Monday, 1 June 2009
Big Brother 2009 Starts Thurs 4th June
Just as the nice weather is starting, Channel 4 provides us with a reason to stay glued to our TVs. Yes, that's right, Big Brother returns for its tenth series at 9pm on Channel 4 on Thursday 4th June. As ever it will be interesting to see the new Big Brother House design and be introduced to the new housemates, and Channel 4 will be doing its best to mix things up to keep the programme fresh and interesting. If you want to know what previous year's Big Brother housemates are up to, then the Channel 4 website has a Where Are They Now page.
Saturday, 30 May 2009
Dance Troupe Diversity are Britain's Got Talent Winners
The bookies gave them odds of 20 to 1, but a commanding performance of their "Transformer" dance routine bought dance troupe Diversity enough public votes to win Britain's Got Talent. The British public obviously appreciated the energy, creativity and skill of the 10-strong dance group, and Simon Cowell felt their performance had delivered perfection. What is beyond doubt is that Ashley Banjo, the group's choreographer, has a rare gift for delivering unique and exciting dance routines, and that all members of the dance group have the high levels of dance ability necessary to execute them.
Susan Boyle came a commendable second, and many are saying perhaps that was a good placing for her, as the talented singer won't be under so much pressure, as she was under intense media scrutiny in the run up to the final.
In third place was saxophonist Julian Smith, who captured the public imagination with his mesmeric musical performance.
Honourable mention for us must go to the Brett Domino Trio (see also their MySpace page), who showed originality and considerable skill in the use of retro Yamaha keytars and keyboards. Although they didn't make it to the final, we noticed they'd already got a gig as the house band for ITV 2's Britain's Got More Talent, so they'll probably be able to quit their day jobs soon.
Susan Boyle came a commendable second, and many are saying perhaps that was a good placing for her, as the talented singer won't be under so much pressure, as she was under intense media scrutiny in the run up to the final.
In third place was saxophonist Julian Smith, who captured the public imagination with his mesmeric musical performance.
Honourable mention for us must go to the Brett Domino Trio (see also their MySpace page), who showed originality and considerable skill in the use of retro Yamaha keytars and keyboards. Although they didn't make it to the final, we noticed they'd already got a gig as the house band for ITV 2's Britain's Got More Talent, so they'll probably be able to quit their day jobs soon.
Sunday, 24 May 2009
Cheap Mobile Calls when Abroad with Vodafone this Summer
Vodafone Passport is a free to opt-in call scheme which allows you to take your Vodafone UK price plan with you when you go on holiday to over 30 European Countries, as well as Australia and New Zealand. Once signed up to Vodafone Passport, there's normally just a 75p connection charge to make or receive a call, and then charges are as per your UK Vodafone call plan, so if you have inclusive minutes the cost of the call is taken from these. Great news for your Summer holidays is that between 1st June and 31st August 2009 Vodafone is abolishing the 75p connection charge you normally pay under Vodafone Passport, so you just pay your normal UK rate, and this includes texts and picture messages too. When the promotion ends, you will remain on Vodafone Passport, and whilst the connection charge will be reinstated, the call plan still offers relatively cheap mobile calls from abroad.
For mobile offers and more information visit Vodafone. The full list of countries covered by Vodafone Passport is:
Albania
Australia
Austria
Belgium
Bulgaria
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
France
Finland
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Ireland
Italy
Japan
Latvia
Lithuania
Luxemburg
Malta
Netherlands
New Zealand
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
Visit Vodafone for new mobiles and more info on their European calling plans.
Friday, 8 May 2009
£110m Euromillions Jackpot
The Euromillions Jackpot for Friday 8 May 2009 is an estimated £110 million pounds. Remember that you can play Euromillions online although it is best to book your ticket well in advance as the website can experience very high traffic levels.
Wednesday, 29 April 2009
Another Flash Dance from T-Mobile
Those of you who are into flash mobbing and the like might be interested to know that T-Mobile is organising it's second "flash dance", which will take place in Trafalgar Square between 6 and 7pm on 30th April 2009 (see YouTube video below). The first dance took place at Liverpool Street Station and proved a highly effective advertisement for the mobile phone company.
Thursday, 23 April 2009
Free Beach Bag Offer from BeCheeky Swimwear
For the next 7 days you can get a fabulous free beach bag when you spend £50 or more on swimwear at BeCheeky. On the BeCheeky site you can find all the top bikini brands including Aguaclara, Jolidon, Gottex, Despi, Chloe, Moontide, Sunflair, Sielei and Sunseeker.
Thursday, 9 April 2009
Advice on Choosing a Mobile Broadband Service
If you want to use the internet on your laptop when you’re away from home, then mobile broadband is for you, but how do you choose a mobile broadband provider, and is the service any good? The key factors you’ll want to know about is how fast the broadband connection is likely to be, and how reliable it’s likely to be. With mobile broadband being a radio service, it’s more difficult to get an idea of how well the service might work for you simply because it is dependent on your exact location.
The first step in your research should be to check the mobile broadband coverage maps that each of the major providers have made available online. These will tell you whether you are in a 3G area for a given network. It’s critical to be in a 3G area as only then do you have the possibility of a fast mobile broadband connection (although you can’t be absolutely certain of this just from the map data). If you aren’t in a 3G area, then mobile broadband reverts to the GPRS standard, which results in a connection slower than old 56k dial-up, which is a nightmare if you’ve got used to a fast broadband connection. If the map does show you to be in a 3G area, you still can’t be guaranteed a good service. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the maps aren’t always accurate and they may not be detailed enough to take account of highly localised signal differences. Another issue is that even if you do have good signal strength, there may be so many people trying to use mobile broadband in the vicinity, that the connection speed gets badly slowed down, and the only solution to this will be when the network decides to boost its capacity in the area. To improve your chances of choosing the best mobile broadband in your area, we suggest the following:
1) If you know someone who already has mobile broadband, ask to borrow their USB modem and trial it in your area. The modem only takes a minute or two to install, and this will therefore quickly give you an idea of exactly how well mobile broadband will work in your location.
2) If you don’t know anybody with mobile broadband, then think about making use of a trial period from one of the networks, as most of them allow you to test the service and return it if you are not happy. However, just make sure that you follow their T&C’s carefully and return the modem in good time, as the networks can be strict in accepting returns.
3) Another check you can do is to take a look at your mobile phone. If you have a fairly recent handset it should have a 3G indicator which will show whether you are within your network provider’s 3G area. This is only of use of course if you are thinking about going with the same network for your USB mobile broadband dongle.
4) Read some user reviews of mobile broadband online. Our partner site, BestMobileBroadband.co.uk, has plenty of these, both good and bad, and they will give you a good insight into the various providers. Our impression is that Vodafone and T-Mobile are leading the way in overall service quality.
5) Look to see what awards have been won by a mobile broadband provider. Vodafone was the winner of Best Wireless ISP at the Internet Service Providers Awards, which was voted on by industry peers, and T-Mobile came first in the January 2009 YouGov DongleTrack mobile brodband survey. Winning any significant awards can give you extra confidence in the overall quality of service that a network is providing.
Our own choice of mobile broadband service was Vodafone, and we’ve been pleased with the performance and reliability of the service so far. It’s certainly fast enough to get on with standard web browsing and checking e-mails, and often fast enough to stream radio and video. 3G coverage is still mainly restricted to cities and large towns, but this is set to improve rapidly. Telecoms experts believe that mobile broadband could become the primary way people connect to the internet as early as 2010, so it is likely that all the major mobile networks will be looking to achieve full UK coverage as soon as possible. There are already hundreds of thousands of people using mobile broadband, and if you want to join them, then following our tips above should ensure that you find the best mobile broadband service for your requirements, and your first experience of mobile internet will hopefully be a good one.
The first step in your research should be to check the mobile broadband coverage maps that each of the major providers have made available online. These will tell you whether you are in a 3G area for a given network. It’s critical to be in a 3G area as only then do you have the possibility of a fast mobile broadband connection (although you can’t be absolutely certain of this just from the map data). If you aren’t in a 3G area, then mobile broadband reverts to the GPRS standard, which results in a connection slower than old 56k dial-up, which is a nightmare if you’ve got used to a fast broadband connection. If the map does show you to be in a 3G area, you still can’t be guaranteed a good service. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the maps aren’t always accurate and they may not be detailed enough to take account of highly localised signal differences. Another issue is that even if you do have good signal strength, there may be so many people trying to use mobile broadband in the vicinity, that the connection speed gets badly slowed down, and the only solution to this will be when the network decides to boost its capacity in the area. To improve your chances of choosing the best mobile broadband in your area, we suggest the following:
1) If you know someone who already has mobile broadband, ask to borrow their USB modem and trial it in your area. The modem only takes a minute or two to install, and this will therefore quickly give you an idea of exactly how well mobile broadband will work in your location.
2) If you don’t know anybody with mobile broadband, then think about making use of a trial period from one of the networks, as most of them allow you to test the service and return it if you are not happy. However, just make sure that you follow their T&C’s carefully and return the modem in good time, as the networks can be strict in accepting returns.
3) Another check you can do is to take a look at your mobile phone. If you have a fairly recent handset it should have a 3G indicator which will show whether you are within your network provider’s 3G area. This is only of use of course if you are thinking about going with the same network for your USB mobile broadband dongle.
4) Read some user reviews of mobile broadband online. Our partner site, BestMobileBroadband.co.uk, has plenty of these, both good and bad, and they will give you a good insight into the various providers. Our impression is that Vodafone and T-Mobile are leading the way in overall service quality.
5) Look to see what awards have been won by a mobile broadband provider. Vodafone was the winner of Best Wireless ISP at the Internet Service Providers Awards, which was voted on by industry peers, and T-Mobile came first in the January 2009 YouGov DongleTrack mobile brodband survey. Winning any significant awards can give you extra confidence in the overall quality of service that a network is providing.
Our own choice of mobile broadband service was Vodafone, and we’ve been pleased with the performance and reliability of the service so far. It’s certainly fast enough to get on with standard web browsing and checking e-mails, and often fast enough to stream radio and video. 3G coverage is still mainly restricted to cities and large towns, but this is set to improve rapidly. Telecoms experts believe that mobile broadband could become the primary way people connect to the internet as early as 2010, so it is likely that all the major mobile networks will be looking to achieve full UK coverage as soon as possible. There are already hundreds of thousands of people using mobile broadband, and if you want to join them, then following our tips above should ensure that you find the best mobile broadband service for your requirements, and your first experience of mobile internet will hopefully be a good one.
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