So, as a bit of a web-savvy user (I’m so cool, I’ve got a Google Calendar and a blog) I decided it was time to bite the bullet. Dive in and find out what all this twittering is all about, because surely I can’t be the only one who is completely befuddled by its purpose in life?

The first thing you notice is its simplicity. The Facebooks and Myspaces of the internet are about as disorganised as an overworked student’s desk compared to the smart organisation of Twitter, and its lack of attention grabbing features will probably mean that Twitter isn’t aiming for the tween market.

But what’s it for? Well, using Twitter you can ‘tweet’. That is, you can update your Twitter page with what you’re doing there and then, and anyone following your Twitter profile will get an update on your banal lives. On a personal level Twitter is absolutely useless, and a rather disturbing insight into how selfish and inward looking we are becoming as a society.

But during my adventures with Twitter I did stumble upon a few ingenious uses. As a journalist it’s important to stay up to date, which involves typing in a wrist-destroying number of URLs. However, with Twitter I can just follow the websites I rely on, so that when they update I’ll know about it straight away, all from one merciful page.

But despite this undeniable usefulness, I still can’t quite remove my scepticism about the website. What does it say about us that we can reduce our lives to just 140 words? Do we really need to tell the world what we ate for breakfast, or how bored we are sitting in front of our computers? To be honest, the majority of people on Twitter are completely insignificant and even hearing Stephen Fry’s opinion on everything is rather self-fellatiating. Maybe they should have called it Twatter?

(Because Twitter is an ego thing, you can find Michael’s Twitter feed at http://bit.ly/ZiiyY. Follow him into a new dawn of greatness. Or find out when he last had a shit.)

Michael Copus

Oh dear Sega, just what are we going to do with you? First your little white Dreamcast facepalmed spectacularly, and ever since its just been a downwards plummet to complete and utter insecurity, with an awful of lot hedgehog corpse raping involved.

In an attempt to not only stay relevant, but probably also alive, Sega are shifting things about again in order to encourage integration between their Western and Eastern departments. What they haven’t done is announced the things that people actually want, such as a decent 2D Sonic game without any swords or hedgehog on girl making out, or perhaps a Western localisation of Ryu ga Gotoku 3, which looks awesome.

Nope, for now the good ship S.S Sega is set to continue bailing out buckets of water into the ocean. On the subject of Sega’s faltering performance, the head of Sega’s CS division Takayuki Kawagoe said: “There were mountains and valleys.”

There’s a load of brainless idiots as well, it would seem.

Michael Copus

I’m stunned at the outcome of this trial! I had a gut-feeling that the Piratebay guys would be fined, and maybe given a slap on the wrist, but jail-time?? C-Net UK reports:

The Pirate Bay has officially lost its trial. The four men accused — Peter Sunde, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Fredrik Neij and Carl Lundstrom — have been sentenced to one year in prison, and a collective fine of 30m krona (£2.4m).

After the court made the announcement, it was stated that the jury’s decision was unanimous.

Co-founder Peter Sunde, however, has promised The Pirate Bay will remain online, and further emphasised the point earlier this morning in a message on Twitter: “Stay calm — nothing will happen to TPB, us personally or file sharing what so ever. This is just a theater for the media.”

All were accused of allowing copyrighted material to be freely shared over the Internet. The site is one of the most popular BitTorrent sites in the world, with around 22 million global users.

The music and film industries have given their (predictably smug) reactions to the conviction. John Kennedy, chairman and CEO of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, said, “The trial of the operators of The Pirate Bay was about defending the rights of creators, confirming the illegality of the service and creating a fair environment for legal music services that respect the rights of the creative community.

“Today’s verdict is the right outcome on all three counts. The court has also handed down a strong deterrent sentence that reflects the seriousness of the crimes committed. This is good news for everyone, in Sweden and internationally, who is making a living or a business from creative activity and who needs to know their rights will protected by law.”

A spokesperson for the Motion Picture Association said: “This is an important decision for rights-holders, underlining their right to have their creative works protected against illegal exploitation and to be fairly rewarded for their endeavours. This decision will help to support the continued investment in talent and in new online services (both locally and internationally), and the creation of new films and television shows for enjoyment by audiences around the world.”

This case is considered by many to be the first, if successful, of many suits by the recording industries against pirates. I’ll be watching these stories with great interest, as if we’re not careful, we could see all kinds of crackdowns online that may affect the Countercultural community at large.

Ken Eakins

In Bob’s own words, at  Play this riff:   “you`ll find HD lesson videos of me showing you how to play pretty much every song from “The Action is Go” “King of the Road” “Eatin` Dust” “California Crossing” “Start the Machine” and “We Must Obey.”

That alone sounds pretty amazing, but what the website has to offer does not stop there. The website also offers online music lessons featuring, gear, soloing tips, practice tips and theory. Guest teachers include:

* Nick Oliveri (QOTSA, Kyuss, Mondo Generator, The Dwarves) teaching bass and guitar!!!!!!

* Brant Bjork (Fu Manchu, Kyuss, BB and the Bros, De-Con) teaching drums and guitar!!!!!!!

* Ron Emory (T.S.O.L.)

* Shane Clark (3 Inches of Blood)

* Dan Beeman (Helmet)

* Kyle Stevenson (Helmet)

* Dan Fuller (Helmet)

* Jon Karel (The Number 12 Looks Like You, Horse the Band)

* Laurent Lamont (Pelican)

* Mike Watt (Minutemen, DOS, fIREHOSE)

* Jack Gibson (Exodus)

* Hewhocannotbenamed (The Dwarves)

* Fresh Prince of Darkness (The Dwarves)

Bob also promises to to add videos on a weekly basis and also, to upload videos from other bands and artists by request.

This is very exciting stuff, check it out !

Paul Banica

It was literally only yesterday that myself and Techmole-Mike were discussing how cool it would be if we could play games cross-console. It’s a regular annoyance to me that I can’t play, for example, Street Fighter 4 online against my friend who has it on a different platform to me. However, it would appear that first small step to bridging said gap may have appeared in the shape of Rockstar Games.

Using a nifty new service developed by GameSpy Technology, players of the newly released ‘Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars’ on the Nintendo DS, will be able to login into the Rockstar social-club website, play some of the cool little flash based mini-games, and generate some income for their charecters.

Developmag.com hooked up with the guys over at GameSpy to get the inside skinny:

“A great example is Chinatown Wars on the DS. The core game is on the DS and it includes our stat-tracking tool - but if you go to the Rockstar Social Club website, the Chinatown Wars presence there will have a bunch of minigames including money laundering - and others planned, too. The idea is that the money made in the mini-game becomes accessible to your character in Chinatown Wars.

“That’s using our technology - we facilitated all of that for Rockstar to help them tell those bigger stories and offer new experiences.”

Like I said, small steps, but hopefully the first leap into my console-crossover dream coming to fruition!

Ken Eakins

“It seems that an experienced hand can completely disassemble the DSi in less than ten minutes using standard tools, especially since the job does not require a tri-wing screwdriver. This should make repairing and tinkering with the DSi substantially easier. The DSi now includes two integrated cameras that, unfortunately, have only 0.3 megapixel resolutions. This is certainly a bit underwhelming considering most mainstream phones have cameras of at least 1.3 megapixels. On the chip side of things, Nintendo is using a Samsung MoviNAND integrated 256 MB Flash memory / MMC controller chip, as well as a custom ARM CPU + GPU is stamped with the revision code ‘TWL.’ The DSi’s chips all had manufacture dates around September 2008, indicating that Nintendo has been stockpiling these devices for quite a while prior to the North American release.”

Now, as promised, here are the innards of the beast:

Do try this at home folks...apparently

Old vs. New: the DSi side-by-side with the DS Lite

Since my girlfriend has commandeered my old DS, i’ll probably have to get a DSi. However, if I see a be-speckled gentleman brandishing a custom screwdriver anywhere near it, I’m going to get very angry!

Ken Eakins

It all sounds rather rosy - the source reckons the next PSP will feature a sliding screen that will reveal the controls, which apparently will include sanity saving dual thumbsticks. Interestingly there’s more comparisons to Apple’s iPhone than the runaway leader of the handheld market, the DS (which recently evolved into it’s third money making form, the DSi) which suggests that Sony may be taking a step back from competing directly with Nintendo’s juggernaught.

Unfortunately rumors are all we’re going to have for now. We emailed David Wilson at SCEE, and all he could say was this:

“We don’t comment on rumor or speculation I’m afraid. There has been nothing officially announced on this subject, so probably best to wait and see.”

Interesting, but Sony fanboys are just going to have to wait that little bit longer for any confirmation.

Michael Copus

Now, I’m not the biggest NIN fan, but I have always found Trent Reznor’s embrace of Internet culture quite admirable. In the latest Dialouge, Rose and Reznor engage in a really interesting conversation about technology, Internet business models and much more:

ROBOTRON! I’d totally forgotten about that classic game! Anyway, go and check out some of the other cool interviews over at Digg Dialouge, you won’t regret it.

Ken Eakins

There is something about this phone which looks familiar. Hmm, I know what it is; the “multi-touch handwriting”, I’ve seen that before.

Of course I’m talking about the HiPhone, which was featured in the press and online media about a month ago. The term Shanzai and what it stands for has became known to the western world and the word is now associated with cheap fakery of the Chinese variety. But the HiPhone is not the only gadget cloned by Chinese companies or underground innovators; almost everything has been cloned to date: car designs, toys, restaurants, shoes, anything imaginable. There is one minor exception, the G1 (Google) phone. There have been copies with the “Android” interface in Australia, but so far no real G1 clone. Why is that? Hmmm.

If imitation is considered some sort of flattery then the people behind the G1 phone must not be flattered at all. The amount of clones the iPhone has spawned is ridiculous. There are clones both official and unofficial. The champion currently being LG; now releasing a “rival” for the iPhone, on what it seems, every month.

It is safe to say that the G1 phone was the victim of a marketing disaster and this should not have been the case. It is after all a Google phone and an alternative to the ancient Windows mobile system. A few months ago there was news of 1.5 million units being pre-ordered. This number was later discovered as consisting of potential upgrades for those already subscribed to the service provider. That was most of what I can remember of anything that could be called “hype” regarding this gadget; Google has only to itself blame for this situation. There was never a feeling that the Google phone has arrived.

But maybe someday; one day in the future, a cheap plastic copy of the G1 will come to a market near you; then we will certainly know that the G1 is here.

Paul Banica

I’m not trying to scaremonger anyone when I say this but if graffiti is replaced by Twitter ‘tweets’ then civilisation is in big, big trouble. This is courtesy of Urban Prankster.