Yummy Wakame

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With a distinctly South African flavour

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BBC News | Technology

Hype about Web 2.0 is making web firms neglect the basics of good design.

Describing Web 2.0 as the “latest fashion”, Mr Nielsen said many sites paying attention to it were neglecting some of the principles of good design and usability established over the last decade. More…

You’ve felt the buzz, so you might be wondering, what is Web 2.0?

Some designers have taken it upon themselves to redesign famous logos in Web 2.0 format!

And here’s a Web 2.0 how-to design style guide of sorts…

Healthy Choices Healthy Lives Newsletter

The Dirty Dozen

Why should I reduce the dust and dirt in my house?
Pollutants can be tracked into our homes on our shoes and clothing. Invisible residues of pesticides, carcinogens, solvents, paints, mold, bacteria, lead and other toxins that are brought inside can get on our hands and food and be eaten or inhaled. Over a long period of time, these agents accumulate and can increase the chance that illness will develop.

What can I do to get rid of house dust and dirt? more…

TIME Photo Essay:

Across a country, hitchhiking along interstate on-ramps and riding freight trains, there’s a large extended continually migrating family…

Corey stands at the opening of a boxcar while he waits for the train to resume moving, Portland, Oregon.

The cheapest destinations

Luang Prabang, Laos

As amazing as it is seeing the famous sights around, say, Western Europe, there’s nothing quite like dumping your pack in a beachside bungalow, dining out on incredible local food, drinking a few beers and crashing out knowing you’ve spent the equivalent of a Sydney commuter’s daily toll fare on the whole experience. more…

Mother Earth News

Crushes on a coworkers might be biological…

Psychology Today:

Since the mid-1980s, Cindy Hazan, an associate professor of human development at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, has been looking into why we pair up the way we do. It turns out we long to be close to those close by.

Just as an infant forms a special attachment to his mother or caregiver, adult mates become attached to each other through a similar mechanism, Hazan and her colleagues believe. Attachment helps to secure an infant’s survival; the bond between adults, while not quite so vital, provides the security and reliability they need to thrive.

Whether it’s Mom or your wife-to-be, the presence of your beloved triggers the release of oxytocin, a hormone that induces a state of contentment and stimulates a desire for continued close physical contact. “Proximity is really the core of attachment. Familiar people have a calming, soothing effect on us,” says Hazan. Zookeeper’s logic applies here: Put two members of any species in the same cage, and they are bound to mate.

This scenario is often played out in the cage that is the workplace, where like-minded humans of both sexes are locked up for eight- to 10-hour days. “When you ask someone why he got together with someone else,” Hazan says, “he will never say, ‘Well, she was just hanging around,’ but propinquity is a big factor. When you have repeated contact with someone, your attraction to them increases. If we have evolved to reproduce, then we shouldn’t have to wander around the earth searching for an ideal partner.”… more

GREEN LIGHT: Botanical Lamp, Terrarium, Air Filter All-In-One by the Experimental Design Lab (xDesign)

The fabulously innovative Green Light by Natalie Jeremijenko, Amelia Amon, Will Kavesh of the Experimental Design Lab is a chandelier, terrarium, and air filter all in one. The system brings clean air, light, AND greenery to your home- three things no one should live without.

The Green Light design kicks off first of our many sneak peaks from this year’s quickly-approaching HauteGreen 2007 exhibition. This smart carbon-neutral system improves the internal air quality of a given room using an integrated solar panel to power a super-efficient LED bulb to stimulate plants of high air filtrating varieties. The entire system is designed with products and parts that are both recycled AND recyclable. Plus, the bulb from the unit provides a lovely glow to any room, giving a new meaning to the words ‘Green Light.’

GIZMODO:

There’s a cheap computer on the way that undercuts them all, the $99 Zonbu, due this summer in a silent-running form factor that’s about the size of a paperback book. It has 4GB of flash memory on board, and automatically backs up a copy of your data online. Besides that $99 purchase price, you’ll also pay $12.95 a month (for 25GB,scales up to 100GB for more money) to store its data on the Zonbu servers, giving you the ability to compute anywhere with this tiny device, or access your data from other PCs. If you don’t commit to a service plan, the little PC costs $250… read more…

This is so nifty I’d love to have one! And what a perfect way to dip my toes into a Linux-based system…

Liveplasma is a nifty little web app that might broaden your music taste by suggesting bands who are influenced by the bands you like. It works with movies too!

Thanks Pieter :@)

CNN.com:

Hong Kong scientists have invented a device to help diabetics measure their blood sugar painlessly for the first time - without pricking their fingers.

The size of a mobile phone, the instrument emits a weaker form of infrared, or near-infrared, which penetrates the skin on the finger and homes in on the bloodstream.

Out of the many components in the blood, the beam is able to identify bits of glucose through the frequency, or wavelengths, they transmit and the amount of blood sugar present would be displayed on the instrument in 10 seconds.

BeJane.com is the first women’s home improvement resource and community for DIY projects, home repair, painting, plumbing, electrical, how-to’s etc

Recommended by Beverley

Always ready for action and never gets pregnant.

Is your TomTom voice driving you round the bend? Well, liven it up with Eddie Izzard’s new TomTom directions!

A court upheld decision by the Copyright Royalty Board in the US to hugely increase royalties for streaming music online could kill off all but the largest internet radio broadcasts on May 15th. more…

Listening post:

The Wu-Tang Clan have 215 MP3s on their website that you can download for free, including album hits, alternate versions, demos, mixtape entries, online-only exclusives, and more from 2003 to 2005.