its about time we were appreciated.

Researchers at the University of Washington have developed a new game called “Foldit” in which player twists the protein and pulls its arms to move it into its most stable position, which is the shape it would take in nature.

The game has been developed to utilize the skills of gamers from around the world in making medical discoveries, perhaps even finding a cure for HIV. It could win you a Nobel prize.

Im gonna give it a go now.

Try it youself!

//Craig

Aussie Consumer group Choice, claims that consoles such as Sony’s Playstation 3 chew up five times more energy than a fridge.

Apparently a fridge will go through £100 worth of electricity a year while a PS3 will cost £500 a year even if it is not used.

The XBox did not use quite so much juice but came second behind the Sony. The PS3 used ten times more power than the Nintendo Wii.

The report said that the Apple iMac with a built-in display, consumes just two-thirds of the energy consumed by a traditional PC and that LCD monitors were more energy efficient than the CRT versions.

Even makes me feel a little guilty even though i own an Xbox 360 and a PC with LCD monitor.

Sauce!

//Craig

Read it Here first

//Craig

yes it is a nice phone. quite compact, moreso than its main competitor the iPhone.

The 5mpx camera is great very clear and i love the vista sidebar style interface i think its great but other than that its lacking something, some coolness that the iPhone has so much more of.

I dont know exactly what it is. The feel of the interface is wrong and not as well thought out at the iPhone. i cannot quite put my finger on it but still a nice phone altogether.

//Craig

I promise the madness will continue when i hit level 20 lol!

//Craig

So i set about making my own button layout.

Ok here is a zip folder with Xpadder and a 360 controller layout pic aswell as my custom AoC button layout.

There are a few changes to the default button keybindings in AoC and theres alot of controls to add so an explanation of how its controlled it probably needed.

Here are the following keybinding changes within AoC:

Sheath/Unsheath Weapon = Tab

Arrange Shield Left = F5

Arrange Shield Centre = F6

Arrange Shield Right = F7

Arrange Shield All = F8

And as promised a quick As Possible explanation of the control system.

There are 2 modes Combat and Normal. When LT is held down Combat mode is Active.( The controller will gently Rumble when you are in Combat mode

But first Normal mode:

• LS is for Movement/Looking Around and holding LS Button is to Sprint
• RS is for Mouse Control and Pressing RS button is to Left Click
• On the D-Pad Left is Left Click,
• Right is Right Click
• Up is Scroll Up
• Down is Scroll Down
• A is to Jump
• Y is to Use
• X is to bring up the Journal
• B is for Inventory and Equipment
• LB is for Combos, Spells and Special Abilities
• RB is for Skills and Attributes
• Back is for the Map
• Start is to bring up the Menu
• RT is to Hide
• and holding LT is to switch to Combat mode and Sheath/Unsheath Weapon.

And in Combat Mode Controls are the same except for:

• D-Pad Left is Focus Shields Left
• Right is Focus Shields Right
• Up is Focus Shields Centre
• Down is Focus Shields All
• X is Action Button 4
• A is Action Button 5
• Y is Action Button 6
• B is Action Button 7
• LB is Action Button 8
• RB is Action Button 9
• Back is Action Button 10

In Combat Mode on the LS:

• Push LS in the direction of attack (e.g. Pushing it Left and Up will do the Top Left Attack or pushing it Right will do Lower Right Attack)
• Pushing LS Down will use Active Blocking.

I hope thats not too confusing.

Xpadder Website for more info or how to use the software!

It takes me back to my PS1 days when i played some Ailen style shooter with even worse graphics than this. Shows how far gaming has come though!

//Craig

Play it now!

The Boffins from the University of Leicester explain their very complicated mathematic problem as so:

The maximum size for a text message is 160 characters, which takes 140 bytes because there are only 7 bits per character in the text messaging system, and we assume the average price for a text message is 5p. There are 1,048,576 bytes in a megabyte, so that’s 1 million/140 = 7490 text messages to transmit one megabyte. At 5p each, that’s £374.49 per MB.

Mind boggling mathematics for mere mortals such as you and me!

Nasa say that to send one megabyte of data from the Hubble Telescope to Terra Firma costs only £8.85.

It seems to me that they havent done much research either seeing as every network i know charges 10p+ for their texts. Making the cost of sending texts roughly £748.98. Which means sending text messages is a staggering 82 times more expensive than querying the Hubble Telescope

//Craig

Sauce from the University of Leicester!

According to the BBC, an operative planted the pot in the side pocket of a randomly-selected suitcase belonging to an innocent incoming passenger. The airport’s sniffer dogs were then expected to hunt down the sneakily-placed gear, but they failed miserably and the officer “could not remember which bag he had put it in”.

The chap in question apparently broke regs by using a real piece of luggage for the test as opposed to the standard dummy bag. He admitted: “I knew that using passengers’ bags is prohibited, but I did it because I wanted to improve the sniffer dog’s ability. The dogs have always been able to find it before… I became overconfident that it would work.”

The airport’s customs chief, Manpei Tanaka, offered: “This case was extremely regrettable. I would like to deeply apologise.”

The powers that be have, naturally, asked the recipient of the narcotics to contact customs officials.

I am actually booking a Flight to Tokyo as we speak!

//Craig

Sauce!

Strikes me as a little strange as Vista was not released very long ago. Which is probably why M$ is keeping it quiet to stop people skipping Vista and going straight from XP to Windows 7. And there was me thinking that Vista was a good investment and it was only going to get better. Duh!

Apparantly there are screenshots leaked onto the Internet but i dont have any.

I Will update with said screenies as and when i find them!

//Craig