Zune, James Bond K800i, Wii and more

Tech-news!
Milking the plump info cow via the teats of opinion

Item! Microsoft are cosying up to record companies. They’re offering a delicious slice of the Zune hardware profits pie, a bit like an indulgent surburban housewife greeting the Vicar, only with more trips to the toilet for cocaine breaks. It sounds like good sense – there were all sorts of murmurings about record companies feeling like they’d been stiffed by Apple a while back, and let’s face it, Zune is going to need all the help it can get. It also prompted Universal honcho Om Malik to say this: “If the music industry cannot sell one additional song to consumers then, you as a business, have lost grip over your core competency.” Which as corporate gobbledygook goes, is right up there, I think.

Item! The silver James Bond K800i is here, and that means Double-O Heaven and a License to Thrill for all concerned! For many years, I had an aversion to the excellent, voodoo-themed Live And Let Die, due to an exchange between Roger Moore and one of Mr Big’s henchmen in which I thought Moore said, “I’m sorry, I don’t talk to darkies.” As a well-brought-up child of impeccably liberal parents, I thought this was incredibly racist. However, on re-viewing the film some years later, it turned out that Moore actually said, “I’m sorry, I don’t talk to LACKEYS.” That’s not really got anything to do with gadgets.

Item! The tension as we wait for Wii is becoming unbearable – a bit like in the gents in a particularly threatening pub. However, the unveiling of the PS3 EyeToy has made me think that its main rival might not suck as much as I expected. The gaming implications of this 3D motion-sensing super-thing could be amazing! But, hold on, how has Sony chosen to illustrate the EyeToy’s potential? By showing the exciting possibilities it has as a novelty desktop interface! Dear oh dear. Sony: the clue’s in the names – PLAYStation and EyeTOY. Nobody in the universe wants to use your console as an AV hub or watered-down PC!

Item! Well, all those things happened yesterday, at the end of what I think can only be described as a slow news week. The rest of the week can be summarised thus. Bong! Tat-merchants release glowing fish iPod thing! Bong! Game controller “will have cable” shock! Bong! Apple’s computers to get a little bit faster and have a little bit more storage! Bong! Microsoft Vista to be launched at roughly the time we expected! Bong! Coding links to Webpages – which is done not by me but my glamorous assistant James from T3.co.uk – is arduous and dull!

List up!
Comparatively easy-to-write collations of made-up things

The top 10 games I’m looking forward to on the Wii’s Virtual Console!

1. Frantic Alan
2. Goku Baku Mercantile Trauma 7
3. Pling!
4. Copyright Invaders
5. First Division Manager 1986
6. Delia Smith’s Extreme Cookery
7. Timewaste Race 2000
8. Metal Insertion Unit
9. Alphonse the Badger in: TB Trouble
10. Infidel Crush!

Top 6 spam emails this week

1. “You could have amazing LIFE” from Blair Rectangle
2. “BIG size man!” from Eurypedes Himmler
3. “Appropriate qualifications – passed over for promotion?” from Rupert Lillilliliana
4. “All medz here! Vighagra!” from Guinevere Jones
5. “Re: 126” from Kestrel Kaneshiro
6. “Your Christmas Gift Voucher from Argos” from Argos

And finally…
Word Farm!
The place where bad words are humanely culled and eaten

This week: “Pain journeys”.
Nothing to do with travelling on Virgin Trains, or in a cab with a driver who has lively opinions on immigration and capital punishment, this is what doctors are getting their patients to log on PDAs, according to this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6129016.stm.

Wheelchair-bound patients simply log the location and type of discomfort they are currently experiencing, in order to build up a 3D model of how painful they’re feeling, allowing doctors to study the aforementioned “pain journeys”.

I personally find that feeling pain is perfectly sufficient and that I don’t really need to “see” it. I also find it more therapeutic to register my level of pain by using a sliding sonic scale from “Ouch! Bugger! Ooh!” (stubbing toe) to “AAAAGGH!” (Accidentally dropping anvil on testes) all the way up to “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!” (Chris Moyles appears on TV). Still, each to their own.

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