Microwave Cooking is Killing You!

Che-ez! Fox2 ultra slim 2mp digital camera, don't know where you'll be able to get it from though.

joshwaller.tk, i got a bit bored of waiting for the camera from dixons, so i've put up a review of the visioneer mx-200, a 2mp digital camera for the stonking price of only £39.99 from toys'r'us.

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Robotic bollards to take control
BBC NEWS | England | Hampshire/Dorset | 'Sweet approach' to pub troubles

PCWorld.com - Bugs and Fixes: Microsoft Releases a Big CD Full of Fixes: "If you haven't been religious about updating your operating system every time a security patch comes out, you'll probably be happy to hear the news: Microsoft is now shipping a CD that includes every fix for all versions of Windows, going back to the original Windows 98. The disc is free--you don't even have to pay for shipping and handling. Use this link to order the Windows Security Update CD." (surely the link should be "this link" rather than "Windows Security Update CD" as they have done...?)

BBC NEWS | England | Hampshire/Dorset | Mother jailed for child's truancy - I'm guessing you would like to still be able to talk to your child about the problem once you're behind bars, but what if they don't bother visiting?

Fuji Finepix A120 (pdf 100kb) uses a 3MP Super CCD sensor - but doesn't stick a "super CCD" logo on the camera - they also don't do the usual fuji tradition of doubling the output resolution to 6mp when using a super CCD sensor. Almost widely available for £99 or less - with a release price of £99 I would expect this to come down to around £60/70 within about 3 months. (pretty much what happened with the Fuji Q1, RRP £99 in shops to start with, now £60 online, and £69 from places like dixons etc)

BBC NEWS | England | London | London hit by freak rain storms - yup, that was a bit freaky. There was hail or something. and then 10 minutes later it had stopped. So I didn't need an umbrella because i had been on a train.

Fujifilm FinePix A120 digital camera although not yet listed on fujifilm's website, you can view their pages about it - plus jessops have it listed at 99 - which for 3mp from a high street shop is pretty good, especially as it uses "Super CCD" which is normally reserved for high end cameras from Fuji - pixmania.com have it's release date listed at 5/5/04 and the price 97. On the more info page, highlights such as "Stuff", and "More Stuff".

Also - why not check out Fuji's refurb shop, highlights: Fuji A405 £75, and the S602 £224.

Kyocera Imaging | Mita FineCam M410R another 10x Optical Zoom Lens Digital camera (kyocera lens), this time 4MP, 640x480/30fps video with sound, SD memory, 326quid from pixmania.com and a google search thinks nobody has heard of it.

HP 945 also worth checking out: 5MP, 8x Optical (lens made by Fuji, apparently), 2" LCD and only £240 (see kelkoo.co.uk) another review and some more - although it does appear to have a fairly poor video mode: 288 x 208, 60 sec max, with audio.

What do people think of identity cards? Anyone got any ideas how they can be used to reduce crime in general and specific bits of criminal behavior, given that the consequences of some crime is far worse than any subsequent punishment..
quote: Mr Blunkett admitted the cards would offer no guarantee against a Madrid-style terrorist attack in Britain, but insisted they would help tackle serious crimes including terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundering, identity theft, illegal working and illegal immigration.
He said: "The primary reason for having ID cards is not because we believe they will stop terrorists. It will contribute towards the overall task of prevention but it will not guarantee that we will not be hit."
- muslim women don't need to put their faces on cards.
- would everyday retailers need to see your id before selling things to you?
- the intended punishment for not having an id card is 10 years jail [can police really spend the time required to check on people who may not exist?]
- under 16's don't need cards (presumably they don't get involved in organised crime)

[I guess they'll award the it contract to run the database of 60million uk residents to a separate company that runs the databases of NHS records, which is a separate company to the one that runs the criminal records buraeu.. well more money for IT anyway :-)]

Holy Cow Batman! Broadband now quicker - for FREE! and new 3MB service to be released by Telewest! My 512kb broadband will get upgraded to 750kb for free at the end of may! BT and NTL should also be speeding up their broadband as well! Hooray!

Jay Maynard's TRON costume. and David Brent / The Office, how did they do it? Oh, and we just missed depression week. Orange County quite a funny film. (worth watching as it's now on video)

BBC NEWS | England | Hampshire/Dorset | Donor is found for second brother A worldwide search by the Anthony Nolan Trust, which maintains a register of bone marrow donors, has, so far, proved unsuccessful.
[yay visit the website.]

Digital Cameras with 10x Optical Zoom (as requested by Matt - pictures above not to scale?)
Size Comparison, hp 945, Z1, DX6490, Canon S1, 750, 765, S5000 (vaguely to scale)

• 3MP
  
• Canon S1 IS '04 3mp, 640x480/30fps with sound, Image Stabilisation £380 (reviews)
  
• Fuji S5000 '03 3mp, 320x240/30fps inc sound. £200
  
• Olympus c720 '02 £169 / c725 '04 £183 (8x optical, 3mp, 320x240/15fps ?sound),
  
• Olympus c730 '02 (3mp, 320x240/15fps sound) N/A,
  
• Olympus c740 '03 (3mp, 320x240/15fps no sound) £214,
  
• Olympus c760 '04 (3mp, 640x480/15fps inc sound) £240 *,
  
• Minolta Z1 '03 3mp, 640x480/30fps sound, 4cm super macro £200

• 4MP
  
• Olympus c750 '03 (4mp, 320x240/15fps inc sound, super macro to 3cm) £260,
  
• Olympus c765 '04 (4mp, 640x480/15fps inc sound) £280 (sd review) *,
  
• Olympus c770 '04 (4mp, 640x480/30fps inc sound, 3cm super macro, includes 128mb as standard (XD)) £409 *,
  
• Minolta Z2 '04 4mp, 800x600/15fps (640x480/30fps) sound, super macro mode £250
  
• Kodak DX6490 '03 4mp, 2.2" LCD, 320 x 240/20 fps inc sound £240 (reviews)
  
• Panasonic FZ10 (4mp, 12x opt), FZ2 (2mp, 12x opt), FZ1 (2mp, 12x opt).

* = World's smallest 10x Optical Zoom Digital Cameras!

BBC NEWS | England | Staffordshire | Patriotic boss sends staff home someone start a petition to make st. george's day a national holiday

CD-Rs are unreadable in as little as two years, because the dyes in the CD's recording layer fade. there goes my backup plan...

Life as a Guy

Jetstar International (a virtual flight company website) sues Quantas for launching a flight service called "Jetstar".
wooden pcs not selling well, but you can buy a lead free motherboard.

Topix.net Weblog: The Secret Source of Google's Power

joshwaller.tk updated, refresh to see different photos, also, the photo gallery now includes JPEG EXIF info, for those that are interested, this means, with the one's I've recently uploaded you can view technical details such as: shutter speed, aperture, flash used, camera etc. (see the April 04 photos). Also I've signed up for a "Gmail" account - sign in to blogger and you may be offered one :) quick get in there whilst the address you want is available.

Digital Camera Sharpness and Noise on high [eg 8mp] MP digital cameras: Lack of sharpness: "Of course this has nothing to do with any lack of resolution, but rather with the fact that these particular files need an appropriate amount of USM [un-sharp-mask?] to look their best, and the amount they need tends to be at least 50% higher than one might be used to from other cameras"

so basically, 8mp digital cameras aren't as sharp as they should be, because they have to compensate for the higher amount of noise they produce... after that paragraph look at the "workflow" bit! he's doing a HUGE amount of processing in order to get the image he wants!

i'm waffling on about small digital cameras over at bababa or whatever it's called. feel free to comment here about my post there. it's just me thinking out loud really and trying to write what cameras meet the requirements of small, with sound, and decent brand / high mp.

Cheap Digital SLR? The strange 2MP Pentax EI-2000 Digital SLR camera on ebay co-developed by hp and pentax.

"a Washington research firm, found that 400,000 cars were burning up every year, burning more than 3,000 people to death"... "the Ford Motor Company makes 24 per cent of the cars on the American road, yet these cars account for 42 per cent of the collision-ruptured fuel tanks. Another staggering fact that was discovered was that a large and growing number of corpses taken from burned cars involved in rear-end crashes contained no cuts, bruises or broken bones. They clearly would have survived the accident unharmed if the cars had not caught fire." more on the design flawed ford pinto

And here we have the delightful Royal Free Hospital, a lovely example of concrete architecture.

Slashdot - New South Wales Traffic Authority Switches to Macs anything else happening out there?
IHT: Gout link with beer and liquor, but not wine, is proved but what causes sweaty knees disease?

What printer would you recommend? I want one with seperate ink cartridges (for easy / cheap replacement), and borderless A4 printing, the Epson R200 £85 looks ideal with 6 seperate ink cartridges* - which should give really good photo prints / colour etc, and be fairly quick - I currently have an Epson 680, which is fairly good, but slow. But what do you have and what would you recommend? *Replacement compatible cartridges can be had for £3.60 each from ebuyer.com, which is surprisingly cheaper than mx2.org.

BBC NEWS | Scotland | Teenager comes to Microsoft's aid
Lets face it, a company that earns $1.48 billion every 3 months needs all the programmers that are prepared to work for free it can get.

99quid (Refurb) CASIO QV-R40 Dixons CASIO QV-R40 4MP, 3 x Optical Zoom, 10mb memory, 1.6 inches LCD Screen Size, 3.2 x Digital Zoom Motion picture recording LCD Screen Continous shooting mode USB Connection Image modes Manual ISO overrides. Go to dixons.co.uk if link above doesn't work. Reviews of the camera. It has manual focus which is pretty cool, but videos do not have sound. (doh!) It's small and fast. Personally I think this is a bargain! (especially as they go for at least 122quid on ebay)

7dayshop.com also have some bargains: Fuji A205 (2mp/3x Opt) £79 - Fuji S5000 (3mp/10x Opt) £199. etc.

"more people are becoming aware of the government's increased interest in all data, I have a feeling that the quality of that data will deteriorate, as it has already for online databases. I don't even know why Yahoo bothers to collect data from people signing up for free email; it can't be worth the hard drives used to store it, let alone the electricity to keep those drives spinning." Link

Good point well said, do any of us still fill in the forms truethfully (and should we) when we sign up for free stuff online.

GMail ok in uk. "Google's forthcoming e-mail service probably won't run into legal issues in Britain, as long as the company doesn't deceive customers about how their personal information will be treated."

Amazon.co.uk: Kodak EasyShare DX4530 Digital Camera [5MP 3xOptical] only 159GBP. (seriously cheap, especially when a "centon" 5mp/3x opt is 200quid) Kodak DX4530 reviews: here, here, here, here, and a foreign one just for fun. Some sample photos from kodak etc.

BBC NEWS | Magazine | Glimpse inside the virtual church.
all about GMail - i thought GMail was an April's fool - but perhaps I'm wrong.
GIMP 2 is out. in case you didn't know. it's meant to be way better. plus they're protesting about patents.
AC Computer Warehouse - Product Listings no seriously, these people STILL have 21" monitors for 40quid including VAT.
link - whilst we're on the subject of things that are £40: Richer Sounds have FreeView boxes for £40.

ipod mini has flaw which means the headphone socket doesn't connect to the mainboard properly after about 2 months of use. allegedly. or alternatively, some ipod users have reported some problems, and these are isolated problems with individual ipods which are all covered by guarantee. Maybe ipods only cost a few pounds to replace.

and there's this linux that you run in a window in windows.. called colinux so you don't need to reboot.

Iomega launches REV backup system 35gb per "tape/thing" uncompressed, up to 90gb compressed. Apparently they're mini hard drives? but more reliable than standard hard drives... more info here. external or internal drives available.

Tesco now do a "Tesco Fairtrade Tea" - More information at Tea Review. Let me know if you're not a member of tea review, and would like adding :)

Finished my mini-review of the Fuji Fujifilm Q1 Digital camera at my site: http://joshwaller.tk. If anyone want's to buy it off me, please email me to let me know.

Remember printing those big pictures of people in ascii, well there's this thing called rasterbator which does pretty much the same thing, but it looks neater.

Story and photos of woman who rides her bike through the area where the chernobyl disaster happened.

example pic
hi. we're back! photos and a short entertaining 17minute video are available in the gallery at joshwaller.tk - so far the video's only available as windows media files - for some reason the real player file ended up as 78mb compared to the 12.5mb and 31mb windows media files... so if anyone's really desperate for alternate file formats - please let me know.

some violence in the passion of the christ (note.. may contain spoilers if you haven't already seen it or read the book)

Road reopens after plane crashes
"[the] plane crashed at the small Blackbushe Airport near Camberley"
"[the] wings were ripped off in the incident."
"The plane, which eventually crashed into a tree, had taken off from Luton and had been heading towards Farnborough."
.. obviously there's a more sensible organisation to the sequence of events, but I think we can safely blame the tree for ripping off both wings and then stopping the plane gently enough for the pilot to escape with just bruising and shock.

[other recent crashes: plane hits tree in alfalfa field, utah Hotham Kaiaua Why do local people not want to be named? still, make sure you've got the name of the chip shop.]

meltdown - if we drive the bus 4degrees hotter, we get 7m less buildings [2 storeys] by 2035.

bouncing spam disables many mail servers. [more from google.. and the original paper]

Attempt to build a makeshift supercomputer from hundreds of random laptops has missed its target of breaking into the list of the world's top 500 fastest machines.

2 days without posts !

"Josh is you all-reeght?"

"Triffit says the "dot pitch" of LCD screens - the diagonal distance between two phosphors of the same color - is much coarser, making fine line work more difficult." "Colour matching on LCD screens is also problematic, he says, and because they are not consistently bright across the screen, different viewing angles can dramatically alter the perception of brightness and contrast." "Triffit says graphics and photography professionals are "starting to hit the panic button" because the supply of top-quality CRT screens is drying up."

"his philosophy is "if the picture looks good, it's good". - well no, if you're TFT is making all your images too bright, and then you send them off to other people, and everybody else without a TFT sees images and they're too dark - then no, it's not good. TFT vs CRTs. "Wood says the CRT display gives a more accurate representation of how material will look when it is printed."

The Digital Darkroom - Forums - What's that noise? Can you guess what the noise is?

Items matching ( girlfriend ) sad or lonely? want a girlfriend - why not buy one on ebay.

light aircraft visits wycoller

album sales up in australia

Arrrrg some one has "WORM_NETSKY.D" and its using my e-mail address as the from address. Yay. I suspect its a New Zealand person thats through trade me (like E-bay). Frustrating.

Also I removed CoolWebSearch using CWShredder neato.

5.5 MP Digital Camera / webcam / game 5 in 1 built in games "terris" and "snake" !

Polaroid Digital Cameras distributed by plawa. The Polaroid X530 digital camera doesn't make sense. Their marketing says: "wowee look we use this cool 4.5mp foveon sensor (really 1.5mp), at every pixel there is red, green, blue - which is way better than normal" BUT surely that's brilliant so long as you stick to 1.5mp images (so that every pixel is made from red,blue,green) - but then the camera produces 4.5mp images - so they're basically stretching 1 (rgb) pixel into 3 pixels... which seems to totally defeat the purpose of using a foveon sensor...

aw so cute (800k image)
shopping channel goes wrong. (video)

"Notoriously quick off the blocks with the latest Mini-ITX news and reviews, Epiacenter.com have new reviews of the VIA EPIA TC10000 and the VIA EPIA MII10000 mainboards. Author Joseph Waller is impressed with the awesome connectivity features of the boards and unique storage options including the CardBus and Compact Flash slots and the onboard DC-DC convertor on the VIA EPIA TC." subscribe to the VIA Eden Newsletter over here. :)

The Passion film prompts murder confession
Computers apparently rob children of sleep! "children were spending time texting under the bed covers when they should be asleep." naughty, in your bed!

Sensitive Light: Dangerous streets interesting stuff.

kew gardens opens another attraction

Items matching ( (digital, camera, new, canon, fuji, minolta, olymups) ) I like ebay.co.uk's predefined search for digital cameras under �100 - especially how they search for olymups.

Newly Released Documents Shed Light on Microsoft Tactics Microsoft letter to Intel asking them to stop supporting "Go".

Starsky and Hutch. Recommended. Good film, funny, cool cars, good action.

that company that makes Coke, right, they go to the trouble of bottling (tap) water that costs more than coke and advertising it everywhere, and it's not actually water they add calcium and other stuff, and then say its as pure as bottled water gets, and then they realise that the calcium isn't very pure so the water has too much 'bromate' stuff, more than is legally permitted in something for humans to drink, so they recall it and decide not to sell that water stuff any more. hurrah
They do have some refreshing desktop pictures though. Won't take you more than 3 minutes to remove that silly logo :-)

I, Robot the filum. Trailer looks good in parts.

BBC NEWS | Business | Microsoft hit by record EU fine

Bendy-buses withdrawn after fires in London
UK's ugliest building demolished.
Monty Python's Life of Brian to be re-released.
Police warning over 'gun' prank.

tech news sites: i4u, Gizmodo.

pyroport reviews the Olympus C-750 and have a gallery with some really nice pics.

woman died of a heart attack whilst watching 'the passion' and comments about the film from creator of 'the last temptation of christ'.

eat less, live longer nice picture of a bacon sandwich on this page.

hamster computer mod (click hamster when you get there). not by me, but images resized as the one's on the original forum are 1600x1200!!

NHS offered own Windows system: "The NHS is in discussion with Microsoft about the possibility of a health service-specific version of its Windows and Office products." "Microsoft is in talks with the UK's National Health Service (NHS) for a "tailored" version of its Windows operating system and Office desktop suite in a deal that could have huge implications for the way it sells to its largest customers - but the company denies it will sell a 'stripped down' cheaper version." "Granger has previously and very publicly stated his demand for much bigger discounts on Microsoft software based on the NHS' bulk purchasing power of over half a million licences."

Windows for Welsh Folk as well. This is funny: IBM patches Hitachi laptop hard drives. In more BBC news bad picture usage: BBC NEWS use a picture of a mini-disc player when talking about MP3s! (see the picture here.) New Doctor Who.

London Weekend Pictures of Matt's birthday etc now on my site (joshwaller.tk).

Sony 1.3MP Camera Phone: picture here. Here's some cool photos of london signs. Text 84600 with 'Memory C' to win a Pentax Optio S4 (courtesy of T3 magazine).

Microsoft 'in talks to buy AOL'. Will Microsoft eventually own everything?

Nano-ITX boards shown at the Cebit thing, lots of pictures here. Not only is this much smaller (nano-itx = 12cm x 12cm, mini-itx = 17cm x 17cm) than current mini-itx boards, it's also got an updated chipset (and graphics?) which should make it quicker than current VIA EPIA boards! (plus it looks like it will be passively cooled at 1ghz!)

the CRUCIBLE of my heart - the crucible another interesting blog (this time with his dreams on it). with lots of links to other people's blogs.

Want a Cat? Get frantic and it'll react more.

Camaras digitales: Fujifilm Q1 Digital - Review in a foreign language, but includes lots of sample pictures. translation to english?. image quality looks average-ish.

PCWorld.com - Nokia Flashes Megapixel Camera Phone... apparently there's a picture of the phone here. Here's a 1.3mp cameras phone from siemens: the S65

DCRP Review: Sigma SD10 another review of the Foveon sensor based Sigma SD10.

Intel develops new chip numbering system, "similar to the model numbers BMW uses on its sedans." After reading the article I'm confused - I'm sure punters will be even more confused.

Let Me Out

Hollywoodreporter.com: Passion to make more money than 'The Titanic' in fact they think it could make the most money ever for a film.

Adrian's Rojak Pot - dispells hard drive myths.

Alien Zoo - Robot World and Alien Zoo. really awesome stuff.
For matt: PCWorld.com - Apple Updates Mac OS X

this is a nice site: ::: alancreech ::: home ::: which got me onto thinking about Lent - what's that all about then? Who invented it? Is it in the bible? Is it just some strange tradition? Do we need lent?

More about Lent: Honest to God: "Life is not always uplifting, or wonderful, or pleasant, or joyous—but we have been taught the lie that for spiritual people like us, it must be so. So we become play actors, hypocrites—telling ourselves that by lying, we are having faith, and that if we lie enough, the bad things will fade away, like a dream upon awakening." - When does "positive thinking" cross over into lying?

remembering rebecca :: march 2004 collective nouns for mac users. see her computing page for more.

Backing up - Please backup your data. Don't wait till your hard drive dies, or your computer explodes before you do something about it. Cheap easy solution 1: buy a second 80/120gb hard drive 50/60quid inc vat (i recommend samsung because they have a 3yr warranty - what point is there in buying a hard drive with a 1year warranty?), backup your main drive to that as often as you feel fit, or 2: buy a DVD-writer for about 50/60quid from ebuyer.com and write a DVD every so often with your stuff on. They fit about 5GB if I'm not mistaken.

Three people have been arrested following a double shooting in a Liverpool pub on Friday night. "Both are in a serious condition following the incident at the Cock and Bottle on Wavertree High Street." update: Three on bail in shooting inquiry - apparently it was during a lock-in at about 4am in the morning.

we were in there about 2 weeks ago. :o

link ALL 15 self-navigating vehicles in a 150-mile race across the Mojave Desert were knocked out within a few miles of the starting gate Saturday, victims of technical glitches, barbed-wire fences and rugged terrain.

whats more interesting? digital cameras or computers? or mobile phones? or just technology in general? or what's interesting you at the moment?

and why do people now think mullets are cool? they're not, perhaps they're cool on other people, but seriously, you'll look back in a few years time and puke. and mohawks - some people actually have these nowadays - they're not cool. stop it. :)

who is jordan cooper? perhaps Matthew Brunton knows - but who is matthew brunton? (and what is "shoutlouder" all about?) perhaps Adam Whittaker knows some of the answers...

vnunet.com Fujifilm Digital Q1 Fuji Q1 Digital Review. I found one!

Read my VIA EPIA MII-10000 review at EPIACENTER.com now :)

Films I want to watch: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), the day after tomorrow, and starsky and hutch. Saw Big Fish at the cinema last night and it was: kinda good. see it on video. that's my advice.

One film I have an issue with, is The Passion - not necessarily the film itself - but the fact that churches (mine included) are arranging trips to see the film, and recommending it to everyone, yet they haven't even seen the film, so why recommend the film to people? Lake County church shows bootleg tape of 'Passion' to 12 year olds!

Unused space on hard drives recovered? reclaim the extra space on your hard drive. (seriously!) people try it here and it works. eg: IBM Deathstar 120gb, 65.7gb in extra space. update proof that this is just messing up the partition info.

Something I hadn't known till yesterday was that the chernobl nuclear reactor meltdown thingy was caused by the people running the reactor doing some dodgy 'tests' that hadn't been thought through properly I guess. but also because there were 3 +ve feedback mechanisms that mean control of output is not linear.. (Xenon in the fuel rods, steam doesn't dampen the reaction like water does and the control rods displace water but are not homogeneous in their behavior) I like the way alot of stories say it was down to 'violating safety mechanisms' and 'flawed reactor design' when mostly it was a planned intentional violation of safety mechanisms, with a poor planning / understanding of the reactor design. Although I guess its easy to say that in hindsight. link 1 link 2

internetmood.co.uk the internet, it's 62% happy, 27% sad and 11% indifferent apparently. hoorah!

Mobile Phones Enter 2-Mpixel Era talk of 2mp, Auto-Focus, and Flash.

The Macomb Daily "A Shelby Township Web site operator is accused of trying to extort $300,000 from the county's primary law enforcement agency — the Macomb County Sheriff's Office." Yes expensive, but surely he should be paid for hosting the website rather than taken being arrested for extortion!

VIA EPIA Nehemiah M10000 1Ghz All In One M/B Mini-itx In case anyone's interested, I'm selling my M10000.

most annoying website ever award in my opinion goes to: BBC Top Gear Carbage for having a stupid flash pop-up on every single page that you have to find the miniscule close button on each time you go to a new page.

infoSync World : Sharp GX30 to break Europe megapixel barrier The new Sharp GX30 has a 1MP CCD digital camera - and comes with a flash! (well more like a bright white LED apparently)

1978 Reinhold Yeti history of the smack the penguin games

Please can the bbc get someone to proof-read their articles. Please.
Computers help land mine victims
... He said: "They will be distributed out to landmine victims, who will be will be shown how to use the computers.
"They will be trained up on them, they will be shown how to use Word and Excel so they can use the databases....

Amazon.co.uk: Fuji FinePix A205 Digital Camera [2MP 3xOptical] 89.99 free postage too.

Recommended Buys UK: Fuji Q1 Digital review review here. cheapest supplier 61quid (9quid postage - another french company that will want proof of address etc faxed to them). total 69quid - wonder whether anyone on ebay would pay 99quid for them? (apparently not) There's also about 1 maybe 2 paragraphs written about the Q1 in April "Stuff" magazine.

PRAKTICA DC-42 DIGITAL CAMERA - Digital Compact Cameras - Jessops.com 100quid for a 4.2MP camera!

59quid for what is basically a casio EX-S2 (a tiny 2mp camera).

Matchstick Men Quite good - the lead is called Ray Waller (like our grandad), his wife was Heather (in the film), and they mention a Josh too - and true to life a Pizza guy comes and says "Ray Walter?" to which Ray goes, "no, Waller" - I normally get Walker if people are going to get my name wrong. Anyway, I reckon it's worth watching.

blatant plug: Samsung V200 Camera phone - yes, now you too have the opportunity to buy one of these lovely phones, they retail in the shops for 300 pound, but I reckon you could pick this one up for just under 160 pound. You've got till next sunday, so don't all bid at once. Please note I don't condone you bidding if you have no intention to purchase ie; if you were just bumping up the price, that's known as spoof bidding or something..

Slashdot | HardOCP Sues Infinium Over Legal Threats
Philips Fluid Lenses: Digital Photography Review: "Philips Research at the CeBIT exhibition is demonstrating a unique variable-focus lens system that has no mechanical moving parts. "
Getting Digital Exposure Right interesting article about the differences between film and digital, with film, if things appear white or black, the detail's often still there, but with digital if it's white , it's white and that's it basically.
1 on 1: Fuji S1 versus Nikon D1 super CCD vs CCD in these high end 3mp cameras - the Fuji super CCD has the edge - BUT is this down to the way Fuji cameras process their images - or is it actually to do with the SuperCCD sensor? (re colour /saturation etc etc)

Times Online - Motoring - Splash water car boat thing (different to the other water-car thing that richard branson bought)
Universal's entire music catalogue goes digital so they can sell tracks on-line.
SCO sues Autozone madness
SCO wins Linux licence payments and more madness
Virus writers exchange coded insults :O proper mental.
Were Worm Outbreaks Sparked by Dueling Hackers? more of the same but a bit duller.
worlds weirdest football game is apparently in england! link to video

DIY iPod battery pack - engadget.com ha ha ha. looks fab. thanks to barbara for getting a birthday card to me today :) and no thanks to everyone else in the world who didn't send me a card! thanks also to hexus forums, bit-tech forums and webshots for emailing me a happy birthday message. and also my parents for emailing me a happy birthday message. thanks to matt for emailing me about graphics cards :)

mini digital cameras. minolta xg (3.2mp) apparently is better than 4mp cameras from casio and pentax, and better than a 5mp sony camera. another site somewhere said the casio Z4 (4mp version of the 3mp Z3) was no better than the Z3 because the lens wasn't good enough - ie the 3mp sensor was picking up as much detail as the lens could chuck through - so adding a 4mp sensor simply makes the image bigger, but with no additional detail... or perhaps that was in a magazine somewhere - i can't remember. i've added 3 extra paragraphs to my fuji 2800 review and today's date is 02/03/04 which is pretty cool, and tomorrow's my birthday :)

MP3.com.au - badger remix it's alreet.

mini-itx.com - projects - mini-itx cluster a mini-cluster of 12 epia 800 boards.

This will be of most interest to matt - i've put a review of a Fuji Finepix 2800 on my site. (joshwaller.tk). this looks like a good deal: Minolta X20 2MP/3xOpt very small £99 (won some kind of: "8th Annual DIMA Digital Camera Shoot-Out" - in the $200-299 price range) also available down local ASDA for't same price. (here's a steve's digicams review - it does audio with vids, it does macro, and it's got a little mirror in the front so you can take pictures of yourself) Also the 3mp (no zoom) Sony P32 is £99 from prcdirect.co.uk - is it just me, or are digital cameras always coming down in price?

Forbes.com: Dell Could Reclaim PC Crown In First Half Mac market share at all time low - "We expect iPod success eventually to spill over into Mac purchases." - why? your ipod and mini ipods are very cool, expensive for an mp3 player, but very cool therefore people buy them, but why would that make your imac successful? you've got to have a computer already to use an ipod - therefore all the people with ipods already have a computer - therefore: why do you expect them to start buying macs?