Everyone in your office may be boasting about the latest shiny gadgets that they received over Christmas, but according to a recent study more than half of Brits admit to not being able to properly work the most basic of home technology products.

The research, carried out by online printer cartridge retailer Cartridgesave.co.uk, found that 51% of respondents didn't know how to use all of the technology in their homes.

The main culprit seems to be the elusive printer, as 41% said it doesn't work properly because it's broken or they can't change the ink. Although we hate to admit it, we've been stumped by a confusing printer many a time in the past, but come on guys, let's all use some initiative here and get Googling.

Many more admitted to not being able to use their home technology because it's damaged, with 71% explaining that their laptops are broken and 77% revealing they own a broken mobile phone.

Now it's the new year why not make it a resolution to either get your home electrical products fixed or recycle them? We dread to think how many sad, lonely and smashed gadgets are sat in cupboards across the nation dreaming to be fixed or turned into something new. Sigh.

2,084 people across the UK took part in the study in 2011.

[Image via YoungThousands]

Letting employees use their own computers and tech stuff for work makes them more productive, according to a recent survey by YouGov.

30% more productive, if you want to know.

It's a bit counter-intuitive - surely having more control over the computers gives you more control over the employees? But it seems not.

The YouGov research was commissioned by a company that makes remote access software - Citrix Online - so obviously has an interest in the results. Their software will let you access work servers from your computer. But from personal point of view. I can see where they're coming from.

Here's a quick list of why using your own computer work well in my experience.

Benefits from the employer's perspective
- It's a lot cheaper because you don't have to buy the computers - or the software
- You're not responsible for updating or maintaining the computers either
- Employees can be happier and more productive
- Employees are more likely to invest in the latest software and hardware than a business

Benefits from the employee's perspective
- You can work from home or from wherever you are, as opposed to being tied to your office desk.
- You can work with the computers and tools that you want to work with - if you prefer a Mac, you can use a Mac. And if you want certain software, you can get it yourself, without having to go through bureaucracy.
- You can do other stuff apart from work during work. They can't ban Facebook if you're using your own computer.

Downside:
- When there's a computer failure, there aren't back-up computers or IT support
- Security of information - businesses have less control over where their information is

You know what it's like. First you get stuck in a line behind 20 sunseekers who don't understand airports' liquid restrictions - and somehow deem it worthwhile to argue about it. Then you finally reach the metal detector, barefoot and holding your trousers up by your hands because you've removed your belt and shoes - only to be informed you have been selected for a "random check". (Yes this really happened. Twice.)

There is however a light at the end of this tunnel - and they're calling it the "Checkpoint of the Future". The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has just presented it - a tunnel that scans you as you walk through. It's 20 foot long, meaning there's ample time for it to scan your person, your shoes, and even your bags. Just walk on through with no dallying - it's the airport dream we all dream.

It's not quite here yet, but until then the IATA is considering a special security line for those with good records - like the 5-items-or-less queue at the supermarket, if you like. This will be for frequent fliers who have proved themselves worthy of this trust. Similarly, dodgy characters may find themselves taken aside for extra checks - this will be based on eye scans and police records though, and not the personal opinions of security staff.

[via Huffington Post]

It's not me, it's you - this seems to be Julian Assange's attitude these days.

The Wikileaks founder, who is still fighting extradition over alleged sex attacks, spoke to audiences at the Hay literary festival, where he accused the audience of having "a rather annoying middle-class squeamishness" when it came to the publication of secret documents.

Assange also parted with some nuggets of gossip over the superinjunction issue, claiming there were more than 200 outstanding rulings that the public knows nothing about. He said he was prepared to reveal the names of the people who had taken out superinjunctions in the UK, if he were to stumble upon the information.

Still, being an information-freedom-fighter-slash-terrorist does not come without drawbacks, according to Assange. People who reveal secrets on the internet continue to be "hounded from one end of the earth to the other".

[via TechEye]

It says it all, really. Some poor kid in China has decided to sell an internal organ - surplus to requirements but STILL - to buy an iPad 2.

The teenager had arranged the sale of his kidney on the internet, as is possible in China where blackmarket organ trading is flourishing. He or she was paid £2,450 for the kidney, which was enough for not only an iPad 2 but also a laptop.

The story came to light when the mother became suspicious at the new hardware, and when she saw the scar from the surgery the kid then confessed. It is not know whether or not the teenager, identified only as Little Zheng, regretted the decision.

[via BBC News]

This time it's the Sony Pictures internal database that has taken the fancy of hackers, if their claims are to be believed. The culprits call themselves LulzSec, and they say they have stolen personal information of 52,000 Sony customers after breaking into the website.

It was not very long ago that Sony was at the centre of a hacking scandal at the PlayStation Network, which caused the system to go offline for over a month back in April. Sony said it had strengthened its security systems after the attack, but if the latest claims from the hackers are true, there is still work to be done.

Hacking group LulzSec explained in a statement distributed on the internet how it used a technique called SQL injection to break into Sony. Using this method, a hacker would enter commands that cause a database to produce its contents. The hackers said they had gained access to a database that contained unencrypted personal information belonging to more than one million customers: "Sony stored over 1,000,000 passwords of its customers in plain text, which means it's just a matter of taking it. This is disgraceful and insecure: they were asking for it."

A Sony Pictures Entertainment spokesman, told The New York Times the company is "looking into these claims."

Lawmakers in the state of Tennessee have passed a potentially significant new law, stating that it is illegal to share passwords to paid-for online services.

The bill was promoted by the music industry, keen to find another way to stop music sharing. The law, the first of its kind, is awaiting a signature from the governor, but soon it will be illegal for the people of Tennessee to share passwords to music- or film-streaming services.

Apparently the law was aimed at fraudsters who sell these passwords, but it will technically be illegal to use a password belonging to a friend or family member. It is unlikely the police will crack down on siblings sharing an account, but it seems the law could take an interest in any kind of larger scale sharing, such as emailing your password to all your friends.

[via The Huffington Post]

The past six months has seen a 165% rise in the number of women being employed in the digital sector, according to a report from PeoplePerHour.com released today.

48% of these jobs were in the area of design and programming, with 10% of them being in database development. Web graphics and flash programming each represented 9%.

"The IT sector had predominately been seen as male dominated, but these figures show that women are easily a match for men in the sector," says PeoplePerHour.com founder and CEO, Xenios Thrasyvoulou.


The high statistical increases are likely to be at least partially due to the upswing in employment following the recession. Thrasyvoulou thinks the downturn is part of the reason women may have retrained to find work in the digital sector: "The figures today also show that women who have been hit hardest by the recession are becoming more entrepreneurial and gaining new skills to beat the depressed jobs market."

The most significant progress was seen in the North, where there was a 1,000% increase in the number of women moving into the digital sector. There was a 72% increase in the South.

Ebay has complained to Ofcom about the shoddy state of mobile broadband coverage around the UK. It keeps the people from spending, says the retailer, and stifles economic growth in the process.

Apparently eBay's beef is with places like rural Wales and the Scottish highlands, or the 16% of the UK which is an "m-commerce non-spot", according to research commissioned by eBay. Mobile spending is at least 20% under the national average in these areas - after all it's hard to spend on your mobile if you can't get a decent signal.

It won't be cheap, getting coverage to remote areas with few mobile subscribers, and this has been the reason it hasn't been done yet. Ebay reckons UK retailers would be earning £1.3 billion more a year if mobile connectivity were better. We haven't seen the full study so we don't know how this number was reached, but we feel confident in thinking not all of this will be coming from the Scottish countryside. After all, only just over a quarter of people in the UK have smartphones, so coverage is only one part of this equation.

... What comes first, though, the phones or the network? It's the chicken and the egg, folks.

[Smartphone ownership stats as of August 2010, via Ofcom]

Stephen Fry may well be a national treasure, and now we'll get to listen to him while visiting some of the country's other treasures too. Plonk yourself down on one of the National Trust's new benches and Mr Fry will pop out of the woodwork (so to speak), with a little bit of information on what you're looking at.

John Sargeant, cricketer David Gower and comedian Miranda Hart are among others who will be brought to us from the National Trust. Five minutes snippets have been recorded about Calke Abbey in Derbyshire and Northumberland's Cragside, while philosopher Alain de Botton is the voice of choice at Castle Ward in Northern Ireland. Some effort has gone into pairing the narrators with relevant sights; Stephen Fry said he hoped his bench at Felbrigg Hall in Norfolk would provide "comfort, balm and solace for many a weary bottom", notes The Guardian.

It's an interesting idea, but it remains to be seen how keen people will be to have their countryside strolls punctuated by a celebrity's drawl. Sometimes it's good to just get away, you know. But we can't help but wonder - instead of building this voice recording into the benches, wouldn't it have been easier and cheaper to just make an app?

PayPal claims Google played dirty in developing Google Wallet, its new electronic payment system. The payments group has now filed a lawsuit against Google, claiming the tech giant poached key PayPal staff in order to get access to PayPal's business secrets.

PayPal executive Osama Bedier jumped ship earlier this year after nine years at PayPal, and is now working at Google as vice president of payments. In the lawsuit, PayPal claims Bedier "misappropriated PayPal trade secrets by disclosing them within Google and to major retailers".

PayPal and Google had been working closely with each other for the past three years, however Bedier is accused of having secretly interviewed for a job at Google while at the same time being in negotiations for PayPal to handle sales Google app sales on Android phones. This could have been a conflict of interest.

Google has yet to respond to the claims.

The Google Wallet, which has just launched in New York, operates on NCF (near field technology) to allow users to pay for goods by swiping their handsets across shop payment terminals. Users can access the wallet app free of charge, and the system uses a PIN code for security. Details of the payment will remain within the handset, where it will be encrypted, but all details pertaining to payments can be erased if the handset is stolen. Google also assures that customers will not be held liable for losses in case of theft.

Popular website platform WordPress has announced it will no longer be supporting Internet Explorer 6.

Jane Wells, UX lead for WordPress, explained the reasoning behind this in her blog: "It has required increasingly complex code trickery to make the WordPress dashboard work in the IE6 browser, which was introduced 10 years ago and does not support current web standards."

Users of WordPress will still be able to use Internet Explorer 6 to view the site, but it won't work very well. WordPress will show you a big red warning if you try. The changes will take effect when the new version of WordPress (3.2) is launched in June. So keep on top of those upgrades.

Orange customers are the first to be able to pay for goods using their mobile phones - assuming you also are a customer of Barclaycard and have a Samsung Tocco Quick Tap handset.

So not the broadest roll-out yet, but it's a good start for something we've been eagerly waiting for. More of us should be able to enjoy the service as well, as other handsets and networks follow suit to offer touch-to-pay services. With Orange, users can pay for items costing less than £15 by swiping the handset onto readers, which activates an NFC (near-field communication) chip.

Apple is rumoured to be planning this function in the next iPhone, with other manufacturers also thought to be planning this for rollout within the next six months. But the lucky ones in possession of the Barclaycard-Orange-Samsung combo can start today - loading their handsets with up to £150 through an app on the phone. The system will check the transaction against your account and run a daily tally.

Having said that - as the "wave and pay" function is incorporated into the SIM card and not the handset in this case, it should be possible to remove the SIM and put it into a different handset and it should still work.

About 50,000 shopping outlets in the UK will accept this type of payment, including McDonald's and Pret a Manger, but this is likely to increase as more mobiles are equipped with the technology.

If you've been getting invitations to Scoville recently, or saw a rash of #toptuesdays on your Twitter feed yesterday, this article is for you. What is it? Should you care? What is top? why Tuesday?

#TopTuesday?? EXPLAIN
It's where you share awesome places with your friends, on Twitter.

On Tuesday?
Yes.

Why Tuesday?
Well the recommendations go out once a week, and the day on the week it goes out on happens to be Tuesday..

Why would I want to do that?
Well, if you like going to great places, recommending other great places and, like, getting your friends to go with you this could be handy.

What is Scoville?
Scoville is the name of the scale used to determine the heat of chilli peppers, it's also a cunning new service built on top of Foursquare. It's the group that run the TopTuesday hashtag.

Their sell: "We're building the most awesome discovery platform. Every Tuesday we'll feed you with awesome places worth checking out, with personalized recommendations based on the places you've loved and those your friends have recently loved."

Foursquare...?
Remember Foursquare? Of course you do, it's that location-based social network that everyone loved about 12 months ago, then Facebook Places came along and we all predicted it would die. Well it hasn't and this little tweak could help it keep going.

Why is there a picture of a cow on the website?
I don't know.

So the Scoville app is just a twitter hashtag basically?
Well this latest tweak is the simplest thing I've ever seen. Despite the beta tag and the fancy interface, it is essentially a hashtag - a way of collecting up a bunch of tips in one place and sharing them among a group of people.

However a few qualifications: You can only nominate your #TopTuesday from places you have actually visited that week and checked in at on Foursquare. You see recommendations from your friends, but you can also see other ones near you. Like with Foursquare, you get points for doing more stuff - inviting your friends for example.

Scoville is still in beta, but if you have a Foursquare account, you can sign in here

Interested parties will need the Digital Space App, a free app soon to be launched on the App Store and Android Marketplace. Then you hold your phone over the digital watermark on the letter and voila - you have digital mail.

Only people with a 3G iPhone or an Android phone can use this though. For now it's expected the service will mostly be used by companies sending out ads and corporate leaflets. Scanning the digital stamp will take you to the site of the sender's choosing, such as a website or a video.

"Royal Mail is committed to helping make leaflets and mailings increasingly sophisticated and engaging for the people who receive them," said Dave Smith, Royal Mail's chief customer officer, as the British postal service becomes the first to offer this scheme.

This could be potentially interesting - send along a link to an online photo album with a post card, for instance. In either case it brings snail mail closer to digital mail, and that can only be a good thing.

[via The Daily Telegraph]

McDonalds will roll out contactless payment card readers to all restaurants in the UK by the end of this month.

Contactless credit cards - aka Wave and Pay cards - use Near Field Communication chips embedded on cards to mean that customers just need to wave their card near the reader to make a payment, instead of the old Chip-and-Pin way. It's quicker, and they promise us, secure.

Coffee chains like Eat and Pret already have the devices installed in some stores, McDonalds is jumping on the bandwagon too, in the expectation that the technology will get big.

McDonald's UK IT chief was under no delusions about the current popularity of contactless cards - saying that only a very small number of customers used them . However, he told Computing Magazine that the big advantage for retailers is that contactless payment saves time at the checkout - reducing queues.

"It's about the customer journey. It's quicker than the chip-and-pin transaction," he said.

The firm doesn't expect the service to experience heavy use initially, but to grow in time, leading to increased revenue.

"The number of cards with contactless capability among the customer base at the moment is low. But we recgonise that contactless near-field communications capability will soon be in many customers' hands. We believe that having this technology now will help drive people into our restaurants."

Near Field Communication chips are slated as one of the big trends of the next year and we'll start to see them in phones and cars as well as cards. More: Mobile World Congress 2011: The five big trends from the gadget fair

[Computing via NFC.com]

Living on a freelancer's salary means this one's a bit theoretical for me - but if I somehow had access to the fanciest hotel towels I may well be tempted to upgrade my at-home collection.

This may however no longer be an option, as hotels are starting to incorporate RFID-chips (radio frequency identification) into their fancy linens. Until now this technology has been used for things such as tagging books to prevent theft, animals to track movements and timber to prevent illegal logging - but it seems a new purpose has now been found.

Granted, when considering the cost of replacing all those fluffy towels the hotels might be justified in taking this arguably stern approach. So far three hotels in New York, Miami and Honolulu have bought into the technology and tagged their towels, linens and bathrobes. The Honolulu hotels said it used to lose 4,000 towels a month before this initiative, and this has fallen to just 750.

Total savings: $16,000 every month. Now those are some pricy towels.

Imagine a CCTV camera that listens to what's going on around it as well as videotaping it.

British start-up Audio Analytic have invented software that recognises dangerous noises and then uses them to alert security monitors to developing criminal situations. The camera has been trained to recognise the sounds of breaking glass and aggressive voices among other things...

This video explains it pretty well ...

The company Audio Analytic was a finalist at the IFSEC 2011 competition

MetPro Rapid Response is the company used by London's Barnet Council to prevent bloggers from filming their budget cut meetings.

Private security contractors MetPro was asked by the Council to stop some residents from entering the public gallery to see the council vote through cuts.

The story has been documented by Barnet blogs such as David Hencke and Broken Barnet. Hencke repots that MetPro stands accused of covertly filming residents and may even be monitoring Barnet bloggers, something the Council denies.

But now MetPro has gone bankrupt, and the contract with Barnet Council is for sale. Moreover, MetPro is allegedly in debt, owing around £400,000, more than half of this due to the HMRC.

Speaking to David Hencke, Barnet Council said: "Barnet Council is urgently reviewing MetPro Rapid Response's position and will be liaising with the liquidators involved."

We love 3 dimensional printers and we love them even more now you can use them to order tiny statues of yourself off the internet. You take some pictures of yourself, send them off, an artist somewhere makes a 3D model of you and prints it out.
Beautiful.

Unfortunately the finished result is not quite as beautiful as the seamless ordering process - they look kind of freaky to be honest. But they're still cool. It's like you're really down with 3D printing. And we all know that's cool.

Go on! treat yourself!

60 euros for a figure from Sculpteo.com