Secretive Bilderberg Club ready for protests - Times Online

Secretive Bilderberg Club ready for protests - Times Online

Splash! Could that be the sound of Lord Mandelson hitting one of the Dolce hotel’s four pools? Or Robert Zoellick of the World Bank? Paul Volcker of the US Economic Recovery Advisory Board? Or merely the euro taking another dive?

That is the thing about the Bilderberg group’s top secret meetings: you never know quite what is going on behind the police checkpoints.

Across the world, secretaries to the rich and the powerful have blocked out the next three days in their bosses’ calendars for their annual gathering, this time at the Dolce in Sitges, one of Spain’s most exclusive resorts.

Israel Attack Freedom Flotilla

Ahes to Ashes

"I'm arresting you for the murder of my Quattro", a perfect end for the fab five in Ashes to Ashes. Having watched since the Life on Mars days I was slightly apprehensive about watching the last episode in case I was disappointed. I wasn't, here's how it ends

Gene Hunt, Alex Drake, and their colleagues Ray Carling, Chris Skelton and Shaz Granger were in fact all dead - meaning 'life' at Fenchurch East CID was simply a 'purgatory' for dead police officers caught between Heaven and Hell.

After thinking she can return 'other world' before being allowed to go home, Drake realises instead of being in a coma she has died after being shot in 2008 and will never return to her daughter Molly.

The increasingly creepy complaints officer Jim Keats turns out to be the devil - luring the officers to joining him in the burning depths of Hell.

It appears Keats has already succeeded in bringing Viv James to Hell after he was seen cradling him in his last moments when he died in episode six.

Before Keats' role became clear, Skelton tells his colleagues he dreamt about Viv being surrounded by flames - alluding to Hell.

Keats gives Alex the location of a field in which he alludes to the presence of the remains of Sam Tyler. As Drake starts digging up the grave, Hunt demands that she stops... but when she finally comes across his body and pulls out his police badge, he is left unusually speechless when he remembers who he is.

Rather than the middle-aged man audiences have watched in the Seventies-set Life On Mars and its Eighties follow-up Ashes To Ashes, it turns out Hunt was just a rookie cop on his first week of the job when he was shot dead on Coronation Day in 1953.

Then out of the shadows came Keats, hoping to lure Drake to Hell by claiming Hunt is trying to keep her with him in limbo.

Meanwhile, back at Fenchurch East, Ray, Chris and Shaz also realise they're dead after watching videos of their deaths, cruelly left for them by Keats.

All three have been 'seeing stars' and been haunted by various eerie noises from the era they died in.

Ray watches himself sitting in an armchair struggling with depression before standing on a chair and hanging himself. His last words being 'sorry dad'.

He later explains he disappointed his dad by choosing to be a police officer rather than join the army.

One day, he took his anger out on a young man outside a pub, who ended up dying.

While his DCI helped Ray by covering up the man's death, living with the guilt prompted his suicide.

Chris then sees himself as an officer in the late Seventies or early Eighties, being led to his shooting death by his sergeant, who orders him into the line of fire.

Finally Shaz breaks down when she finds out she was a 26-year-old office from 1995 who ends up stabbed with screwdriver as she tries to stop a car thief.

As former fiance Chris rushes to comfort her, the reason behind her anger throughout the series finally becomes clear to her.

She cries: 'All this time I felt so angry, so frustrated, I thought it was the job. It isn't fair.'

The trio, furious with Hunt for keeping the truth for them, are given the option to 'transfer' to another department by Keats.

An incredulous Keats shouts: 'Oh come, you didn't think this was a real police station did you?'

As the trio follow Keats to his 'new department' in hell, Hunt lures them back for one last job and promises Shaz a promotion.

As the fab five carry out their last job together - stopping a jewel heist in the airport - Hunt's beloved Quattro ends up destroyed by gunfire.

A furious Hunt yells: 'He's bl**dy killed my Quattro... I'm arresting you for murdering my car, you dyke-digging t**spot..'

After the 'blag' is successfully completed, the gang all head back for a pint - but this time it's at the Railway Arms instead of Luigi's, which fans will remember from Life On Mars.

Walking out of the Railway Arms isn't Tyler - as many fans wondered if Simm would return - but the landlord Nelson (Tony Marshall) does return as a type of St Peter, welcoming people at the gates of Heaven.

It turns out there is no need to Tyler to come back - because he's already in Heaven.

As Hunt put it, 'Sam had to go, end of.'

Before entering the heavenly doors of the Railway Arms, Shaz and Chris reconcile after breaking off their engagement in between Series 2 and 3 as she tells him 'I love you, I'll always love you forever and a day, you got that'.

As Ray, Shaz and Chris 'pass over' into the Railway Arms, Drake thinks she can go home to her daughter Molly, but the look on Hunt's face makes her realise it isn't possible.

A devastated Drake finally realises she is dead and will never return to Molly, which she has been fighting to return to in 2008 for all three series.

Hunt assures her 'I know, I know. Way of the world, Alex. She'll be fine'.

Despite Drake's best efforts to stay with Hunt in his limbo world, Hunt tells her to follow the others, because they've 'got a saloon bar', while he will have to spend eternity 'sorting out the troubled souls of Her Majesty's constabulary' and 'those who have issues with their passing'.

The pair finally share a kiss and Hunt says 'see you around Bolly-kegs'.

With Drake and the others gone, Hunt is chided by his nemesis Keats, who has become increasingly more devil-like with his evil laughter and snakelike hissing.

He returns to Fenchurch East and find a brochure for a Mercedes Benz 190D - a stylish replacement for his poor old ruined Quattro.

Then a brand new officer bursts through the doors - very similarly to Tyler's entrance to 1973 in Life On Mars - demanding to know what is going on.

Clearly from the Noughties, just like Drake, he demands 'one of you jokers give me back my iPhone'.

So with Tyler and Drake gone, it looks like Hunt has another challenging working relationship on his hands.

He leans out of his office and says to the new recruit, 'A word in your shelllike...' and so his existence stuck between Heaven and Hell continues.

Extracts taken from The Daily Mail

Google Nexus One: Now With Multitouch

Google Nexus One: Now With Multitouch

Posted using ShareThis

Everybody Hurts: the verdict

Story from THE TELEGRAPH Everybody Hurts: the verdict

Like sonic aftershocks that inevitably follow any modern disaster, the reverberations of the Haiti earthquake can be heard all over the airwaves, as celebrities raise their voice in song.

This week, not one but two all-star charity singles are being unveiled. First up from the UK is Simon Cowell’s version of REM’s ‘Everybody Hurts’, which will be swiftly followed from the US by Quincy Jones re-recording of ‘We Are The World.’ Between them, they have mustered about 100 pop stars, over emoting for a good cause. The message is coming through loud and clear: We have felt your pain … now its your turn to feel ours.

I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. There is an air of sanctity around charity records that effectively puts them beyond criticism. Indeed, when Radio One DJ Chris Moyle unveiled the Helping Haiti version of ‘Everybody Hurts’ on his show, his remarks were confined to noting where the money was going, concluding “It doesn’t matter whether you like it or not.”

I just can’t bring myself to be so circumspect. I write this from the position of a music critic, not a philanthropist. I already gave, and I’d give a bit more not to hear this record again, although I suspect it’s going to be hard to avoid.

I was anticipating the worst and Simon Cowell has not let me down. The record is truly awful. Its an excruciating, saccharine, overblown farrago performed by some of today’s blandest pop stars to a sentimental, orchestral, rock power ballad accompaniment. It is completely lacking in the restraint and toughness that lent the original its intimate, understated power. In place of Michael Stipe’s grit and gravel voice, we get lots of breathy warbling and tremulous vibrato from the likes of Leona Lewis, Mariah Carey, Cheryl Cole and Kylie Minogue and boy band harmonising from Take That, Westlife and X Factor runners up JLS. Its very much a pop affair, with only Rod Stewart and Jon Bon Jovi (wailing dreadfully) representing the veterans. There is neither sight nor sound of Britain’s contemporary rock fraternity but room for relative nonentities like Joe McElderry. It says something about the record that only Susan Boyle strikes the appropriate note of humble sincerity. It’s a recording with far too much ego and it reeks of the re-positioning of the Cowell brand, as the impresario gets to show his caring side with his stable of television talent. It even comes with the endorsement of Gordon Brown, who knows a bandwagon when he sees it.

The US charity recording is going for more of a Hollywood blockbuster approach, with a chorus of over 75 stars rounded up by Quincy Jones after the Grammy Awards, straight from one red carpet to another. We haven’t heard the song yet, but we have heard a lot of chatter about how exciting the experience was for the singers themselves, with Celine Dion calling it “an amazing opportunity to work with amazing people”. Cowell’s fellow American Idol judge Randy Jackson said “I think this is a great moment in time and I wasn’t going to miss it for anything,” presumably not a message aimed at Haitian survivors. I think the organisers may have missed a trick there. Why not make singers pay to appear on charity records? Just think, if we charged them $50,000 each, these songs would have already raised 5 million before they were even released.

Helping Haiti’s ‘Everybody Hurts’ will be available for download on Sunday 7th, and in stores on Monday 8th February

Introducing the iPad, Wings not Included

Thanks to its feminine-hygiene-product overtones, the unfortunately evocatively named iPad that Apple have just unveiled for its new tablet PC is rapidly beoming an internet joke.

Soon after the launch Twitter was buzzing with tweets hashtagged with #itampon. In fact #itampon was trending before #ipad

The iPad measures 9.56 inches in height and is 7.47 inches wide. It weighs 1.5 kilograms. Full charged battery would last for about 10 hours at a stretch and 30 days in standby mode. It is not fully absorbent and does not come with wings.

Regardless of the name I am sure it will succeed and herald the next generation of computing however I don't think I will be buying one any time soon.

Twitter now has 75M users; most asleep at the mouse

Twitter now has 75M users; most asleep at the mouse

Posted using ShareThis

RATM "I won't do what you say"

So the official Xmas number one for 2009 is the popular Xmas ditty "Killing in the name of" by the well known band Rage Against the Machine, after a successful Facebook campaign to beat the usual X Factor dross which is churned out year after year. The irony is that the lyrics say "I won't do what you say" yet the public did exactly that and pandered to the whims of a certain John Mortimer. The 35-year-old hi-fi technician from Essex, launched a group on Facebook, along with his wife Tracy, 30, and we did exactly what they said. Word is that Cowell has now offered him a job.

Don't blame me for creating stories on Twitter, says Stephen Fry

Don't blame me for creating stories on Twitter, says Stephen Fry

Posted by
Mercedes Bunz Tuesday 17 November 2009 11.23 GMT
guardian.co.uk

The millions of Twitter users make stories - I only point them in a direction, says Stephen Fry in speech to conference


Stephen Fry, speaking today at the 140 Characters Conference in London, said:

"There is a power of Twitter. We can't deny it any more, well for sure not as a celebrity Twitterer. A year ago, nearly no one heard about Twitter. But things move so fast today - and the bewilderment, content, disbelief with which Twitter was greeted ...

They called it the most banal and pointless waste of time. And do you know what they say now? Now they say: Our Twitter strategy is ...

It is a very odd thing when people think they are being smart when they speak not as humans but as business people. They say, I need a phone that does this, I need a social network that does that. You know what? I know a lot of executives that lead big companies, and they talk about what excites them and what convinces them. They are driven as human beings.

And you know what? Before humans are reasoning, they are emotional beings. With gadgets you communicate with other people, and therefore this is an emotional internet that you have. Not just plain function. It will come as no surprise that as the next big thing it wasn't designed as business for business. Twitter was created to babble to each other. Remember it was called Twitter and not serious debate or marketing tool.

It is important for all of us to understand its nature. It is human shaped, not business shaped. And the swell will move elsewhere if you try to make it all neat and attractive. The greatness and the magnitude of its energy will all move.

Think of Twitter or the internet like the invention of the printing press. 1450 - when there were no printed books and about 500 years later there were 20m. The press became available for a great number of people. There was a new freedom of the press. This caused upheavals. Huge numbers of magazines, broadsheets and pamphlets were published. And the most popular ones were not called "the Debate". They were called the Idler or the Spectator.

There was no class more contemptuous of Twitter than the commentating journalists. Why should we care about what Britney Spears had for breakfast, they said. So may I ask you, why do you write about it in the paper? The journalists said, who needs this Twitter thing and in the next moment you read: Follow the Daily Mail on Twitter at ...

But like with the printing press, Twitter changed the situation. People like me, Twillionaires [people with more than a million followers], we can cut out the press from our PR requirements. It used to be a pact with the devil. You wanted to inform the press about a new film and they said they will interview you, but only if they are allowed to ask you around other themes about your private life. Today, Britney Spears tells her PR manager, why should I care about that this journalist of this newspaper with big circulations, I will reach this circulation just by typing into my keyboard.

So well, whole newspapers are on the one side filled with resentment against Twitter, on the other side they are using it and searching Twitter messages. By the way, have you recognised, they are using it as a feed, the deadwood press doesn't say stream. Puzzling.

Then there are good moments. There was the case of Trafigura, which forbade the Guardian to write about it. It caused a storm on Twitter, which I joined in quite late as that morning I came from the gym - it is pathetic, I can't believe I said that but it is true, and the thing reached such a heat by 1pm or 2pm that the lawyers had to do something about it. This can be considered a victory.

Or a journalist from the Daily Mail wrote about something very awful which happened to affect a friend of mine, although I don't make a big deal about that fact. But I saw this brilliant answer from Charlie Brooker and so commented and pointed there. And then they said, 'Who the hell does Stephen Fry think he is forbidding this journalist to think freely?' Well I never did.

But because of the weight of my numbers I am now credited or blamed for inventing these stories. But this is not the way Twitter works. The Twitter millions create the story. You can only point them in a direction. It is like with your parents, when you come home and say you did this because a friend told you and they go like: well if he told you to stick your head in the fire, would you do that?

Twitter is about participating - by which I mean you tweet and read other people's tweets. Then you understand it, and get its rhythm. But remember: It is about being authentic. These things are human-shaped."

Fry is afraid that Twitter will be swamped by PR professionals. What do you think?

Twitter user Penelope Trunk who Tweeted her miscarriage sparks media storm

By Tom Chivers
Published: 3:51PM GMT 03 Nov 2009


The miscarriage Tweet from Penelope Trunk Photo: TWITTER Penelope Trunk, who describes herself as an author, blogger and entrepreneur, wrote: “I’m in a board meeting. Having a miscarriage. Thank goodness, because there’s a f------up 3-week hoop-jump to have an abortion in Wisconsin.”

Within a few hours, via the 20,000 followers of her Twitter account @penelopetrunk, the news made it on to CNN, The New York Times, ABC news and even Oprah.

She told one magazine: “It’s no different to me saying what I had for lunch. I thought nothing of it until the horrified followers’ replies started flooding in.”

Miss Trunk, 42, is a mother of two, a five-year-old and a seven-year-old. She had previously had two miscarriages, and had booked an appointment at an abortion clinic after discovering in August that she was pregnant once more.

Commenters have accused her of heartlessness, and a CNN interviewer asked if she had “no shame”. However, Miss Trunk argues that the real issue is the three-week wait for an clinic appointment in Wisconsin which would have forced her to travel to Chicago, Illinois, for her abortion.

She told CNN: “It seems everyone in the whole world would prefer a miscarriage to an abortion, even the Pope.”

She rejected the idea that her reaction shows a lack of compassion. "The first time I had a miscarriage I was sad about it, and it was a very typical experience," she told ABC. "But I think it's limiting that it's only OK to talk about miscarriages if you're sad about it."

She adds: “I was just stating a fact. To those who call me callous for being so matter-of-fact about losing a baby, I ask, what do you want from me?

“Do you expect me to cry every time I talk about it? It’s a fact: I’m happy I lost that baby.”

Miss Trunk has had plenty of support from the blogosphere. Rachel Walden, in the Women's Health News blog, said: "The idea that miscarriage is something personal that should be kept secret whether a woman wants to keep it secret or not, when so so many women have them, is a problem.

"The idea that people's bodies should effectively be hidden from the work environment where we spend so much of our time is problematic in its own ways."

Amanda Marcotte on XX Factor, a women’s issues blog, agreed, saying: "If the public at large had to face up to the fact that not every miscarriage is met with a vale of tears, that could have a dramatic impact on how we regard pregnancy, abortion, and women's diverse experiences with our reproductive functions”.

I'm so addicted to email, Facebook and Twitter, I have to hide it from my wife

As a new book claims Britain is under the tyranny of email, James Delingpole owns up to a compulsion that is affecting his friendships, family and working life. Article is available at The Telegraph

Derren Brown: rumours swirl about lottery stunt - Times Online

Derren Brown: rumours swirl about lottery stunt - Times Online




Derren Brown’s apparent success in predicting last night’s national lottery numbers on live television has sparked a massive nation-wide sleuthing mission.

Viewers baffled by how the illusionist carried off the trick have been watching clips of the show online and clubbing together on social networking sites to suggest explanations.

Brown’s ten-minute Channel 4 show, The Event Live, in which he revealed a pre-selected set of lottery balls shortly after the real ones were drawn, is to be followed by an explanatory show tomorrow night.

But, unable to wait, viewers have set social networking sites alive with the idea that Brown, watched by 2.7 million people last night, used a split screen to fool viewers. The technique would have seen the picture divided into a live shot of Brown on the right-hand side and a pre-recorded shot of the lottery balls on the left-hand side. When the lottery numbers were drawn, an assistant would have put the correct balls in place before the entire shot was converted to a live feed.


But those brave enough to go public with their split screen detective work on Twitter and YouTube have been criticised by the technologically savvy who claim the shaky camera used for the show ruled out the explanation. The camera, they said would have needed to be stationary so the pictures could be spliced together.

But the truly suspicious disagree. One keen detective, going by the unusual moniker of Mutated Monty, posted a video demonstrating how Brown could have employed the split screen technique and added artificial shaking later.

Times Online reader John Smith adds weight to Mutated Monty’s explanation, arguing that the moment when the split screen reverts to a live feed can be seen.

"Between Derren saying "23" & "28", the left-hand ball moves upwards! (clearly the moment of mixing from split-screen to full-screen again, after correct-numbered balls have been placed).”

Magic balls are another popular explanation. Times Online reader Alfie LeBeauf is convinced Brown employed a special type of ink to fool viewers.

“This trick can be done by using 'e ink' which uses programmable molecules on an object surface, enabling the numbers to be whatever you might want.”

Less popular theories swirling around cyberspace include the use of a false wall and the unrealistic suggestion that Brown filmed multiple versions of the show in advance to cover every conceivable combination of lottery result.

One Twitter user who mused that it was the work of “psychic fairies” failed to find any traction.

While Brown has promised to put an end to the speculation tomorrow night, fellow illusionist Paul Daniels has warned fans not to give up the sleuthing.

He said Brown was unlikely to give away his secret and would instead be vague in his explanation, employing "gobbledegooky" and putting the trick down to something like "neuro-linguistic programming".

*Derren Brown: How to Win the Lottery will screen on Channel 4 at 9pm, Friday 11th September


Shared via AddThis

Computers Help Decode Ancient Texts : Discovery News

Computers Help Decode Ancient Texts : Discovery News

Posted using ShareThis

I Wish I Knew Who You Were, And Who You Worked For (Automatically)

Article on Twittercism

Lots of people have multiple accounts on Twitter, for various reasons. I can’t tell you the number of times I get a message from somebody out of the blue and I’ll think, “Hey, I know you, don’t I?”

But who is it?

Some detective work later, I figure out that the reason I know this person is because I’m following one of their other accounts. Perhaps their business account. Maybe their personal one. What bugs me about this is I might have a friendly relationship with this person on one of their accounts, but have no idea who they are on another. Or even that they have another.

What I’d like Twitter to offer (and this would be entirely opt-in) is a way for multiple accounts to be linked together. This would be great for businesses that have main accounts and lots of additional ones for their staff. Like Twitter themselves, for example. When you visit the Twitter profile, all their employees should be right there, too. With titles and responsibilities. And if I stumble across an individual employee, it shows that they’re linked to Twitter.

(Think Twitter + LinkedIn.)

Some people do this now in their bios, but it’s kinda awkward, and doesn’t translate well into manageable data.

It could even work a bit like a newsfeed, with one main account pulling the updates from everybody else. So, if I wanted to really follow Google, for example, an @GoogleTeam user could be setup so that everybody who worked for the company could be followed via that one account. The different users would feed in and I could reply to them accordingly.



(Think Twitter + RSS.)

And it wouldn’t have to stop at businesses. Participants in sports teams could link together, as well as social groups and other clubs. You could start your own tribe.

(It might even come with privacy. You could direct message everybody in your tribe with one click. Wouldn’t that be convenient?)

As it is, it’s awkward to find out all the people that work for any corporation on Twitter. I’ve been trying to do this for Twitter themselves, and Dave Winer is doing some great work with his 100twt project. (Check out what the people who work for the New York Times are saying.)

I’d like to see it automated. I think it benefits businesses and customers, which is rare enough to make it very worthwhile.

Read this and more at Twittercism

Charlie Brooker on how to save newspapers

You know what'll save newspapers? Magic coins. Yes, magic coins. And I've just invented them

Hello reader. Where are you reading this? In the paper? On the website? On an iPhone?

Is the Guardian even available on the iPhone? Bet it is. There's probably even a little downloadable application that lets you turn the pages by tilting it to one side. After all, there's an "app" for everything. There's one that turns the iPhone into a motion-sensitive light sabre: it makes wooshy Star Wars noises as you swipe it around. Really passes the time during the unrelenting march to the grave, that.

I'm unmoved in the face of friends screaming at me to join the iPhone cult. It's horrible. Here are a few iPhone apps I'd like to see:

1. An app that makes the iPhone scream 'I'VE GOT AN IPHONE!' each time the user pulls it out of their pocket. Once activated, it would be impossible to switch off. The only way to stop the constant embarrassment would be to repeatedly crack the device against a wall, or preferably your own face, until it shattered.

2. An app billed as a "comical toilet paper simulator". You switch it on, pretend to "wipe" your backside, and hey presto: the screen appears smeared with virtual pixilated poo. But – ho ho – just like the screaming iPhone app above, it's a permanent booby trap. Once you've performed your first comical wipe, in a frankly desperate bid to impress your non-iPhone-owning friends, it's impossible for the screen to revert to its original state. Instead, you're left with no option but to go home and cry.

3. An app that makes your iPhone unexpectedly oscillate and explode halfway through a conversation to a loved one, sending thousands of miniscule shards of plastic and silicon hurtling into your ear canal like a swarm of angry pins. As a bonus, the detonation also blasts your hand apart like a spent casing. Why? Because you bought an iPhone, silly.

Still, there's a good chance you're reading this on an LCD display of some description, rather than on paper. There are advantages and drawbacks to both platforms. The paper version can be rolled up, scribbled on, and read on the tube. If I write something obnoxious – something about the hilarious inherent low-self-esteem of iPhone owners, perhaps – the page can be torn out, screwed into a ball and thrown across the room, thus providing a slender amount of catharsis. (Come to think of it, iPhone owners can probably download an app that makes a satisfying "thwock" sound as they bat the paper ball across the room with their ridiculous handheld toys). Paper is tactile, and that's a plus. Trouble is, you have to pay for it.

Not so online. In Webland, it's yours for free. Better still, the byline pictures are slightly smaller, so there's less chance you'll be sick. But it isn't tactile. Here, catharsis comes in the form of interactive feedback – so if (for example) you're a uniquely inadequate, unfulfilled and unattractive sort of man, and the article you're reading happens to have been written by a woman – any woman – you can vent your annoyance in a series of inadvertently revealing messages, then masturbate into a sock. (This describes 33% of all messages on all news websites. Check if you don't believe me.)

Still, at least the misogynists know what's making them angry. There's an astounding level of unfocused rage on the internet, which is weird considering it's full of people getting something for nothing. Films, TV shows, music, newspaper reports . . . none of it costing a penny.

But newspapers won't be free for ever. At least that's what Rupert Murdoch thinks, and he's probably evil enough to know. Last week he announced the Sun and the Times are to start charging for their online editions. But will it work?

Nope. Not until someone perfects a system of universal online micro-payments once and for all. Some simple means of easily "tossing a penny in a cup" for the internet is required. Everyone knows it; no one's managed to crack it. Sure, there are systems such as PayPal (familiar to anyone who's used eBay), but they're fiddly and boring. What's needed is something universal and user-friendly.

But more than that, it should be fun.

That's right. It should be intrinsically fun to spend money. How? Huh? Wuh? Listen. If you ask me, one potential answer to the newspaper industry's woes lies somewhere in videogame design. A simple payment system shouldn't just be easy to set up: it should be intrinsically satisfying to use. It should feel positively Nintendo. Look at the Wii. Look at the micro-games in Rhythm Paradise, or Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, both on the Nintendo DS. That's how online payments should work. They should have the illusion of being tactile.

On your desktop: a cartoon purse filled with fat gold coins. Pull out a penny. It shimmers on the screen. Drag it toward a "coin slot" situated right there on the web page you want to view, and drop it in. It disappears with a satisfying ker-chunk. And you're in. If you're feeling cavalier, you can throw your coin toward the slot; with practice it won't bounce off the rim. And hey, iPhone users: we'll even let you play. You can "fling" coins from your phone directly on to the screen.

One page costs one penny: not too off-putting for anyone – and crucially, the teeny spoonful of fun and satisfaction you derived from playing with that virtual coin each time is worth the penny anyway.

Has anyone else thought of this already? If not, consider it patented right now, by me. I'll settle for 0.001% of every penny spent for all eternity, thanks. And now, over to the Dragons.

Article by Charlie Brooker via The Guardian

Murdoch to charge for news website access

Guardian News article about media mogul Rupert Murdoch's plans to charge for news website access

In what can only be seen as an 'interesting' move, Rupert Murdoch has announced that you will have to pay to access The Sun, The Times and News Of The World websites as of next year.

Currently all of these websites offer free access to stories that are in their newspaper equivalents that day, but this is all set to change according to Murdoch.

Murdoch's words seem to be spurred on by a $3.4bn (£2bn) net loss for News Corporation for the financial year to June. This is something that has been put down to restructuring, writedowns and a slump in commercial revenue.

It is unlikely that people would be prepared to pay for news which can readily be accessed on other news channel sites however could this lead the precedent for future pay per view news access bu other news organisations?

Full article can be read here

UK Government Writes a Twitter Guide … in 20 Pages

Interesting article by Stan Schroeder on Mashable

A tweet can have a maximum of 140 characters. A guide on how to use Twitter, well, that’s another matter. The UK government has one, and it took its author, Neil Williams, 20 pages and 36,215 characters to create it.

The guide,is actually quite an interesting read. Besides giving a clear cut explanation of what Twitter is and how (and why) the UK government should go about using it, it enumerates a number of third party tools (for example, bit.ly is to be used for links because it offers traffic analysis), talks about risks of using Twitter (for example, publishing embargoed news too early), and discusses the value of retweeting. Unlike some other Twitter guides, like the one from Wall Street Journal, it’s not focused on forbidding things and telling employees what NOT to do, which is a good example of how these types of guides should be done.

The document can be found here

The King of Pop is Dead and nearly took Google with him

Love him or hate him, pretty much everyone on the planet knows who Michael Jackson is and will remember the moment when they heard the news that the controversial pop star had died on Thursday 27th June 2009. A news flash interrupted my weekly fix of Question Time to broadcast the news and I knew this was going to be a big news event. As many other people did I immediately turned to the internet to "Google" the news of his demise. BBC news report states

Millions of people who searched for the star's name on Google News were greeted with an error page

.Google spokesman Gabriel Stricker confirmed this in a statement

"It's true that between approximately 2.40PM Pacific and 3.15PM Pacific, some Google News users experienced difficulty accessing search results for queries related to Michael Jackson and saw the error page,"

It seems however that Google was not the only company who felt the strain of the public scramble to search for more information. The microblogging service Twitter is also reported to have crashed with the sheer volume of traffic by users. The BBC reports

Queries about the star soon rocketed to the top of its updates and searches. But the amount of traffic meant it suffered one of its well-known outages.According to initial data from Trendrr, a Web service that tracks activity on social media sites, the number of Twitter posts Thursday afternoon containing "Michael Jackson" totaled more than 100,000 per hour.

Many celebrities took to the internet in particular using Twitter to pay tribute to Michael Jackson.

Philip Schofield: Now sadly confirmed that we have lost such a gifted performer as MJ. What a terrible tragedy on so many levels.

Stephen Fry: Goodness. Michael Jackson. Poor old soul. Oh dear.

Demi Moore: I am greatly saddened for the loss of both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson. Especially for their children!

Ashton Kutcher: Now the ap confirms aswell. Rip Sending love and light to family and friend but especially his kids.

Miley Cyrus: michael jackson was my inspiration. love and blessings

Samantha Ronson: Say what you want about Michael Jackson's private life (just not near me) but NO ONE can deny his talent, his compassion and his legacy.

Peter Andre: "Michael Jackson dying is absolutely devastating. I am totally shocked. MJ, you're the best."

Lance Armstrong: Terrible news about Michael Jackson and Farah Fawcett. My best to their friends, fans, and families.

As I said in the beginning of this article love him or hate him he was certainly one of the most famous popstars on the planet.

ALLTOP - All the Top News

I have recently discovered a new way of collaborating a personal collection the most interesting news stories to me and the best thing about it, it is user friendly. Alltop is an “online magazine rack” of popular topics. The stories are updated every hour. Pick a topic by searching, news category, or name, and they will deliver it to you 24 x 7. All the topics, all the time.

State of the Twittersphere June 2009

Hubspot have compiled an interesting factfile using data on 4.5 million users they have collected from Twitter Grader.

For instance:

• 79.79% failed to provide a homepage URL
• 75.86% of users have not entered a bio in their profile
• 68.68% have not specified a location
• 55.50% are not following anyone
• 54.88% have never tweeted
• 52.71% have no followers

• The average user tweets .97 times per day
• The average user has tweeted 119.34 times in total
• The average user has a following-to-follower ratio of .7738

Some interesting Statistics on Tweets

users are frequently using Twitter to interact and communicate with other users rather than just answer the “What are you doing?” question.

• 1.44% of all tweets are retweets

• 37.95% of all tweets contain an “@” symbol (mentions)

• 33.44% of all tweets start with an “@” symbol (replies)

Many users are reaching the 140-character limit in an attempt to get as much content as possible into every update.

The report can be found at the hubspot website