Forever Flashlight

“The Forever Flashlight uses no batteries or bulbs. Instead it uses Faraday’s Principle of Induction and a bright LED to produce light without batteries. The light is shaken for about 30 seconds to recharge a capacitor and it will then provide about 5 minutes of light. As the light is shaken, a magnet passes through a metal coil generating electricity. During prolonged use it can be shaken for 10-15 seconds every 2 or 3 minutes.” —Forever Flashlight (Think Geek)

How many times have you shaken a flashlight when its batteries are dying? It’s such a natural action, even though usually it never does any good. This sounds like great design to me. Does anyone know how the light compares to, say, the focused beam of a Mini MagLite? Via WebWord.

P.S. My birthday is October 11. Hint, hint, hint.

I already have a blue LED on a flexy neck that plugs into my laptop’s USB port. It casts out a fairly nice general light, with a little spot that I aim at the keyboard (particularly at the navigation keys, which are in different locations on every keyboard I use, so the light really helps when I’m up late typing and don’t want to disturb anyone else).