Those that are somewhat computer savvy are often asked to help out clients, friends and family in dark times of computer nightmares. What seems logical to some is apparently not to others.

This can be the start of a long and fruitful relationship, or the end.

The world of AI is coming to you quicker than you think.
It is no longer a far off sci-fi premise that robots with independant thoughts will soon roam our landscapes, sometimes up to all sorts of mischief.

The future is coming, and fast. Computer power and function is increasing at an incredible rate, and the future is becoming quickly blended into the present. What is real and what is not? This question in itself poses a whole new question. What does REAL actually mean?
This line is becoming increasingly blurred, and in that sense the digital world is actually taking on a life of it's own.

Does this mean that at some point we need to start thinking about their rights too?
The following youtbue clip is a fascinating look into a new programme developed called Project Natal, where an onscreen character can interact with you in real time using webcams, scanners, and voice recognition software.

This is actually a couple of weeks old now, but still a very relevant article. It was posting on the AAP website on June 9th 2010.

It appears that embattled BP went on a campaign recently to buy up key search words to direct traffic away from websites that might be putting a negative spin on the environmental disaster that is the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

Internet users searching on Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft's Bing for "oil spill," "Gulf oil spill," or related phrases deliver a "sponsored link" at the top of the search results page to BP.com and the message: "Learn more about how BP is helping."

Clicking on the sponsored link takes a user to BP's website, where the company outlines the measures it is taking to address the environmental damage from the Gulf oil disaster.

Sponsored links are purchased by advertisers and feature prominently at the top of a search results page or along the side next to results delivered by the search engine's algorithms, such as links to news items or other material.

Fridays music clip of the week this week is by a brilliant viral band that has made the most of the new social media and used this as a platform to catapult to bigger bank balances. Today's video is one of the more recent releases, and features a continuous shot video with a mousetrap game style Rube Goldberg machine. Very cool - and one would imagine a nightmare to do in just one shot.

OK Go is originally from Chicago in the US, formed in 1998 and won a Grammy for "Best Short-Form Music Video" in 2007, for their song "Here it goes again".

On July 31, 2006, the band released a video for "Here It Goes Again" featuring an elaborately choreographed dance on treadmills, also directed and choreographed by Trish Sie. This video was viewed by over one million people on the media site YouTube in the first six days. As of April 2010, the original video upload for "Here It Goes Again" has been viewed over 50 million times, putting it in 42nd place for the most views of any video and 29th place for most viewed music video as well as the 7th most favorited video and the top favorited music video of all time on YouTube. The record company has disabled the feature which made the band a hit in the first place - the ability for their music video's to go viral via You Tube. The result, the band has walked from their contract. The lead singer from the band posted an article explaining their decision.

This is a serious remote Controlled plane. Not just your average kit from the shop, this guy actually built a scale model, jet engine powered SR-71 Blackbird.
The Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird was the original 1970's Stealth Bomber, was built between 1964 - 1998, with only 32 ever produced. Of this 32, 12 were destroyed in accidents.

The SR-71 is capable of travelling at 3500 km per hour, and to build a scale model that actally works is quite a feat. He apparently built the jet engines too.

Where can I get my hands on one of these?

I have been following David Thorne's website and Twitter for quite a while now. He is hilarious in a self depreciating / cant believe you could say that kind of way. I can fully relate as he is also a graphic designer / web developer and some of the situations that he reacts to stem from the same sort of frustrating issues we encounter - usually with random folks asking for down right silly things from us.

Some of his posts and articles on his website are simply laugh out loud (haha LOL) funny.
He takes everyday situations and pushes the envelope with people via email to later use as fodder for his website.

I have refrained from posting his site as some of the things he does just go a little too far, but some out there may appreciate his sense of humour as do I.
His latest post about a co-workers missing cat is just too funny. With looming deadlines a co-worker asks for him to "whip out" a colour poster advertising that fact that her cat is missing.
The email conversation and design solutions provided are hilarious.

Heavy rain in Louisiana on the 22nd June 2010 has resulted in an oily rain run off on the ground.

This is some quite serious stuff. How is this possible?Given the comments on the clip by many people there is much discussion as to whether this is fake or not. Some also have suggested that this kind of activity will be just the beginning as the gaseous elements rising from the well then condense and fall with the rain on land, resulting in a huge environmental risk on land now as well as in the gulf. Others are suggesting that this may have something to do with the dispersant used to break up the slick on the surface of the ocean

Over the coming days I am sure that there will be more reaction to this so possibly more information will surface. In the mean time check out the quick youtube clip taken from a man in the street.

This Gulf Oil Spill environmental disaster is spiralling into a disaster for all, not just for BP.

With all of the hardcore material about this disasterous BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill I have been reading about, this came as some light relief. Finally it makes sense what the plan is.

Enjoy.

This weeks Friday Music clip is an old favourite, The Beastie Boys "Sabotage" - a tongue in cheek homage to 70's crime shows like Hawaii Five-0, Starsky & Hutch and the like.

"Sabotage" is a 1994 song by American rap rock group Beastie Boys. It appears on their album Ill Communication. The song's style is characterized as rapcore, featuring traditional rock instrumentation (Adrock on guitar, MCA on bass, and Mike D. on drums), turntable scratches and heavily distorted bass guitar riffs.

In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked "Sabotage" #475 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In March 2005, Q magazine placed it at number 46 in its list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Tracks, and was ranked #19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 90s list.

It has been reported again that Nasa are stating that we better get it all sorted - we are in for a rough time of it from the sun over the next couple of years.

Nasa is telling us to prepare for a once in a generation storm which could result in widespread blackouts and leave us without critical communication signals for considerable periods of time.

The overheating of national power grids, mass disruption of air travel and the complete shut down of electronic items, navigation devices and major satellites are just some of the consequences of the sun reaching its solar maximum cycle over the next couple of years. There is debate over when this will be exactly (why?) but most agree it to be around 2012.

BP are in some hot water over this oil spill malarky.

It really is a PR nightmare for them right now. They are getting spanked by everyone, but at the end of the day what they have to do to fix this is quite a task. At 5,000 feet they are dealing with some fairly extreme parameters, not withstanding the big one, huge volumes of oil gushing from the busted well at huge pressure.

They need to be seen to be doing something, so that is what they have done. Given everyone on the intraweb thingee the power to see exactly what they are doing to fix the problem via live web cam feeds (click the read more). This is fascinating. Poor buggers responsible for operating the robotic arms on the Remote Operated Vehicles (ROV's) - they must be under some performance pressure at the moment.