We’re warned when we’re about to view some Ryvita dry, crappy government site with a handy .gov.uk suffix, so why not filth? Well, there is a plan to create a specific domain for filth-peddling websites.

It’s looking like it’ll be .xxx which was first put forward three years ago but was rejected by internet regulators, Icann (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers).

The governing body will reconsider the .xxx scheme on 12th March.

Initially, Icann had welcomed the domain with open legs back in 2005, but then chickened out after a bunch of protests from US conservative groups. No-one should ever listen to those idiots, should they? They think everything is immoral… especially three consecutive x’s in a domain name.

“If the contract is signed, we could be selling names by the end of the year,” said Stuart Lawley, chairman of ICM Registry, which put forward the plans for .xxx and would sell the domain names. “Those that do want to see it can; those that don’t can filter it out,” Lawley added.

Apparently, an arbitration panel at the International Centre for Dispute Resolution ruled that the plan should be revisited. It’s hardly surprising it got the go-ahead as the panel was made up of the muckiest buggers of all – retired judges. I bet they were all wearing fishnets under their trousers and had tangerines secreted up their backsides. Or am I thinking of someone else?

This news comes as the sex.com domain, often described as one of the most valuable internet domain names, comes up for auction. It’ll be sold on March 18th and will have a starting price of $1m (about £670,000). It’ll surely go for much more than that?

[BBC]

You might have picked up on the fact that we’re quite excited about the impending arrival of the Apple iPad next month, but it’s easy to see why some people think that it’s nothing more than a bigger version of the iPod Touch. Sort of the same way that a bus is just like a bigger version of a car.

Fortunately, some major companies are getting ready for the advent of touch-screen tablet computing (yes, other tablets will be available) and are doing some good hard imagineering about how the new format can be best used. Here’s a glimpse into the future courtesy of Penguin Books and it shows that the iPad will be so much more than an (already-obsolete) eReader.

There’s interactive games for little people that make use of the touch-screen and motion sensor capabilities along with educational books where you can chat live online with other students who are on the same page.

There’s also travel guides that allow you to build your own holiday itinerary or email postcards to loved ones with some simple dragging and clicking. You’ll even be able to hold your iPad up to the heavens and get instant info on the stars in the sky.

All of that makes us feel a little bit tingly and if none of it dazzles you even a little bit then we don’t want to be your friend anymore. Seriously. Go and stand over there, next to the Luddites. You’re dead to us.

As we revealed at 9am, Apple are exploring the idea that an iPhone could theoretically replace your old-fashioned set of keys.

Well, now it’s 9.30am and that idea seems like so much tired old hat, thanks to Microsoft and a man called Chris Harrison. Harrison made over 300 appearances for Plymouth Argyle during the 1970s and 1980s* but now, as this video shows, he is an electronic pioneer.

He’s the man that will help us to control our mobile phones, entertainment devices and game-playing gizmos using our… OWN SKIN!

As this video demonstrates, tapping the skin on different parts of your arm creates a series of different sounds. When those sounds are picked up by a gadget that straps on to your arm, they are then translated into instructions that will control your phone or mp3 player or help you become a Tetris champion. Cleverly, they’re calling it ‘Skinput.’

Some questions arise. How do the menus appear on your arm? We don’t know – probably lasers. What do you do if you live in a freezing cold country like Britain? We don’t know – but we’re sure that the boffins will find a way around that. If you exercise your forearm and make it bigger and stronger, will that make your mp3 player have a larger capacity? No, don’t be so ridiculous.

It’s early on a Monday morning and Bitterwallet has already given you a vision of the future on a plate. Now stop scratching your arse and go and get some work done so we can all get there quicker.

*Possibly not the same Chris Harrison.

Some apples yesterday. It is unknown whether or not they contain keys

Apple have reportedly filed a patent for a piece of wacky space-age technology that will allow iPhone users to use the much-lauded device to act as a replacement for keys for the likes of the family car or the family home.

In the patent, which the Telegraph claim has been filed in the US of Americana, the following words appear…

“The device can communicate with an external device to open a lock. By way of example, the electronic device may be a model of an iPhone. The external device may be any suitable electronic device such as a portable media player, personal data assistant or electronic lock that may be used to access a door, car, house or other physical area.”

Known as Near Field Communication, it’s a similar sort of technology that is used in Oyster cards and keyless car shenanigans by the likes of Lexus, Toyota and Mercedes – and Apple clearly want a piece of that action to jam into the iPhone at some point.

Perhaps the day will come when the iPhone will be an instant source of paying for goods as well as a way of getting in and out of your house. *GROTESQUE SEXISM ALERT* You might even be able to deploy it to start the wife off in bed on a Saturday night while you watch the end of Match Of The Day…

Been a while since we had an Apple story eh readers? Agreed – so here’s a fairly big one.

Apple have confirmed that the iPad will go on sale in the UK in late April. Both versions (Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi+3G) will be released at the same time with US citizens able to get their mucky paws on the Wi-Fi version from April 3^rd (they’ll have to wait until later in the month for the Wi-Fi+3G model)

Steve Jobs conveyed nothing of any importance whatsoever when he blathered: “The iPad is something completely new. We’re excited for customers to get their hands on this magical and revolutionary product and connect with their apps and content in a more intimate, intuitive and fun way than ever before.”

He might as well have just unzipped his chinos and unfurled his floppy member instead to be honest.

UK prices for the controversial slab of tech have yet to be confirmed. Let the Apple-based moaning commence in the box below!

The question mark in the headline not only asks a genuine question but, with any luck, acts as a safeguard against any potential lawsuits because, as I sit here in my undercrackers eating Angel Delight dry from the sachet and borrowing an article from another website, I’ve got no idea.

Pointless disclaimer out of the way, consumer watchdog Which? is all pleased at the news that the solicitors’ watchdog – Solicitors Regulation Authority – will pursue its complaint about a London law firm, Davenport Lyons, which accused hundreds of people of illegal file sharing despite the fact they’d done nothing wrong.

The SRA have agreed with the Which? accusation that Davenport Lyons of being ‘bullying’ and ‘excessive’ and that there are grounds to call them to account.

It’s going to a disciplinary tribunal.

Deborah Prince, Head of Legal Affairs, Which?, said: “We’re pleased to see some action at last from the SRA and hope the tide is finally turning in favour of consumers. We now want to see some decisive action to stop these bully-boy tactics. We hope the SRA’s decision sends a message to law firms like ACS and TBI that they can’t make a quick buck by accusing people of copyright infringements they haven’t committed.”

Apparently, Which? continually hears from people angered by letters they’ve received that wrongly accuse them of illegal file sharing and demanding payment for their ‘crime’. It has produced advice for such people on its website, which you can find here.

Have any of you lot had any bother with letters such as this? Feel free to rant in the comments.

[DOF]

Some people are idiots. I should know – I’m one of them. However, I’m not so dim that I can’t see the problem with yattering on a mobile phone rather loudly whilst sat on a train or bus. If thoughts could kill, then noisy phone talkers would probably be killed enough to last a thousand lifetimes.

However, some gizmo-developers have been horsing around with technological thingummyjiggery which could see the end of the hooting commuter (provided they’re smart enough to realise that they’re irritating in the first place).

A prototype device is being developed which could see people being able to conduct silent phone conversations. How? Well, the technology measures and tracks the tiny electrical signals produced by muscles used when someone speaks. The device can record these pulses even when a person does not audibly utter any words and use them to generate synthesised speech in another handset. How mental is that? And how feasible is it that it’ll actually work, seeing as our technology has great difficult mastering voice commands.

“I was taking the train and the person sitting next to me was constantly chatting and I thought ‘I need to change this’,” Professor Tanja Shultz of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology told BBC News. “We call it silent communication.”

The device is on show at the geekwankfest Cebit electronics fair in Germany and relies on a technique called electromyography which detects the electrical signals from muscles. That shit is usually used to diagnose diseases and what have you.

The prototype uses nine electrodes that are stuck to a user’s face which ” capture the electrical potentials that result from you moving your articulatory muscles,” according to Professor Shultz. “Those are the muscles that you need in order to produce speech.” Via Bluetooth, it’s all passed to a device which records and amplifies them before transmitting the signal via Bluetooth to a laptop. Then, and here’s the best bit, the software translates the signals into text, which can then be spoken by a synthesiser leaving you talking like Stephen Hawkins.

Apparently, NASA have been mucking about with this for years. It’s well future. Of course, you could have privacy issues with this, provided of course that someone manages to make a version of it that doesn’t require nodes being stuck to someone’s chops. Still, if it shuts up fat blokes in ill-fitting suits and students from talking about the shitty house-parties they’ve been to, I’m all for it.

Ooh oooh, look! Tech Radar have revealed some iPhone 4G pictures, and there’s some radical changes afoot!

Look at it! Different coloured skins, a flash on the camera, porting of the iPad interface to the mobile phone side of things. There’s even a microSD expansion slot – cowabunga!

Oh, hold on, it’s just some bloke’s guesstimate of what the 4G might look like (if it even exists.) Shit – what a letdown.

Here’s our guesstimate of what the new Apple phone might look like and we think it’s just as pertinent.

Yes – it’s a frigging cake. Move along everyone, nothing to see here…

Hey, Apple fanboys! Time to turn the fire up an extra bar and bring on the vinegar strokes. Some very clever chaps with plenty of time on their hands have gone to the trouble of rendering key Apple products in 3D. It’s two minutes long, so some of you will probably manage thirds:

Quite possibly a LibDem, this morning

The House of Lords are currently debating the UK Digital Economy Bill. First, they all have to read the manual to a computer and see if they can successfully switch the bloody thing on and then, once they’ve managed to send “an electronic letter” to another Lord, they’ll be able to start unpicking the prickly subject of online copyright.

The LibDems are now getting involved and boy oh boy, they’re making themselves look like real tools. Well… less useful than a tool, but you get the gist.

Lord Razzall and Lord Clement-Jones, have introduced an amendment that would open the door to nationally censoring entire websites on unsubstantiated claims of copyright infringement.

According to Cory Doctorow this could mean that YouTube or WordPress.com might disappear from the British Internet if someone makes a false accusation of copyright infringement against them.

How shit is that?

The Lords have asked for this clause to be inserted:

“97B Preventing access to specified online locations

(1) The High Court (in Scotland, the Court of Session) shall have power to grant an injunction against a service provider, requiring it to prevent access to online locations specified in the order of the Court.”

There’s more of their proposal to be found by clicking these differently coloured words. How you’d go about fairly implementing something like this is beyond me (granted, I’m as thick as your mum’s custard).

God damn blimey crikey – look at THIS! (But try not to listen to the music – it’s pretty off-putting.)

Although this footage (from Samsung it seems) appears to have been around since before Christmas, it’s gone viral all over the place in the last couple of days. It’s a bendable, unbreakable video screen – no doubt some of you will be along shortly to inform us that it actually appeared in The Times in 1863 and that we’re even further off the pace than we think we are, but we are agog at this one.

We don’t know whether it’s LED or LCD or OLED or P-OLED or ARSEH-OLED – all we know is that we want a gadget incorporating this screen that we can use and we want it NOW!

Actually, once you’ve watched it two or three times, that tune really starts to burrow its way into your brain doesn’t it?

[The Chive]

Medicine. No-one likes taking it. Even if it comes with a spoonful of sugar, people just can’t be arsed.

Most of the time it isn’t a problem because you’ve got a jar full of placebos anyway because your GP either thinks you’re a hypochondriac or he actively wants you to die because you’re annoying.

However, if you’ve got high-blood pressure or diabetes (and want to live), then it’s pretty important that you take your pills because you’ll either explode or lose a limb or something.

People with chronic conditions are seemingly the worst offenders when it comes to the whole Not Being Arsed To Take The Medicine.

So what’s the solution?

Well, some company called Express Scripts Inc., is testing an electronic pill container in the US that issues a series of increasingly insistent reminders. What this means is that you’re getting a bottle of tablets that will nag you daft. Actually, it is not the container itself, but rather, the bottle top which is called a ‘GlowCap’. Initially, when I read the name, I thought it was a glow-in-the-dark contraceptive.

Anyway, the GlowCap is equipped with a wireless transmitter that plugs into the wall and when it’s time for you to munch some chemicals, it emits a pulsing orange light. If you ignore that, after an hour, the gadget starts beeping every five minutes… and the noise gets more complicated and insistent the longer you leave it (aka Annoying).

Then, if you’re able to ignore that, the device can set off an automated telephone or text message reminder to patients. It also can generate email or letters reporting to a family member or doctor how often the medication is taken.

Fucking mental.

That’s got nothing on something Novartis AG has licensed. They are looking into a tiny, edible chip, from Proteus Biomedical Inc. Basically, the chip is attached to a pill and when it hits your failing insides, it sends a signal to the patient and designated individuals.

Of course, if you’ve neglected your diabetes, you may well have gone blind and your ears may have fallen off, which means that none of these things would work… but to be honest, anyone like that is more effort than they’re worth aren’t they? Or am I just a heartless bastard? Or do I not really mean it?

[WSJ]

News so fresh it may cause nosebleeds – the internet doesn’t work. Not now, not then, not ever! Over the weekend, an opinion piece printed 15 years ago by Newsweek has been circulating. We normally wouldn’t cover a story published so recently, but we wanted to let you know why you’re wasting your time by reading this – and not just because you typed Bitterwallet.com in the address bar.

Yes, it’s easy to look back with hindsight afforded by the online advances of the past decade and a half, but it’s interesting to note quite how wrong one man could be:

Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government more democratic.

Baloney. Do our computer pundits lack all common sense? The truth is no online database will replace your daily newspaper, no CD-ROM can take the place of a competent teacher and no computer network will change the way government works.

We’re promised instant catalog shopping–just point and click for great deals. We’ll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts. Stores will become obselete. So how come my local mall does more business in an afternoon than the entire Internet handles in a month? Even if there were a trustworthy way to send money over the Internet–which there isn’t–the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople.

That’s it – show’s over, folks. Nothing to see here. You’ve got to admire the guy – he makes interesting points in the piece about how mentors and teachers can effectively shape the lives of their pupils, but it’s not enough to stop there. Here has to rubbish everything.

And what of the author, Clifford Stoll? Where is he now? Selling stuff on the internet, that’s where! Oh.