Insanely fast mobile broadband speeds could soon become a reality for Londoners, as O2 today announce plans to begin testing 4G connections in the capital.

The trials will run for nine months and will see 25 4G sites created, covering 40 square kilometres in total in areas including Hyde Park, The O2 in Greenwich and Canary Wharf, Soho, Westminster, South Bank and Kings Cross.

According to reports, download speeds as fast as 100Mbps will be possible during the trial, with 1,000 O2 customers expected to take part in the tests.

Ronan Dunne, chief executive officer at O2, said:

"Today's launch of the UK's first 4G London trial network demonstrates our commitment to delivering 4G to our customers at the earliest opportunity.

"The work we are doing now will lay the foundations for our commercial 4G network when it launches in the UK."

Each person testing the service will be able to do so using a Samsung B3730 mobile broadband dongle, with the trial itself using the 2.6GHz spectrum band under a Test and Development licence granted to O2 by OFCOM.

"Our work in London will give us a better understanding of the capabilities of 4G technology and will allow us to explore the superfast benefits it will bring to people and industry across the UK. This 4G trial is the next step on our journey to a smarter network - a network that offers a seamless, connected experience across multiple devices, locations and services.

To find out more, check out Tech Digest's beginner's guide to 4G.

Gone are the days of taking a raggy sponsorship form around your school or office, now if you want to raise money for a charity you use a platform like Just Giving, which makes the whole sponsorship, promotion and donation process quick, simple and most importantly easy to spread around to everyone you know.

This week JustGiving has conducted a study into the dramatic increase in social giving over the past few years and has unsurprinsgly found that all kinds of charity supporters now increasingly prefer to give directly through social channels.

The thing we find most interesting here at Shiny Shiny is that certain social networks prompt different responses from those that support charities. For instance, Twitter users are apparently the most generous, as the value of a donation made by the average Twitter donor is £30.26, a higher amount than those following a call to action through from anywhere else. Give yourself a pat on the back Twitterverse.

However, Facebook is still king when it comes to the amount of donations JustGiving receives, as the social network accounted for more than a quarter of all donations in September 2011, which is a huge rise of 130% over the past year. This number is expected to rise even further and make up 50% of donations by the end of 2015.

As a number of other sites, services and publications turn their offerings into Facebook apps (like The Guardian, Spotify, Deezer), JustGiving has just launched one of its own, allowing any charity to easily take donations through Facebook without leaving the site. Early adopters of the app include War Child, the Dog's Trust and the Rett Syndrome Research Trust UK.

Elizabeth Kessick, the head of insight at JustGiving, says:

"These figures are a fascinating insight into the impact of social networks on the way we give to charity. Third sector organisations should ignore social media at their peril as this data shows that social giving is an increasingly important driver for donations. The good news is that it's also a very cost-effective way for charities to canvass for support, and using the JustGiving app for Facebook, charities can make it easy for their fans to translate their good will into an active donation."

While browsing through a few blogs looking for interesting things to do in the capital we came across the London Pop-ups blog, which collects together details of all the cool pop-up galleries, shops, bars and gigs dotted all over London.

There's a real mix of quirky and entertaining pop-up events, from a design fair to a new film club.

Being huge Apple fan girls and boys we particularly love these geek cakes.

A new site called Drinkify aims to help you solve that age old dilemma of, "just what kind of alcoholic concoction will go best with this tune"?

Simply type in the band or artist you'd like to listen to and not only will Drinkify play you a track, it'll tell you what kind of beverage would best suit the music.

Here are some of the clever little site's suggestions:

Lady Gaga: 6 oz. of Vodka served neat with an olive.
Justin Bieber: 8oz. of Red Bull on the rocks.
The Rolling Stones: 10 oz. of Rum served on the rocks with cocktail onions.
Britney Spears: 8oz. of Vodka and 8oz. of Club Soda in a highball glass and serve.

We'll stop ruining all of the fun for you, go have a play with Drinkify now, or maybe wait until midday...

[Via The Next Web Via GeekSugar]

If you could bottle up the internet, what do you think it'd smell like? We imagine the insane amount of cat videos, Justin Bieber related rambling and porn would make up a pretty foul scent overall, but maybe Pinterest and Etsy would be sweet and floral, who knows...

Well now a new device called Olly lets us smell the internet, or at least assign smells to things that happen on the internet, which will probably be a much more pleasant experience.

The innovative new device dreamt up by the clever minds at Mint Digital's Foundry uses an event on the internet, such as an @ mention or a new email, and then turns that into a fragrance (kind of like a super intelligent Glade poofy room aroma thing).

Olly is powered by USB, so it sits right next to your computer waiting to infuse your room with whatever scent you've filled it with at the back. According to The Next Web, for now you can only have one smell for one kind of notification, but they can be stacked up so an @ can mean a refreshing Apple smell and a new email could mean tangy lemon.

The Olly isn't available to buy just yet, but you can sign up to be notified by the team at Mint Digital so you're the first to know when it is. If you're feeling ambitious and would rather make an Olly yourself, then all of his parts and code are open, so you can follow a number of step-by-step instructions.

[Via The Next Web]

Today we came across a website called Greatvine, which aims to give you a one-on-one chat with leading specialists across a wide range of fields. So, if you need some help with a copywriting project or want to talk to an expert about anxiety issues then Greatvine has a team of experts on hand to help.

The service was set up in response to the fact that there's just SO much conflicting information available online that many people feel overwhelmed when it comes to looking for quick and easy-to-understand guidance.

To get started you visit the Greatvine website, have a look at which specialist would be right for you by browsing through their experience and then you can either call them straight away, request a call from them later in the day or schedule one for a few days in advance. Obviously they can't be sat near their phones ALL the time, but Greatvine aims to provide visitors with as much information as possible about when they'll get to chat and more often than not it's pretty quick.

Of course the main concern with this kind of service is whether you're REALLY talking to an expert, but everyone listed on the website has a comprehensive profile listing their experience, specialities, qualifications and even other people's feedback too.

Greatvine covers lots of areas, including health and wellbeing, business, writing and parenting. Although some visitors to the site may be interested in one-on-one business advice, it's the instant access to health and parenting guidance which we imagine many people will welcome with open arms. Although services like NHS Direct aim to provide access to a professional on the phone, waiting times can sometimes be too long if you're really concerned about the well-being of yourself or your kids, so Greatvine is a good alternative enabling you to handpick exactly who you talk to, guaranteeing that they're going to be able to help or at least point you in the right direction.

The catch with Greatvine is you do pay for the expert advice you're being given depending on how long you're on the call. The rates differ for each expert, with most ranging from a few pence a minute through to £1.50, this seems like pretty good value for an urgent query about your child's health or a question about medication, but longer relationship or business advice may end up costing you a lot in the long run.

Do you think we need a one-on-one service like Greatvine or are you happy to find all of the information you need online independently?

The FBI has recently decided that Second Life is NOT just about innocent escapism and virtual sex, but instead it could well be a breeding ground for gang crime and lots of other unsavoury and highly illegal activities.

According to Kotaku, in the FBI's latest "National Gang Threat Assessment" report, Second Life gets a big mention as a possible environment for gang-related crime, propaganda spreading and even drug trafficking:

"Second Life is a computer-based virtual world with a simulated environment where users inhabit and interact via avatars, or graphical rep- resentations the virtual world may depict a real world or a fantasy world. Users communicate through text-chat and real-time voice-based chat. Second Life provides versatility and ano- nymity and allows for covert communications. Because of its anonymity and versatility, gang members could potentially use second life to recruit, spread propaganda, commit other crimes such as drug trafficking, and receive training for real-world criminal operations."

Of course Second Life has long been on the FBI's radar, back in 2009 it began displaying billboards and posters in the virtual world with information about its Ten Most Wanted fugitive list, the wanted posters of cyber criminals as well as details about how to get in touch with the Internet Crime Complaint Center.

[Via Kotaku]

If you're looking for some inspiration to kick start your online business or need a dose of motivation to persevere with a new blogging project, then take a look at our pick of ten inspiring female entrepreneurs who between them have started blogging networks, pioneered some of the most popular websites in the world and played a key role in how the tech industry has evolved over the past ten years.

1. Krista Madden, Founder of Handpicked Media

Krista Madden founded popular female lifestyle website Beauty and the Dirt back in 2000 and came across a number of websites which were unable to make money on their own, so she began hand-picking websites to create a network, which formed Handpicked Media, a way to represent sites for advertising sales. Handpicked Media is now a collective of independent websites and blogs, covering beauty, fashion, parenting, culture and food.

As well as being a successful online entrepreneur, Madden has also set up a beauty salon in the West End called The Beauty Lounge.

2. Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer at Facebook

Sheryl Sandberg is an entrepreneur based in the US who is currently working as the chief operating officer of Facebook. Before she moved to the social network she worked as the Vice President of Global Online Sales and Operations at Google. Sandberg has played a large part in Facebook's continued success and has overseen many areas of the business over the years, including sales, marketing, business development, human resources and communications.

3. Shaa Wasmund, Online Entrepreneur and Author

Shaa Wasmund is an online entrepreneur and one of the founders of a support network for businesses called Smarta.com, which provides a platform for all kinds of businesses and entrepreneurs to learn from one another, make connections and ultimately be as successful as possible. Wasmund has also recently written a motivational book called Stop Talking, Start Doing, which inspires people to take control of their lives and begin the necessary steps to start making their dreams a reality.

4. Sophie Cornish, Co-Founder of notonthehighstreet.com

Sophie Cornish co-founded popular shopping website notonthehighstreet.com with her friend Holly Tucker back in 2006, which features the bespoke products of small businesses and crafts people. The website currently works with over 1,600 small business partners who sell over 35,000 products between them and last year had a turnover of £15 million.

5. Arianna Huffington, President and Editor-in-Chief of AOL Huffington Post Media Group

Arianna Huffington is both the president and editor-in-chief of the AOL Huffington Post Media Group. Back in 2005 she launched The Huffington Post, a news blog which quickly became one of the most popular websites in the world.

She was named in Time Magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people twice, in 2006 and again in 2011.

6. Martha Lane Fox, Co-Founder of lastminute.com and Digital Champion

Martha Lane Fox co-founded travel and gift e-commerce website lastminute.com and now works as the UK's Digital Champion attempting to get people online who have never used the internet before.

Fox is also a non-executive at a number of large brands, including M&S, C4 and Mydeco.com.

7. Gina Trapani, Founder of Lifehacker

Gina Trapani is a coder and blogger who has been involved in multiple ventures over the past few years and currently works as a project director at Expert Labs, although she's renowned for being the founder of popular, quirky lifestyle blog, Lifehacker. She is currently working on a number of new projects, including ThinkUp, a web-based platform for crowdsourcing insights on social networks like Twitter and Facebook.

8. Natalie Massenet, Founder of Net-a-Porter

Natalie Massenet worked as the editor of Women's Wear Daily and Tatler before she started up luxury fashion website Net-a-Porter in 1998. In 2010 she sold the extremely successful website for £50 million but remains an executive chairman of the business. She has recently set up Mr Porter, a spin-off website aimed at men.

9. Susanna Scott, Blogger and Founder of BritMums

Susanna Scott is a popular blogger at A Modern Mother and founded the hugely successful BritMums social network, which has more than 3,000 members and runs all kinds of blogger engagement programmes, events and a dedicated conference called BritMums LIve!.

10. Caterina Fake, Co-Founder of Flickr

Caterina Fake is an online entrepreneur who co-founded photo sharing service Flickr, as well as Hunch.com, a platform which is attempting to build a 'taste graph' of the internet and lets you share things you like and receive recommendations. After Flickr was acquired by Yahoo in 2005, she ran the company's Technology Development group.

She has won a number of awards and was named in BusinessWeek's Best Leaders of 2005, Fast Company's Fast 50 and she was also named in Time Magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people.

[Image via Roo Reynolds]

I think it's safe to say we're all very sick of daily deals, even the services that involve minimal effort and promise to pick the best selection out for us are still recommending beauty treatments we don't need and salsa dancing classes we won't like.

However, Ticketmaster has become the latest company to try and stand out in the overcrowded daily deals space with its new TmDeals service and we're much more interested in the prospect of discounted event tickets than we've ever been about trips to steak houses and eyebrow waxing.

According to NMA, the site will offer a range of offers for sports, theatre, music, comedy and even special family events too which will all be delivered by email and based on a series of location and personal interest preferences. We think that as long as we can really tailor which deals we're getting this could be a big hit. Interestingly, specific deals are also set to be promoted across Facebook and Twitter too, which will mean there's less chance of the hidden gems going unnoticed.

[Via NMA]

A study carried out by YouGov for Computeractive magazine has found that many of the tech-related words which have been working their way into our everyday vocabulary (see retweet, sexting, defriend and tweetup) actually make many of us very VERY angry.

According to the study, the most hated word is 'sexting', with 24% of those polled claiming that's by far the worst of a bad bunch. Interestingly 'intexicated' came in second with 13% which I've NEVER heard before, but have since found out refers to being intoxicated by a high volume of texts. What strange imagery that conjures up...

Unsurprisingly, the likes of 'defriend', 'twittersphere' and 'tweetup' also made the list.

Although many of these words clearly make many wince, it's interesting to see how language has evolved along with technology. The truth is many of these words may seem annoying, but they're necessary to describe new ways of thinking and behaving. After all sexting sounds much better than "sending naughty texts" and defriend would be particularly long winded, "removing someone as a Facebook friend, but they weren't necessarily an actual friend in the first place, but now they're neither".

[Image via relgar]

One of the Shiny team's favourite new blogging platforms, Jux, has had a revamp today, which means the site now doesn't just make our blogs look better, but content also loads much faster too.

We've written about our love for Jux a few times in the past, we made it fight Tumblr (it won!) AND we even gave you a list of our top seven Jux bloggers including our very own Ashley Norris and his blog Pop Goes Art.

So, we're obviously quite excited by the fact that the Jux team have been making a few changes. Here's a quick rundown of what's different and why we're excited about it.

1. Posts that are quotes, photos and articles can now be lots of different shapes and sizes, which is ideal if you have a particularly wide or tall photo that usually looks a bit stretched or 'pixel-y'.

2. One of the things I love most about Jux is there are special posts for making a countdown or a slideshow (you don't have that Tumblr). These options have now been improved even more and now have a new title page and big images to fill the whole screen.

3. Better support for videos, which means they look better, play faster and are bigger too.

4. A new failsafe saving feature means you'll never get that heart-sinking "I'VE LOST THE POST I'VE BEEN WORKING ON FOR HOURS" feeling ever again.

5. The home page will now load even faster than before, which is always a plus!

6. There are a number of iPad improvements, like pinching out to full screen and tapping for the menu.

So there are the changes we thought were worth mentioning, but there's a handful of smaller bits and pieces too which you can read from this New on Jux blog post by the team.

Yesterday we wrote about Sean Parker's latest venture, Airtime, a new kind of social network / chatting platform that will allow people to meet through random videos. Sound familiar? Well yes, that's because Sean and his business partner Shawn have admitted they've taken inspiration from Chatroulette, although Airtime will still be pretty different.

Everyone knows what Chatroulette is, but it seems that it's become old news and very few people are using it anymore (or at least very few people admit to using it). For those that haven't had the pleasure of trying it out, Chatroulette is basically a website which requires no log-ins or registration, you just sit in front of your webcam and you're paired with a succession of complete strangers in one-on-one video chat.

It sounds like an interesting take on the random chat room interaction, but unfortunately Chatroulette is notorious for oddballs and nakedness and it seems it's been considered a pervert's / voyeur's online haven for a while now that everyone's got a bit bored of it.

But what else has been happening in the strange little lair that is Chatroulette?

1. The Last Exorcism viral marketing use of Chatroulette

This has got to be one of our favourite uses of Chatroulette EVER. To promote The Last Exorcism the team behind the film decided to turn to Chatroulette. We won't ruin it for you, just watch the video below.

2. HealCam connects people for medical chats over Chatroulette

Last year, we wrote about HealCam, a way of connecting people with similar conditions and allowing them to talk to one another. Chatroulette is admittedly a strange platform for that kind of thing, but a nice idea.

3. Ben Folds concert talks to strangers on Chatroulette

Any random weirdos skulking around Chatroulette on the night of this Ben Folds concert would have been in for a strange and surreal treat, as Ben Folds talks directly to a lot of users in this brilliant video.

4. A Chat Roulette party - yay!

This is more like it. Chatroulette always seems to make more sense if a big group of friends log-on as apposed to someone sat all lonely on their own.

So is Chatroulette over, just a place for a few novelty stunts or do you still log-on and flash at randomers regularly?

This morning it's been revealed that a new government initiative in the UK will see top internet service providers BT, Virgin Media, Talk Talk and Sky blocking access to pornographic websites in a bid to stop children seeing content that was clearly made for adults' eyes only.

The ISPs will most likely introduce a system which means new customers must "opt in" to adult content when they open a new account. As Tech Digest points out, this could lead to a number of very awkward phone calls to customer service departments.

The proposed plans make sense. It's becoming increasingly hard for parents to monitor what their children are doing and seeing online because they're using technology more for both schoolwork and play and sometimes erroneous websites can be hard to spot, explicit photos and videos are often hidden on sites that may look and sound innocent at first glance.

Although some companies already provide different kinds of restrictions to stop kids seeing things they shouldn't, the latest developments mean it'll be harder for naughty sites to slip through the net and many parent groups are happy to see much stricter blocks in place.

But, I can't help but think restricting access to any kind of content will only lead to more and more things being banned and deemed inappropriate further down the line.

It's good to see the government and ISPs taking action and responding to a problem many individuals and groups have been voicing for years. But the issue with imposing bans and restrictions is where do we draw the line in the future?

Yes children shouldn't be seeing hardcore porn, that's pretty obvious. But I think you'll find some parents would pop some of Rhianna's performances into the porn category too, or even a Lady Gaga video or two, so if we block "porn" now, what will some want to ban next year or the year after?

A new browser for OS X devices called Raven has been launched today and it stands out from the likes of Internet Explorer and Google Chrome because it turns your favourite sites into easily accessible, dedicated apps. We can't work out whether this will be really useful or a little unnecessary quite yet.

You start off by visiting Raven's built-in app store and install the apps you use the most, so there are a few samples to choose from at the moment, like Facebook, Twitter, New York Times and Flickr. These then appear in your sidebar and clicking on them reveals shortcuts to specific areas and pieces of content.

A lot of effort has clearly been put into Raven's unique user experience and basing everything on apps is an interesting approach I'm sure some people will love. But, is it a little too different to convert the masses?

Download Raven.

Film lovers in the UK can now rent more than a thousand feature films in the UK today over at youtube.com/movies according to The Official YouTube Blog.

The rental service was brought to the US earlier in the year and Canada last month, so it's about time we got it over here on the other side of the pond.

YouTube Movies boasts all kinds of new-ish big blockbusters like Hanna and The Dark Knight, as well as British classics, like Lock Stock and Monty Python's The Meaning of Life. Many of the films available also have added extras, behind-the-scenes videos and parodies bolted on.

To give you an idea of what you get, Shane Black's Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is available for £2.49 on a 48 hour pass. This means you have 30 days to begin watching it and once you do you have 48 hours to finish watching it. I'm sure some people would feel ripped off by this kind of price (especially considering the DVD costs £3.49 in HMV), but I imagine the service will still be VERY popular.

According to the Starbucks website, you can now get free internet access at lots of Starbucks WiFi hotspots throughout the UK.

Granted it was never THAT hard to get online in a Starbucks in the past, you just had to put some money on a Starbucks card, register and off you went. However, I've witnessed a few angry customers freaking out about the immense effort this seems to take them in the past, so the easier process will probably mean much more people using the internet while they get their coffee.

To start surfing for free all you need to do is:

1. Turn on your laptop / mobile / tablet and make sure WiFi is enabled.

2. Once you're online go to: www.btopenzone.com.

3. Click on the 'connect' button and away you go.

We all know that the commute is the worst part of the day, delays, sweaty people, loud people, agressive people, urgh I'm getting upset just thinking about it.

But luckily there are a number of handy resources and mobile apps created to give you real time information as well as an insight into how the transport system works, which may make it all a little more bearable in the long run.

[Image via]

Straight talking entrepreneur Alan Sugar held a book signing today, which is fairly standard for a guy who stars in a reality TV show and loves writing about himself. But this book signing was different because it took place on Twitter.

I know what you're thinking, a book signing isn't a book signing if BOOKS AREN'T BEING SIGNED, but it was actually a quirky ploy to get people talking about his new ranty book and I hate to say it, but it seemed to really work.

At 1pm today, Sugar's one million Twitter followers were urged to go over to http://www.lordsugar.tv/, log in with their Twitter details and then submit a rant, anything they wanted to voice to the masses. Alan Sugar would then choose the best one and sign a book for that user.

It's essentially just a gimmicky competition, but it's good to see Lord Sugar interacting with people on Twitter (in a way) and getting them to enter in a way that's in keeping with the book, which is all about his "rants, revelations and rules for life".

A new buying platform called Buyapowa launches in the UK today, but unlike group buying favourites Groupon and Living Social, Buyapowa offers its users heavily discounted prices the more people who sign up.

It's called co-buying and it means that the more people who opt in to buy a product, the cheaper it becomes for everyone, giving normal customers cheap and cheerful bulk buying discounts.

Granted the idea is pretty similar to group buying platforms, but there's definitely an exciting sense of everyone coming together to drive prices down. This means there's also quite a big social element to Buyapowa, as users are encouraged to get more people to buy the product they want. No matter how sneaky you might think that is on Buyapowa's part, you can't deny it's a pretty clever selling tactic, get someone else to promote the products on your site for you.

Now be warned, you can't drive an expensive bit of tech down to a few pounds, but the "best prices" listed next to each item are pretty low considering how much you'd pay for the products if you found them in a regular store.

The interesting thing about Buyapowa is that you don't have to settle for the products already listed, you can nominate products you'd like to co-buy and if it gets enough nominations, the Buyapowa team will try and source it. The same goes for products that are hard to find and only available in certain countries.

From what I can see of the platform so far, it's a good option for cosmetic and make up lovers with deals from Benefit live at the moment and others from Chanel and YSL coming up over the next few weeks, but overall there'll be a real mix of brands and products once the platform gets going.

We're not sure whether Buyapowa is going to change the way we shop online, but it'll certainly be interesting to see just how low some great products get in the future.

Facebook may be more important than food or going to the toilet here in the UK, but it's fascinating to learn that those in other countries love it even more than we do and others don't use it at all.

But which country spends the most time stalking photos and thinking of quirky status updates?

Well according to a recent study carried out by Experian, it's not us Brits, I know, I know, I was shocked too. In actual fact Singaporeans are sat right at the top of the list, spending an average of 38 minutes and 46 seconds on the social network every time they log in, which does seem like quite a long time, particularly if they're logging in more than three times a day.

Those from Brazil are at the other end of the scale, spending only 18 minutes and 19 seconds tagging, friending and stalking and we're in the middle with a pretty healthy 25 minutes and 33 seconds.

However, a really interesting stat from the study revealed that although we're on Facebook a lot, we only spend 12.2% of our time online on social networking, whereas quick Facebookers Brazil spend around 18.9% of their time on the likes of Twitter and Facebook. Weird, huh? Well not really. Try and imagine living in a country where Facebook doesn't rule EVERYTHING and there you have (among others, obviously) Brazil, where social network Orkut is still (only marginally) more popular than Zuckerberg's empire. So just under half of those in Brazil have been getting really angry about the recent changes, they must be a much calmer bunch than us.

Of course this research has all kinds of implications for brands and advertising, but I think for the individual user it means we don't have to feel THAT bad about staying up until 2am scrolling through photos because we can feel comforted by the fact that someone over in Singapore has been doing it for nearly twice the amount of time. Or at least that's what we can keep telling ourselves.

[Image via]