Fresh Plastic

Busting Loose: Only true love will open this Japanese bra

Nippon scien-tits invent brassiere that busts open only in the presence of a woman's true love.

 

Hacking Netflix whilst legally avoiding paying a penny to TV Licensing: A year in review

Happy New Year, and all that jazz. Welcome to my first post of 2014 - and a very belated Year in Review.

In 2013 the two most popular pages on this here blog of mine were Open up a whole new world of TV and film with this little Netflix 'hack' and How to legally avoid paying the TV licence whilst still watching lots of TV.

Almost all of those who ended up here did so after searching for Netflix hacks and ways to avoid paying the ridiculous TV licence the UK has. So expect more posts on both in the future.

After TV Licensing and Netflix, my posts on the pros and cons of Sky's Now TV service - which included how to watch Sky Movies on the cheap and how The Simpsons were missing from it - proved the next most popular. Again, expect more upcoming posts on that.

Breaking away from moneysaving film and television tips, the next most searched for, and read, post was about the awful mess that was made to my Dell Latitude 10 tablet after I updated it to Windows 8.1. Dell themselves dropped by and, not long after, the problem was fixed for all of us poor souls affected by it (which was pretty much everyone who upgraded). Don't expect any more posts on that!

And finally...

What's been missing is a bit of banter, some dialogue. Feel free to comment, I publish all I receive unless they're from bots or human spammers. Heck, I even published this rather patronising, condescending nonsense from a company that ripped off my sister's mobile phone.

Tech toy tips. Save money, time and headaches this Christmas!

Here's some buying, and post-buying, advice if you're giving the gift of tech this Christmas.

Hooking up: HDMI

• Check whether your media streamer, DVD/BD player, gaming console etc comes with an HDMI cable. If not...
• Buy £1 HDMI cables from Poundland (never spend anything over £5 elsewhere)
• HDMI cables are HDMI cables, an officially licensed PlayStation 3 one, for instance, will work no better but it will leave a bigger hole in your pocket
• Check how many HDMI sockets the TV it's going to be hooked up to has. If there won't be enough, buy an HDMI switch - such as this £7 from Amazon...

Buying a new TV?

• Don't be fooled by brand names. The likes of Toshiba, Sharp and Philips aren't quite what they used to be. Now they're often just rebadged "supermarket" models from Turkey and China.
• There's nothing neccessarily wrong with "supermarket" models but, if you want one, you should only pay supermarket prices.
• Budget plasma TVs from the likes of Samsung and LG tend to look better than similarily priced LCD or "LED" ones - even from the same manufacturer.
• If you still watch a lot of standard definition stuff an 'HD Ready'/720p plasma TV will knock the spots off a 'Full HD'/1080p LCD one.

The games people play...

• Any new console you buy will almost certainly require a software update as soon as you switch it on. Little Timmy won't be impressed if he can't use his new toy straight away come Christmas morn. If you can, it might be a good idea to carefully open the box beforehand, plug it in and let it do it's thing before the big day.
• It's not just the console that might need an update, the games themselves might too. So it might be a good idea to let them do their thing too.
• Some games available in a bundle may actually be a digital download, not a physical copy. Again, it might be an idea to download them before Christmas Day if you can.
• Buying an Xbox 360? If you are, and it's the 4GB model, you might want to pick up a 32GB USB memory stick (or a compatible hard drive) as games such as GTA V will not be playable otherwise.

And finally...

• Batteries. Most things come with them these days, but it doesn't hurt to check. It also doesn't hurt to charge up anything that requires a charge before first use.

Robot takes the piss. From humans. Turns it into power source

Bristol brainiacs have invented a piss-taking robot. Or, rather, a piss-powered robot. Not only have the guys (and, quite possibly, gals) from Bristol Robotics Laboratory found a use for human urine, they've invented a pump to collect it based on a human heart.

Here's the picture:

Sorry, wrong one:

I barely passed GCSE Science, so I'll stop there and direct you towards TheEngineer.co.uk's article for the skinny.

USB bathroom scales. Could they be the 21st Century's greatest invention? I investigate

What a world we live in. Lidl, my favourite discount supermarket from Germany, currently sell bathroom scales that upload 'diagnostic' data via USB to one's computer. And, get this - for just thirteen pounds and ninety-nine pence.

But is it any good? I've got no idea, I've just used it once. However I won't let that, nor my complete lack of knowledge in health, fitness or sports science, get in the way of writing a blog post.

So, without further ado, here's a couple of pictures and some accompanying words.

On the right we have the catchily named Sanitas SBF 48 scales. And on the left you can see my poorly hydrated hand (my body being just 49.8% water) holding my borked-by-Windows-8.1-update, Dell Latitude 10, displaying my vital stats.

You may have noticed that the (supplied) USB cable connecting the two is rather on the short side. It is. Thankfully I have a tablet and not a desktop, so it's not really a problem for me.

Eagle-eyed readers may have also noticed how bad my diagnosis was. For those who didn't, here's a screengrab:

The prognosis is not good, but that's no great surprise to those who know me. Ignore the dial in the lower right corner, that's just for those who happened to have a compatible heart rate monitor.

Over time, the HealthCoach software will be able to chart my progress - it obviously can't do that now as I've only used the scales once. Here's hoping it will be the kick-up-the-arse I need to help turn around my body's current dire state.

Summary

The Good: It's £14, give or take a penny. It looks nice. The software has dials and pretty colours. There are presets for ten users

The Bad: You have to sign up for a (free) account just to download the HealthCoach software. Setting the scales and setting up the software isn't intuitive. Uploading data takes ages and the software complains of errors each time (yeah I used it once, but I also set it up for two other family members)