for Gizmag's quick review.

Chinese manufacturer Oppo has announced the successor to last year’s N1 smartphone, with the new handset offering a motorized swiveling camera that’s ideal for selfie-obsessed users. Known as the N3, the handset offers a fingerprint sensor and improved internals.

Selfie fans, HTC thinks it has the phone for you. The Desire Eye takes mobile self-portraits to a new extreme with a 13-megapixel front-facing camera.

Nixie is a camera-equipped quadcopter designed to follow the user around taking pictures and videos on command, while conveniently wrapping around the wrist to form a bracelet when not in use.

Olympus has announced the PEN E-PL7 camera, which is designed to appeal to the selfie-shooting crowd. The mirrorless shooter boasts a dedicated Selfie Mode, a 180-degree downward flip LCD, and built-in Wi-Fi for easy sharing.

For all the functionality baked into today's cameras, they general limit the user to being behind the lens. Casio has announced a new modular camera that avoids this limitation. The Exilim EX-FR10 is designed so that the controller and lens units can be separated, allowing for more versatile shots.

Sony has revealed a camera designed to look like a perfume bottle and make its selfie-shooting subjects appear more attractive in their photographs. The CyberShot DSC-KW1 has a 180 degree rotating lens, a 19.2-megapixel sensor and built-in Wi-Fi.

You want to be in a photo taken with your own smartphone, but you have no way of propping the phone up, or seeing the shot. Well, the CaseCam is designed to help. It allows a phone laid down on a flat surface to see what's in front of it, plus the accompanying app lets you see what it's seeing.