Tech Digest

How to play Space Invaders - with your brain

Over at top bloke's blog Brandish, you can find out how to give your hands a rest and exercise your brain - to play Space Invaders.

Yes, a team of researchers has poured its energies into developing a brain-to-computer interface, allowing a 14-year old epileptic gamer to play Space Invaders using only the power of his grey matter. Obviously there's more serious applications than retro gaming for such a device - but playing an arcade classic is a great way of making your research 'sexy'. To find out more and to see  a video of it all in action, check out Brandish now.

17th October is UK's 'One Day in History' blog day

Tomorrow is "One Day in History" day, set up by the National Trust, which will allow anyone in Britain with access to the Internet to record a short piece of blog-style text with their reflections on how history has influenced their daily life. The entry must be between 100 and 1000 words in length, written in English or Welsh.

As The History Matters site says:

"The History Matters campaign has designated 17 October a day for the public to make historic.

We want as many people as possible to record a ‘blog’ diary of this one day which will eventually be stored by the British Library as a permanent historical record of our national life.

This is a one off, one day diary done on a mass scale – that will itself make history and can be a resource for historians in the future.

We want to urge people participating to reflect in their diaries how history itself impacted on them that day – whether it be simply commuting through an historic environment, discussing family history, watching repeats on TV, or listening to mum's incessant 80's pop."

Tomorrow, Tuesday 17th October, isn't particularly significant so is being used as an ordinary day for Britons to record their thoughts.

The Sunday Times reports that actors including Stephen Fry and Sir Derek Jacobi, the writer Bill Bryson, and TV historian Bettany Hughes are some of the celebrities who've already agreed to take part, along with pupils and staff of 29,000 schools.

To get involved, first write a diary entry for 17th October, then log on to the History Matters website between 17th and 31st October to upload them.

History Matters web site

Naughty, rude programmers: Bad words found in code thanks to Google

The Register has been doing the modern-day equivalent of the schoolboy looking up rude words in the new dictionary, by using Google Code to search for programmers using less than tasteful language in their code comments.

For the sake of decency, I'll use judicious quantities of asterisks from now on, but you can read the examples in all their glory over at The Register - or search for yourself.

First up is Apple (allegedly) who's code included a comment "// Register the f***ing window class."

Next came some JavaScript written by someone who obviously hates Internet Explorer (like that narrows it down): "// f***ing IE"

Sun decided that they knew the user a little too well: "/* The user is a w***er */"

And finally, some poor programmer who seems to have had enough of the whole thing. Never mind... "// I really give up on this b****cks, I really do. MAME says do this. <sigh>"

Ahhh, poor guy.

One of the less useful, but far funnier, uses of Google Code search. Now go forth and, err, find your own. Not at work, though.

Read (probably NSFW)

Friday Fun: Typewriter keyboard meets laptop meets dodgy Google Japanese-English translation

It's Friday. It's Friday 13th, in fact, and so I feel it's quite appropriate that the web page I've just found (courtesy of Digg) is just one of those that makes you wonder "what the hell?" (or words to that effect). Laugh. Cry. You decide.

I thought I'd share with you the joys of a bizarre technological concoction, twinned with the less-than-perfect Google translation from Japanese into English. Yes, it's banal. Stick with me...

Firstly, the page seems to be describing how someone with way too much time on their hands married an old typewriter keyboard with an LCD screen and various ports (USB and so on). Apparently it actually works. Boing Boing had a go at describing it, and the original page is here, but by far the most fun is by reading Google's translation, which includes such gems as:

"We would like to flaunt any which after all, were made in the person."

"Mack changing atmosphere, it attacks coolly. Rather than with saying, after the Mack producing the feeling which was shaken in the girl, appeared in style. But by your method of designing such time favorite what."

"Around the keyboard, the space bar is the wood product."

"The latest foppery equipment."

"Because key- in chattering treatment the [tsu] [chi] [ya] [u], it tried inserting the circuit of delay."

"Control ball. But another what from this the device and the Morse keyboard of the dream which can be input with the one key in the midst of development. The uncle who cannot use the keyboard well it is, whether properly even, correspondence (perhaps)"

I'll leave you to find the rest. Enjoy.

Website of the Day: Video Games Blogger

Today's Wesbite of the Day is the Video Games Blogger, a collection of articles about consoles and games. It's an interesting mix of news about new releases covering all the major current and forthcoming consoles.

Sony BRAVIA "Paint" TV advert debuts soon

Remember that grey building that we showed you back in July? Well, since then the guys promoting the new Sony Bravia high definition TVs have had a load of fun playing Paintball with it - firing huge globs (70,000 litres, in fact) of coloured paint at it.

Showing the Bravia's mantra "colour like no other" in spectacular style, the paint was fired using controlled firework explosions to blast the fountains of colour into the air and onto the side of the building.

For an advert, it's generated a lot of interest on the web. It will be available to view online before it goes to TV at colourlikenoother.com - presumably sometime in the next week or so as a 70 second version of the "Paint" ad will be premiered on Tuesday 17th October, 8.35pm during the Man U v FC Copenhagen Champions League match.

The official blog explains:

The ad took 10 days and 250 people to film. Huge quantities of paint were needed to accomplish this, which had to be delivered in 1 tonne trucks and mixed on-site by 20 people.

The effect was stunning, but afterwards a major clean-up operation was required to clear away all that paint!

The cleaning took 5 days and 60 people. Thankfully, the use of a special water-based paint made it easy to scrape-up once the water had evaporated.

Keeping everyone safe was also an important factor. A special kind of non-toxic paint was used that is safe enough to drink (it contains the same thickeners that are sometimes used in soups). It was also completely harmless to the skin.

Welsh web users campaign for dot cym

A number of technology peeps from Wales have joined together to form dotCYN to campaign for a web top-level domain (TLD) for the fine country. They believe that having such a TLD will play a strategic role in validating and promoting Welsh culture and language.

It would be available to anyone with a website in Welsh, or of Welsh interest or about Wales in any language.

They base their campaign on a recent successful one by the people of Catalan who now have a 'dot cat' extension (as does anyone who owns a cat and wants my.cat or tibbles.cat)

In an interview with Ping Wales, Siôn Jobbins said that the Catalan experience was that there was an increase of 33% in the number of sites using Catalan since the adoption of .cat. This is a good and effective way of promoting Welsh on the web as well without the need for any new law.

Other campaigns are afoot for domain endings such as .berlin and .nyk (New York).

What do you think? Should Wales have its own domain ending?

Via Ping Wales

Britain’s blogging A list

Earlier this week PR company Edelman, in conjunction with the blog search engine Technorati, published a list of the top British blogs.

It’s a cracking list especially as Tech Digest made number four, but we did notice a few key omissions. So we have put together our very own top ten UK bloggers A list. This is a mixture of the Edelman list, Technorati figures, information from internet data collection agency Hitwise and some qualitative data of our own.

Like the Edelman list it is no way definitive, but I think it might be a good conversation starter. It is interesting to note that the top British blogs mirror the top US ones in that they are dominated by politics and gadgets. It is also interesting to note that most of the bloggers have been blogging for several years now, ironically though with the exception of one of the very biggest.

There is also a discussion about what actually constitutes a British blog. Does it have to have content that is UK focussed? And what if the writer is British but lives outside these isles. That would propel Andrew Sullivan and maybe Nick Denton to the top of the list.

Anyhow we have kept to blogs that are largely written in the UK. Like Edelman we have left out the blogs from the BBC and The Guardian and any other large media company.

Here then is the UK’s blogger A list:

Gaping Void
Blogger – Hugh Macleod
Technorati rating - Rank: 144 (9,060 links from 2,896 blogs)

Indisputably the most popular British blog, Gaping Void is a fantastic collection of cartoons and observations from the wonderfully creative mind of Hugh Macleod. Over the past 3-4 years it has built up a huge following.

Mashable
Blogger – Pete Cashmore et al
Technorati rating - Rank: 400 (12,266 links from 1,867 blogs)

Incredibly Pete has only been writing Mashable for a year or so, but in that time has built up a huge audience who love his news and reviews of the latest social networking sites and other web 2.0 wonders. A massive favourite at Tech Digest, we were shocked when we discovered that the site’s author lived not in Silicon Valley but Aberdeen. 

eureferendum.com
Blogger - Richard North et al
Technorati rating - 611 (5,249 links from 1,545 blogs)

Richard North plus a select group of writers have been blogging about European politics for about two-and-a-half years. It started as a blog "to rehearse and discuss the issues relating to one of the most important political issues of the day - the UK referendum on the EU's constitutional treaty." but has expanded to cover a wide variety of topics with in-depth writing, analysis and wit. It obviously hits the spot for many as it's highly ranked and well commented.

Tech Digest
Blogger - Dave Walker, Andy Merrett et al
Technorati rating -  975 (5,434 links from 1,221 blogs)

One of Shiny's original blogs, running for over 3 years, it's the UK's definitive guide to a huge range of gadgets and technology. Since taking on extra writers earlier this year its range of topics has expanded and its popularity continues to grow massively. Informative but not taking itself, or the technology, too seriously, it mixes hands-on reviews with up-to-date tech news.

Shiny Shiny
Blogger - Katie Lee, Susi Weaser et al
Technorati rating - 1,464 (5,711 links from 975 blogs)

Quite simply the UK's premiere girl's guide to gadgets (though I reckon quite a few blokes sneak a read too), Shiny Shiny has a great female authorship reviewing the latest female-friendly gadgets and tech accessories - and no, not everything's in pink.

coolest-gadgets.com
Blogger - Al Carl et al
Technorati rating - 1,547 (4,394 links from 944 blogs

As well as the usual suspects on this gadget site, there's some great out-of-the-ordinary gadget finds that'll make you wonder how some people dream up such weird ideas. A popular and well-linked blog.

PlasticBag.org
Blogger - Tom Coates
Technorati rating - 1,467 (2,219 links from 973 blogs

Tom has been writing at PlasticBag.org for over seven years and has built up a loyal following to his mix of technology articles and links along with a fair dose of politics, music, religion, politics, and more besides. Great writing and interesting links make this a popular stop on the web.

samizdata.net
Blogger - Adriana Cronin-Lukas, Perry de Havilland et al
Technorati rating - 1,404 (3,166 links from 999 blogs)

I've not read this blog before, despite it's high ranking, so I didn't know what to expect. Whether their description: "The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling." helps at all? Written mainly by Brits with the occasional Australian or American thrown in for good measure, this is a mix of politics, celebrity talk, science 'stuff', and, well, all sorts really. It really needs to be seen to be appreciated, as indeed many do.

c h r o m a s i a
Blogger - David Nightingale et al
Technorati rating - 2,633 (1,746 links from 679 blogs)

Chromasia is a fantastic UK photoblog and deserves its high rank. Amazing photography of people, landscapes, buildings and abstracts cleverly taken and manipulated by David Nightingale. Well worth a visit to this highly commented site.

hecklerspray
Blogger - Stuart Heritage et al
Technorati rating - 5,196 (843 links from 416 blogs)

Hecklerspray, recently affiliated with Shiny Media, may not have the highest Technorati ranking yet, but has become a well-linked and highly trafficked blog in its relatively short year-and-a-half life. Plenty of entertainment news from TV, film, music and video gaming keeps over half-a-million people happy each month.

Tips for getting to the top

If you're a blogger and want to appear on a future UK 'A list' of blogs here's our Top 5 tips to get you started (what do you mean you wanted ten?):

1. Write funny, interesting, useful, or just plain zany content that gets noticed, dugg, bookmarked, linked, commented on...
2. Stay regular: write quality content... often
3. Write lots: see 2
4. Write in a group: Many large, popular blogs are written by a collective of bloggers. It makes it easier to publish more articles, more often, on more subjects, and is more interesting (usually)
5. Become an expert: Know what you're writing about and who's reading it.

Top five most useless inventions ever

I'm a sucker for a new gadget - and I have the debris of half-used, long-discarded items all around me to prove it. Probably class most as disappointing rather than useless - especially in comparison to the list of most useless inventions ever that's been compiled over at top bloke's blog Brandish.

From the Butter Stick (pictured) to the Self Saluting Hat - not a redeeming factor between them. Check out the top five over at Brandish - and if you can think of anything to add to the list, let them know. There's got to be a top 20 out there somewhere.

Check out the top five most useless invention at Brandish

Website of the Day: iFizzle Virtual Mac

Today's Website of the Day is the iFizzle Virtual Mac: an online iMac developed in Flash. Of course it doesn't do everything, but it's a cool app that the developer has spent a lot of time on. It'll play a set of virtual iTunes tracks, iPhotos, Quicktime movies, and more.

It's there to raise money for the author to buy a Mac through donations (he doesn't actually own one at present but is obviously seriously devoted to Mac).

Check it out.