If I may, I’d like to borrow a bit from comedian Bill Maher. New Rule: If you′re going to ask $1,000 for a steampunk device, it must actually do something worthwhile, preferably related to steam power.

And something in this case cannot be “Kingston USB drive,” which is what this is, and $1,000 is exactly what designer Will Rockwell is asking for it.

Note to steampunk aficionados and aspiring designers: When you hobble something together, call it steampunk and charge $1,000, whatever it is you′re making better be powered by a steam engine and have the ability to fight battles on my behalf or fly like an airship. [Etsy via Born Rich]

If I were to tell you that Netflix sleeves and discs were hotbeds of contamination and disease because they were handled by so many people from delivery to DVD player, you know what I’d be? A filthy liar, that’s what.

This is the exact opposite of Netflix discs, which are actually quite clean, comparatively speaking.

You see, those red sleeves and the delectable range of DVDs they contain are relatively free of any funky viruses or deadly bacteria, this according to an interesting slow news day report out of KLTV 7 East Texas.

As part of the report, six Netflix discs and sleeves were sent to an infectious disease expert at the University of Texas for a good swabbing. After some time in the incubator, the petri dishes were removed, and the samples—thankfully for this Netflix user—were no more covered with bacteria than a sample would have been had the good doctor touched them with his bare hand:

“They were fairly clean,” said [Dr. Richard] Wallace [in an interview with KLTV]. “If I took my fingers and laid them on the top of the plates, this is what you’d grow.” As for the disks themselves, Wallace said he found nothing that could potentially cause disease.

So keep on using that copy of Benjamin Button as a coaster. You’ll be relatively safe in doing so—just don’t eat off of it. [KLTV East Texas via Hacking Netflix]

We told you the deals, now tell us how it all went down. Find any sweet deals? Have any horror stories? Reevaluating your plan to flip copies of Paul Blart: Mall Cop on eBay? Let’s hear it.

I wasn’t really in the market for anything, and had no desire to go wait outside in the rain at the crack of dawn. But I did grab the DS version of Chrono Trigger for $10 ($9 after Bing cashback) on Wednesday at Newegg. Not on Black Firday, sure, but it was enough to satisfy my consumerist desires for the week. How about you? [Image via Tri-City Herald]

How did Black Friday go?(survey)

When I first heard the phrase “Lego sorter,” I expected some crazy production line robot with moving arms and a glowing red eye. Thankfully, the Bo×4Blox sorter works as simply as the Lego bricks it stores.

This thing got announced way back in March, and I’m amazed we missed it up until now. The device has four trays with square holes along the bottom. These openings get progressively smaller to sort out the bricks by size. And that’s really all there is to it. Genius.

Sounds good, and according to the Brothers Brick, it works well too. They found it does a great job sorting a kid’s collection, and even works well as pre-sorter for more complex adult collections.

Seems like cool beans, but we’ll have to let Jesus take a crack at it. Then, and only then, will we have the ultimate judgement. [Brothers Brick, Youtube via @chr1sa]

This infographic makes me so glad that we came up with storage methods other than floppy disks. Imagine replacing your 2TB hard drive with 1,422,222 floppies. No thank you. [Curtiss Spontelli via fellow Gizmodian Kyle. Thanks dude!]

The Windows/Apple divide has torn lovers apart for decades, and now this video explains why a Canon/Nikon relationship can never be. I’ll leave the “incompatible lens mount” jokes to you guys and gals in the comments. [Youtube, Thanks Jon.]

As we enter the holiday season, Gizmodo wants to make sure no one offends Auntie Ethel when she sees yet another Fleshlight post on the front page. To avoid the embarrassment, point your browser to gizmodo.com/tag/not:nsfw.

This works with other content as well, like gizmodo.com/tag/not:apple, or not:microsoft. Unfortunately, we still don’t have a not:anythingthatisn’tpuppiesorcottoncandyorrainbows tag in place yet, so you’ll have to wait on that one.

Miss out on any Black Friday deals? Roll your own with Bing. The basically-free-money service has upped cashback rates until December 2. Check out the participating gadget sites below, and keep ‘em in mind for Cyber Monday:

Highlights:
AT&T — 35% cashback (iPhone excluded, unfortunately)
T-Mobile &mdash 35% cashback
Dell — 20% cashback
HP — 20% cashback
Lenovo — 20% cashback
Walmart — 15% cashback
Overstock — 15% cashback

The Rest:
Sears — 8-13% cashback
Circuit City — 8-12.2% cashback
Tiger Direct — 8—12.2% cashback
eBay &mdash 8-10% cashback
Best Buy — 5-10&amp cashback
Buy.com — 5% cashback

Keep in mind it takes up to 60 days until your money is available, but hey, free money later is better than no free money at all. [Bing via Cheap Ass Gamer]

Apple Rejected Me reads like FML, but features stories from rejected app developers instead of inappropriate innuendoes dropped by “that uncle” at Thanksgiving. Got a beef with Apple’s approval process? Sound off. [ARM, Thanks Matt.]

Psystar’s recent legal woes keep proving the company’s insanity. New documents show that these guys planned to sell at least 1.45 million Mac clones by 2011. How many did they actually sell in the past year? 768.

The best part is, those are conservative estimates. According to Psystar’s aggressive predictions, the company planned to move 12 million computers by 2011. 12 million! That’s a far cry from the triple digit numbers they managed to sell.

The other best part is that Psystar pitched their inevitable legal battle with Apple as a competitive advantage, claiming other companies would want to stay away from that mess. Imagine asking the bank for a loan on a truck, saying you’ll use it to haul stolen TVs, and arguing that fear of getting arrested will make yours the only TV truck in town. No wonder these guys are going under.

The documents were provided as part of the upcoming injunction proceedings, where Apple is trying to halt sales of Psystar’s products. Hey Apple, I know this is all about protecting your IP and all, but going by those dismal figures, you really don′t have to worry about Psystar’s sales. [Computer Wold via BGR]