Enjoyable activities like eating good food and having sex don’t just provide pleasure. They lower stress by blocking anxiety responses in the brain, researchers say.

A team at the University of Cincinnati found that pleasurable experiences also seem to have longer-term benefits because the relaxing effects lasted at least seven days.

“These findings give us a clearer understanding of the motivation for consuming ‘comfort food’ during times of stress,” lead researcher Yvonne Ulrich-Lai said in a statement. “But it’s important to note that even small amounts of pleasurable foods can reduce the effects of stress.”

Ulrich-Lai and colleagues including James Herman, director of the school’s Laboratory of Stress Neurobiology, gave rats access to a sugar solution twice a day for two weeks. They then measured the rodents’ behavioral and physiological responses to stress.

The rats who were given sugar water had lower heart rates and stress hormone levels and were more adventurous and social with other rats than the ones in the control group with no access to the sugar solution.

More experiment details can be found at the link below.

Eating, Having Sex Reduce Anxiety in Similar Ways – AOL Health.

So what do I think of Facebook’s new “Social” inbox?  I’m going to avoid any privacy arguments here and focus specifically on the potential of the service they describe.

I’m going to go along with the sections they have in their release video which is included below.

1.) “All you should need to send someone a message is the person and the message and thats it!”  Well yes, I suppose that is a really nice concept and the dilemma does ring true.  Some people only email, some people only text, some only Facebook and some Bebo…really?  Bebo?  Indeed it would be great to have all of these things in one place.  I suppose you could think of it like a multi-protocol chat client which supports all text mediums of communication.  This does already exist in the form of Google Voice, which is the same except it includes voice as well.  So in theory transcribed conversations which are spoken.  If you don’t know about Google Voice there is a reason for this, it’s only available in the US at the moment.  I’ve been wanting it since it was announced over here in the UK.  I wonder if Google will regret not pushing it out more quickly?  Anyway the concept is good as far as everything you receive and everything you send can be in one place (Privacy issues aside).

2.) You get an @facebook.com email address and continues streams of conversations.  This is nice for general chatter and I can see it being popular and Facebook are adamant about the fact that it is not creating an email service.  It really isn’t an email service,  is as they put it “more like a conversation” with no email subjects, no CC fields and no BCC fields.  The main reason for having an @facebook.com address is to allow people without facebook accounts to contact you still by email.  It’s a good solution to the “I have a friend or parent or employer/employee who refuses to use Facebook.” problem.

3.) “The Social Inbox”.  This is the same as email filters.  Nothing different, your friend list is just your filter list.  Actually there is something different.  I bet it’ll be less flexible than email filters.  Both Hotmail and GMail offer this service in automatic forms, such as Priority Inbox and customisable forms, standard email filtering and categorizing.  It isn’t a new concept or idea, no matter how nicely Facebook wrap it up in their pretty wrapping paper (video).  One upside is it may be easier to use, which is no bad thing in this day and age.  Personally I like to be able to customise my filters for me personally rather than play with limited options but each to their own, simplicity may win the battle (not the way I might add).

4.)  ”It is not Email”.  I’ve covered this, no it’s not email, neither does it bring anything new, contrary to what Facebook seem to be trying to push as a new feature.  This functionality already exists in email as automatic filters for email spam and custom filters for people you want to block or just segregate from others.  I feel like Facebook were desperate to get 5 features out… “nice number syndrome”… which gives us…

5.) What they call “Social Context”.   No subjects?  Grouping content by person?  All contact with someone in one long stream?  This is where my main qualm about the service lies.  The quality and reason for conversation is undermined…

There is a limit to how much information that can be absorbed at once and also a meaning in separating large amounts of information.

It helps with memory, concentration and organisation to name a few.  Compartmentalising large amounts of information is something we all do naturally. It is present everywhere, possibly the best example being that every degree is made up of modules, and every module is made up of topics and every topic is made up of sections.  This doesn’t happen by chance, it’s because it’s efficient, it’s how we as a human race remember things and organise our lives.  Just think how you group everything together all the time for a couple of seconds.

“Meaningful” conversation,  conversation which is being had to an end, for a reason, with an aim , is fundamentally telling another person facts and statements and getting the same in return.

Making these facts a long list without any segregation will result in less fact absorption, less interest, and far less conversational efficiency.

You just try to remember most of that conversation you had with your Aunt last week, you might get some of it but not much.  Now do you remember that email you got from XYZ last week, with the subject UVW?  It’s far more likely that you will remember the content of that email than the content of a conversation.  Also how often do you get asked to bullet point things to get information across succinctly and efficiently?  People forget things, compartmentalising things helps that happen at a lesser rate.  So is putting all your text based communications in one long stream really a good idea? Is this a case of lets do it “because we can” rather than “because we need to” or “because its better”?  Don’t get me wrong, I love the “because we can” methodology in creating things, to name one, Google Wave, but I don’t think this will be good when it comes to remembering anything which gets said and therefore, kind of undermines the main meaning in having conversation.

Conclusion

(to a very texty article – apologies – Facebook hasn’t released the service yet so I can’t get you any screenshots).

I think the service will work well, have large activity, with lots of conversation with the added convenience of text based communication amalgamation.  I do also feel however that the conversation within this new service will be mostly nonsense conversation with no meaning or end, just general chat.  Not a bad thing, but not necessarily a good thing either, what do you think?

See the Facebook announcement http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=452288242130>here

Unless you are an avid/regular blog reader it is unlikely that you have heard of BlindType…yet. So does it concern you? In all likelihood, yes, yes it does concern you but by no means in a bad way. How many people do I know who only buy Blackberry phones over iPhones or other touch screen devices because they have a “proper keyboard” or to be more precise a hardware keyboard. BlindType has taken an interesting and probably more successful approach to this problem. However before jumping straight in and showing it to you is probably best to explain a bit more about tactile feedback first.

Indeed even I as a touch screen user find it difficult to type on a touchscreen without having to focus on the on screen keyboard all the time. The main reason for this is that a touchscreen keyboard gives no tactile feedback (actually it does give a really tiny bit because of the edges of the screen and shape of the back of the phone but I digress – either way it is insignificant compared to a hardware keyboard). Tactile feedback enables your brain to work out where your hand/thumbs is/are on a keyboard automatically without you having to focus specifically on the keys you are pressing. Basically it will automatically count the keys as you slide your thumb over them or associate the points of pressure on your thumbs to work out a reference point, the process by which your brain remembers will differ according to device being used and indeed the particular persons way of remembering things. The only thing which most phone have now is a small vibration so you know when you have pressed a key, not really that helpful when typing without looking constantly.

In simple terms, your brain has an image of what your keyboard looks like “shape wise” in your head and probably a pretty good idea as to where all those keys are in space. What tactile feedback does is it gives a reference point on that visualized keyboard in your mind so you know where your fingers/thumbs are and how far to move them to touch a key. Learning how to touch type is basically taking this knowledge and training you to keep your hands regimented in their positioning on the keyboard. Your brain does the rest for you… in a sense (wheeeey! Sorry I couldn’t help it).

Ok so how can one fix this? Well the obvious answer would be to introduce tactile feedback. That however, isn’t easy to do on a touch screen, it’s not going to function like a touch screen if it isn’t flat is it? I suppose ideally you’d want a morphing screen which could change shape according to what it was doing and “simulate” real tactile feedback. This isn’t going to happen, not anytime soon anyway. Some of you may have heard of Swype which is one such technology which tried to deal with this issue. What Swype does to help is that by allowing you to just drag over the keyboard it allows you to use many fewer reference points from feedback. There is still no tactile feedback but you don’t need to look as much because you aren’t lifting and placing so often. Once you have a position on the keyboard you can make your drags to respective keys in order reasonably accurately with only a few glances. Swype is fantastic (was noticed and bought by Samsung for xyz million dollars I think it was 8 but I’m not sure (citation please)) and allows for some seriously speedy typing however it still doesn’t really get rid of the problem with touchscreen not having tactile feedback.

Ok I think it’s time to introduce BlindType and why it’s so exciting to me as a user, as well as a neuroscientist. So at the moment we have this idea that our brain has an image of the keyboard we are going to type on in our heads, we look/feel for a point on a keyboard to tell our brain where we are n its “map”, and then type using both pieces of information right? Ok so who says that we/our brain needs to work out where the keyboard is? This is what I imagine what spawned the thought behind BlindType. If both our brain and the computer have knowledge of what a keyboard layout is – which we do why can’t the computer work out the size, shape and position of the keyboard we are planning on using? Well the answer is that it can which is pretty awesome if you think about it. That means you can type anywhere on your phone screen in any particular orientation and as long as you keep the same shaped keyboard (ish) in your head – the computer can work out the shape of the keyboard for you and in turn what you typed. What’s even better is this doesn’t require you to even look at your phone which means texting and walking on touchscreen keyboards could finally be possible! The video below shows this in action the best – later on it shows the “keyboard shapes” which it is detecting just to show the technology working.

So how did I find out about this? Well the exciting thing is Google bought them on the 1st of October 2010 so hopefully it will find its way to Android or indeed all touch screen phones/tablets/all in one PC’s with touch screens, as soon as possible!

The project was put together originally by Kostas Eleftheriou – a computer science graduate from Warwick university and Panos Petropoulos who has a degree in marketing from Deree College.  I think both of them deserve quite the pat on the back – although Google has already kind of done that!  Either way I’m looking forward to easier typing on touch screen devices, what do you think?

Find out more information about BlindType by going to their site here, or read their FAQ here.

Are you the kind of person who goes to YouTube when they want to listen to a song?  Be it for listening to something new, on a friends advice, or perhaps just to listen to a few songs you already like but don’t have your music with you.  Well if that is the case then you should probably check out JukeFly.

I’m going to start with explaining what JukeFly aims to achieve and the fundamentals behind the service and then follow up with some screenshots of its interface with annotations as to what does what and where.

Jukebox aims to do one thing really well, make the music you want to listen to, available wherever you are.  Ok sure there are plenty of other services which share this aim such as Spotify, my personal favorite Grooveshark, and indeed Windows Media Player now supports streaming to anywhere you can log into you Windows Live Account.  However, one shouldn’t dismiss JukeFly off the bat as there are a couple of quirks which might make JukeFly a better choice for some users and here they are:

What JukeFly at the core does is pulls information directly from sites like YouTube which is specific to the single task of listening to music and/or watching music videos.  Sites which it lists as sources include: Billboard, Amazon, and Last.fm although I imagine they are adding more sources all the time in order to keep their content as rich as possible.  On top of this there is something called the “JukeFly Personal Music Service (JPMS)” which allows one to stream music have on your computer to anywhere with an internet connection.  The whole service does have a “social platform” underneath it allowing for friends to browse and listen to each other’s playlists and such but I’m not going to cover that in this article as it isn’t any different from other “social platforms” put on other music streaming websites.

Anyway this is where I think JukeFly shines:

1.)  Offers music which both you own on your computer AND all the music content available from a wide range of media sites all over the internet within ONE interface.  This is obviously advantageous as long as the interface works well – which it does.

2.)  Streaming music from your PC at home obviously requires your computer to be connected to the internet at home which isn’t always possible, and isn’t very efficient unless you have a way of starting your computer from over the internet, which honestly, isn’t easy to set up.  JukeFly fixes this dilemma but outsourcing.  When you run the JPMS on your computer it uploads your music collections information onto the JukeFly servers, things like the artist, album, release date, all the metadata.  This allows JukeFly to organise and list your music collection on it’s site for you even if your computer at home is unavailable.  If you then try to listen to it, it will find the song on one of it’s other services (and will in all likelihood find it) allowing you to listen to your personal music collection anyway.  In short its like having your music library spread all over the internet, but still organised in a media player interface.

(Grooveshark offers something similar in that you can upload your music collection onto their servers, however that requires uploading the whole music file for each track (wholly data intensive and time consuming) which certainly isn’t for everyone.)

3.) Oh yeah, it’s completely free, no VIP accounts, no adverts between tracks, just pure music related content, unaltered, and delivered in a single interface from the web.  You don’t even need an account if you don’t want to make playlists and things, works right away not questions asked.

Right so you understand the advantages that JukeFly has and think it could be for you, then take a look at the screenshots below to see some more about the service including some of its neat features:

(click the images to show a larger version)

This is what you are hit with when you open JukeFly for the first time – a splash screen of sorts with a search bar to quickly get started and a load of popular content.  Clicking on browse will bring up an interface much like a lot of media players.

Looking at this interface you should feel reasonably comfortable with the left hand side showing currently “active” content and the right hand side being a more pictorial view of what you happen to be browsing at any particular time.  On first opening up the application shows the top “Billboard Songs” which is basically just popular content which you can just click on and it will start to play on the left immediately.

At the top of the two sides of the screen there are drop down menus which allow you to tailor the content being shown.  There is no shortage of content here.  After all it is sourcing from a massive collection of media all over the net.  Obviously you can search all of it with the search box in the top right!

As I briefly mentioned at the top there are two themes to JukeFly, those being light and dark.  This is the dark theme.  I personally prefer it as it feels less hard on the eyes and the blue links don’t stick out so much.  All it all I think the dark theme makes the interface feel a little more streamlined.

This image shows a bit more detail as to what you can do in the player menus.  You can see the currently playing video, in this case the content is being pulled from YouTube and the popular song of choice is “The Requiem by Linkin Park”.  On the right of this image you can see the play queue which currently consists of the “A Thousand Suns Album”.  There are also three tabs below the video which display lyrics, artist information, and associated videos.  There is an option just under the video to choose the quality you would like to stream at and the green arrow takes the video full screen.  It’s not bad if you are watching a music video considering YouTube has so much HD video now (as long as your connection can handle it).

Further options you can see are in the play queue list.  When you mouse over a particular song a small icon shows allowing you to share that particular content to Facebook, Twitter, or just by email.  The save link at the top allows you to save your current play queue as a playlist (if you have an account – once again this is free).  Adding songs to playlists is also supported by drag and drop, possibly more intuitive for some.

Fundamentally I think that JukeFly deserves some attention and is certainly something I’ll use form time to time.  It’s also worth noting that this service is still in BETA and therefore more features could easily be on the way, as well as increased stability and performance – nice to know!This is something I will seriously consider when my Grooveshark VIP runs out later this year.  Do go over and have a look at JukeFly and post your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.

Don’t forget to use the share buttons below to let your friends know and remember you can always subscribe to J.O.S.H by RSS or Facebook to keep up with posts.

With 100% Design occurring from tomorrow until the end of the week at Earls Court 2 I felt that I should post something design related. Yanko Design is a fantastic source of information when it comes to design. I regularly draw inspiration from their concept postings, general news and indeed from several purchases made from their site and I feel it is a site worth sharing. Still describing their content is not going to do them or their designs justice so here I will list a few of my favorite pieces which I have come across over the years (probably with more weighting on their more recent posts).

eTape

Designed by:  Song Han Xin

So how many of you remember listening to cassette tapes?  Most of us probably have a few memories of them, maybe even crack them out on occasion for a bit of nostalgia (I doubt it). Fundamentally these things were a pain, remember that rewinding thing to find the song you want? Man what a pain!!!  However I certainly have fond memories of a particular Peugeot 205 which I used to enjoy listening to cassettes in on the way to school (yes that long ago). As to the music being listened to, the Beach Boys are probably the only ones I’m not too ashamed to mention.

Anyway this design other than being a truly beautiful piece of kit is also extremely well thought out.  A particular feature I think is brilliant is the slightly convex front edge which means that when you put it face down on a surface the screen is elevated to avoid damage.  I’m sure I waste a huge amount of time with my current appliances trying to avoid scratching the screen!  The case is even a cassette box, it’s brilliant!

Take a look at the full article here.

Thru Religion

Designed by: Drzach and Suchy

Now ignoring the name which I dislike for grammar, topic and indeed I don’t think it does this awesome concept any credit at all, this is a fantastic piece.  In the image to the left all you can see is what looks like a total mess (or perhaps a particularly complex air-fix model waiting to be made into something which will hopefully resemble the thing on the box cover).

However this artwork is oh so much more than that with it’s true form only shown through the use of directional light.  What the apparently messy but somehow minimalistic feeling cuboid does is depict images with its shadow when light is shone through it from certain directions.  This particular design here allows one to show several religious symbols.  I personally would prefer it if it showed several simple facial emotions but nonetheless the concept is brilliant.  To see it in action watch from about half way through the video below:

Check out the full article here.

Open Smoking Booth

Designed by: D. K. Wei

If I had to think of a design which caused me to become a regular reader of Yanko Design it would have to be this one.  It is just brilliant both in concept and design.

The concept is that people who smoke are now forced to group with other smokers or outside so that they don’t infringe on other people’s preference not to smoke and cause health hazards to their healthier friends.  I’m not going to bash smoking, I don’t smoke, I don’t like people smoking near me and see it as antisocial, but I also don’t have a problem with people smoking if they want to, it is their choice after all.  So how can one make smoking sociable and safe?  This is one such solution pressurized air currents making pockets of air at different pressures.  The result… a room which contains smoke, filters it, AND has no walls allowing for completely seamless integration with a room.  Basically by creating a pocket of lower air pressure within the bubble it causes all the smoke to stay within the “bubble”.

The designer definitely had airports in mind when he designed this and obviously had his issues with having to go to the smoking lounges.  Take a look at more of the pictures and the full article with more details as to how it works here.

CubeBrowser

Designed by: Ludwig Zeller

How often do you suppose you look at pictures on the internet?  I for one am a serious fan of sites like 4walled and previously covered wallbase.net.  Just browsing through hundreds and thousands of images for a wallpaper or source images, but also just for the sake of looking!  Ok so this is an enjoyable experience when you are at your computer and in some ways is a small way to escape just for a couple of minutes.  This design and concept takes this pastime and makes it a decoration/toy/little gizmo thing.

The design is basically an internet connected cube which shows images from certain websites on all its sides.  These images can be changed according to category or just to find more images in the same category by rotating the cube in different directions.  Put this together with a site like Flickr.com and you’re on to a little gadget that wont get old….ever!

View more images and the full article here.

Control Safety Traffic Lights

Designed by:  Roberto Vackflores for CRAB Diseño Industria

A traffic light, how can that be a cool design or concept you might say?  Well yeah sure we might all think that but perhaps thats just because traffic lights have NEVER changed!  A bit of red, a bit of yellow and a bit of green.  Traffic lights are environmentally unfriendly, and lacking extensibility and features which could improve life for the pedestrian and the driver.

Features this concept touches on include:

• Automatic detection of emergency vehicles to regulate traffic flow to allow ambulances and the like to pass through more quickly to their destinations.
• Lighting at ground level for pedestrians indicating the state of the traffic lights more clearly.
• Security cameras (imagine how helpful these could be with insurance claims and accidents).
• Speedometer.
• Solar panel to power the unit, yay go green! (I’m a little skeptical as to whether it could really power all of its functions).

I think these are great ideas but I would like to see a few more functions such as the filling up or emptying of the light as its duration expires or perhaps automatically detecting pedestrians by bluetooth, wifi, or perhaps infrared (using the camera) at the roadside and allowing them to cross accordingly.  See the official video depicting the design below and be sure to check out the site for product renders here.

These are some of, DEFINITELY not all of, my favorite designs on Yanko Design and I strongly encourage you to go over to their site and have a look at some more beautiful creations.

Got a favorite design of your own?  Put it in the comments below!

I will be working at the 100% Design exhibition in Earls Court 2 representing the Design Guild Mark in the center near the entrance.  Please do come say hello, show me your work, pay me a compliment (or insult) ;P.  Hopefully see you there!!

Sugar Jesus? Perhaps the next big thing according to several outstanding reviews. It is quite amazing that a band with comments such as “Indie Disco Kings” and “The forerunners of Synth Pop’s thriving underground!” from reputable names such as TimeOut and ArtRocker aren’t already causing mass audio induced euphoria during the daily commute. They are my dirty little secret that I and their loyal listeners can turn to in times when we just need to escape for a wonderful 3:30s (approx).

Ahem, in all seriousness and music review jargon aside, Sugar Jesus really could be one of the next big things to take up residence in that place which brings “silent” humming and foot tapping to our lives. Sugar Jesus has a good blend of “mainstream factors” which apply the easy listening required for instantly likeable music, whilst maintaining a feeling that I can only describe as an unique. You really have to listen to it to understand, but if you do in the future, or perhaps you already have, you will definitely understand the emotion that I am doing my utmost best to describe. They are a band which definitely have something at their heart, and that something…is Damn Good!

I have followed Sugar Jesus since seeing them live for the first time a few years back at Dingwalls when their name was “AphelionLive” which then became “Dance Like Me” and finally settled on “Sugar Jesus”. They’ve been through their name changes but what makes them good, certainly hasn’t changed. The thing which got me hooked on Sugar Jesus is their live performance. All their reviews tend to culminate on this one factor, They truly are a spectacle to see live!

“A knockout adrenaline fuelled live set, bursting with energy!” — The Fly

“I have never been to a gig with so many like-minded, friendly people who all just want to go out and have a really good time!”

Recently I spoke to Andrei the main man and asked if we could have a chat about the band, its future, and possibly most importantly, the man himself. He kindly obliged and here are some excerpts from what I can say was an whole day well spent kicking around several coffee houses in Notting Hill.

Interview Participants:

Andrei

Jeremy Hindle

Amelia Darell

Interview:

	“Shall we get started then?”
(Drinks arrive at the table for both of us.)
	“Wow it’s massive – I want to keep it looking pretty”
	“Ha-ha that’s great, ready now?”
	“This is delicious!”
	“Andrei, can we start?”
	“…Right quiz me!”
	“Ok, well let’s start with something standard to get things rolling… When was the first time you even considered making music the way you do now?”
	“Wow, well I started to write music when I was 11, that was just on the piano and I actually arrived to pop music quite late on. I was very much classically trained when I was younger. I used to write stuff back then but it wasn’t anything like what I do now. It is certainly a passion which has grown from when I was very young though.”
	“So how long has Sugar Jesus been together for?”
	“On and off with different members for about 3 years, it’s been going for quite a long time actually, from the end of school through University.”
(Amelia Darell arrives and the interview resumes after brief introductions.)
	“…Nice to meet you Andrei!”
	“You too!”
	“Ok let’s get right into this, so do you do all the writing for Sugar Jesus? Do you write the music and the lyrics?”
	“Yes, I do everything but I do co-writes and collaborations as well. It’s what sort of drives me most with the whole thing, the writing, it’s a bit sad really, you know the geeky boy in his room writing away on his laptop, but yeah I really enjoy writing. We aren’t really the most traditional band, we don’t jam in garages and things like that.”
	“So what inspires your lyrics?”
	“Uuuuuh well… all sorts of things really.”
	“Well how do you make up the lyrics, how do you put them together, what’s the process for you?
	“Um, well like I said all sorts of things. I write a lot about…the weather…um, well a lot of people write about relationships and there are a lot of heavy breakup songs. I haven’t really had a harsh, well you know, a hard breakup like that. If that time comes then I suppose I’ll be able to write stuff about it. If it does happen at least I’ll get a bloody good pop song out of it!”
	“So you feel you need to have experienced the things you are talking about?”
	“Yes, exactly, I’ve been in a stable relationship for quite a while now so I can’t sing about my ‘heart being trodden on’ and all that. Some people tend to write songs when they are down, or when they are angry about life, but the thing is, I’m not so I have to look in other areas. I CAN’T just leave it as being just the weather, that’s a bit sad…Haha…no I like writing sort of weird twisted love songs, argh that’s even worse haha…”
	“Don’t worry you can keep your sources of inspiration a secret haha! You’re pretty specific about your content what with having had to experience it etcetera, so do you not like vague lyrics as well?”
	“Actually, when I listen to a song I often don’t really listen to the lyrics. I mean I know they are there but often it isn’t really until they are pointed out to me that I will notice them at all. The problem with a lot of lyrics is that although they are all well and good, a person’s individual attachment to a song can be completely changed by lyrics. The whole songs meaning to someone can be altered. This being the case I like lyrics which are vague and vacuous so that any person can interpret and develop personal feelings about a song on their own. I feel that a song can mean a lot more to someone if they hear it their way, rather than be told by someone else exactly what it means. So in a sense I like to write lyrics which can mean many different things.”
	“Cool, are their any particular bands which inspire you or you like?”
	“Well yeah, of course, I love the 1980′s, it’s where I’m from after all…Gary Numan, Soft Cell, Human League, and nowadays, well I love most things, I really love The Killers, and Underworld a 90′s dance band are probably my favourites. I mean I listen to everything and I like everything.”
	“What about… dare I say it, metal?”
	“Well actually I had a German exchange once in Berlin and he was very into his death metal. So anyway this guy and I went together to a death metal festival and I remember a band called Cannibal Corpse, who I think are quite famous now. They had a song called ‘Hammer Smashed Face’ which they ended their set on… and yeah, that was a good tune! I also remember that I wasn’t aware of the dress code for these things being there in a white t-shirt. You know, everyone was there in black leathers with long hair and I was a geeky skinny white kid in a white t-shirt so yeah, I remember the propellerhead thing they do with their hair, you could do it actually (inferring Amelia).”
	“Yeah haha I suppose I could! So how do you feel about the band and the stage it is at at the moment?”
	“Well yeah it’s quite scary for me at the moment actually. A lot of my friends are getting jobs and salaries and I really want to just carry on writing songs for a living.”
	“Well you still get paid.”
	“Yeah, that’s true but you’re never really on a salary, you might make a million pounds overnight, or you might make nothing for ten years you know. It’s scary but it’s definitely something I want to do…I’m still young so I’m going to give it a go!”
	“What do you think of the X-Factor or Pop Idol route?”
	“Well, I don’t think our type of music really suits either of those competitions. There’s no doubt that it’s entertaining but I don’t think there is better music in the media because of it.”
	“Were there any difficulties with keeping the band going through university… Did noise levels ever make it hard to find house-mates?”
	“No not at all…actually…at my flat we had a room to rent out and these two lesbians came to look at it. They were so pretty, not like one man, one woman thing which often happens, they were both stunning. It was like ‘If Carlsberg did room-mates, they’d probably be the best in the world!!’ kind of thing! I think I freaked them out a bit though, I remember being all like ‘Oh yes oh yes come in come in…’ and I’m the hairy man… which is EXACTLY what they don’t like you know…’men…disgusting eurgh’ Haha.”
	“Haha, yes you are the exact image of manliness aren’t you Andrei! Haha”
	“Well yes you know I just have to live with it I suppose (Sarcasm)…Is this going to be in the interview?”
	“Yup!”
	“Right haha! Ok, next… what have you got for me Amelia? Haha!”
	“Mmmm something weird…fine ok how long will you carry on doing this if you never fully take off?”
	“Oh come on… Don’t ask that, that’s miserable Haha! Were not talking about if you’d pull the plug on a coma patient here. I don’t think I’ll ever give this line of work up, it’s what I love doing and I want to do it forever.”
	“Ok, how about this, if you become famous what will you enjoy the most about it? The money? The girls? You know…?”
	“Well you know (laughing) that’s all great and that but what really drives me isn’t any of that, what drives me is to write a song that a million people can all connect with. That’s what gets me going! I believe that if I write something good enough and people like it, then it will just sell itself. If I could write something that could have people anywhere in the world, any race, any nationality, dancing and enjoying something I wrote together…That would be what I want the most. Don’t get me wrong women are great and that, I’m not going to put that down, freebies and things…like microwaves, they’re awesome! Really though, in all seriousness, in the end its all about the music.”
	“Ok, alright change of tack, what festivals do you want to play at the most in the future?”
	“Ok well we’ve played a few already, we haven’t played Glastonbury yet, I’d love to play there, it would be amazing.”
	“Would that be the place you want to play the most?”
	“What about Beach Break Live, that’s my favourite festival?”
	“Well yeah I’d love to play at Beach Break Live, I’ve only heard great things about it from both festival goers and band members alike, although I’m not really much of a surfer Haha!
	“Well I seriously reckon you should do that, you’d go down really well there!”
	“Yeah I guess we should go for that. There’s also of course Brixton Acadamy. I really don’t think there is anywhere cooler than that in London. I still remember my first ever gig I went to was Faithless there years ago, I needed my fake I.D to get in and yeah, it’s still one of the best gigs I’ve been to.”
	“So I watched your music video, and loved it I might add, but why did you decide to be in the space suit?”
	“The concept of the video was not actually our idea. It was the guy who directed it Andrew Nicholas from Frarl.com? We went along with it and I think it was alright, yeah I’m really happy with it. I think the idea with ‘Solarize’ was meant to be the euphoria etcetera and there is a love song in there as well and yeah. We came down from Manchester to play a gig for our label for a showcase kind of thing in Shoreditch and we had the afternoon to do it. I had a friend in London who plays the robot, my friend Nick West and he went out with the Director and filmed all those shots on Hampstead Heath. Then we did the pick up shots that evening with Ashleigh’s sexy cousin. Actually it was one of the hardest things that. When you are trying to make a really low budget music video and you are trying to find a sexy lady to be in…it was great to be like ‘Ashleigh you find one.’ It was difficult because you know, you might ring up a friend who you haven’t spoken to for a couple of years and go ‘You’re sexy, mind if I film you?’ It’s all a bit creepy really. You can’t really do that, it’s not acceptable nowadays. So yeah other than that, they filmed the gig and we did at the end and so it was literally one day! Oh yeah! (Andrei finally answers the question!) The astronaut helmet, we filmed that around Kings Cross.”

	“Was it really cool seeing the final video when it was completed?”
	“Yes! It really was! It was about a month later we saw it and it was just weird, so weird. I mean we had been filmed lots before when playing live and such but the music video was very different. Felt really strange watching it back. Amazing, but strange.”
	“If you did music videos in the future would they be ones with loads of backing dancers or the type with just one person in it?”
	“Yeah! Good question, I’d love to have backing dancers! Some of those sexy Ministry of Sound dancers. If I can get their phone numbers then yeah, I would love to be one of those guys. Oh gosh like that music video ‘Duh duh duh duh duh…’ (Mimics the moves and sounds from Alex Gaudino ‘s Destination Calabria) That video was just ridiculous” They’re just taking the mickey really aren’t they, I mean I remember that other one with all the office girls who are just getting ready for the weekend and they all start stripping whilst filing, OH!…. and the photocopier! (Michal Gray’s – The Weekend). Haha totally amazing! It’s ridiculous!”
	“Yeah that ‘Weekend’ video was truly amazing!”
	“Make sure to put that bit in, doing that can be another one of my dreams! Haha and if I can be in it, all the better you know. I bet they’ll get some male model, stunt double to do it though. Maybe I can buff up by then or something. Maybe get me on the Jeremy Hindle diet”
	“Yeah, well maybe, I’ll whip you into shape in no time Andrei!”
	“Yeah, well I think those are the best kind of videos. I mean you always get those artsy videos making the top 100 with all their weird imagery… but NO! It’s all about the ones with the women, the naked ladies on the photocopiers! One’s like that….Man I sound like such a bastard! (Laughter) Actually we are shooting another video for one of the songs on our EP called ‘Man on Fire’. It’s one we are actually doing ourself this time. I thought it would be quite cool, so I borrowed a friends camera and all that and so we set off to do it. ‘Man on Fire’ is about body image and weight and all that stuff yadda yadda yadda. You know drugs and eating disorders and things like that. It’s not done in an emo way though, it’s a happy song…I swear!”
	“A happy song?” (Sceptical)
	“Well, uh yeah, it’s also a love song. There’s actually this line at the end which goes ‘I need your body, ‘cos I have wasted my own’ and what we did there was…actually you can see it yourselves. It’s out in a couple of weeks. There are burning Barbie dolls involved… yeah it is creepy but it’ll make sense if you give it a watch when it comes out. It was meant to be a bit about burning the tools of your childhood and things like that. I was actually much more into Ninja Turtles.”
	“Yep me too, they were awesome!”
	“Yeah I know! They were turtles, who ate pizza. How cool are they! Who thought of something so awesome? What about you Amelia did you play with Barbies? I mean there is certainly a resemblance going on there Haha!”
	“What kind of stuff did you play with when you were younger Andrei?”
	“Well like I said I remember Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles a lot, uuum, I quite liked Tom and Jerry which is just a bit of a classic. Mmmmm…! Oh yeah Captain Planet… ‘He gets pollution down to zero!’ He was pretty cool actually, I mean we were always told by our parents and even more now, and yeah Captain Planet was ahead of the the game really affirming that message all that time ago on the television.”
	“Do you remember all the rings? Each of the Planeteers had their own ring, wind, water, fire, earth, and heart. Which do you reckon Sugar Jesus best represents? Haha!”
	“Uuuum…ok.. so there was water, fire, earth, wind and….”
	“Heart.”
	“Haha…Ok well ok how about wind… NO wait! Wind sounds bad! Um…yeah fire. Yeah we’ll be fire.”
	“So why fire?”
	“Why fire…. well fire grows….NO wait it spreads, not grows, yeah spreads….don’t put that in…and it’s hot…like the band……and IT TAKES LIVES! No… wait……we can be a cleansing flame to the stagnant Simon Cowell spoon fed media driven generation. How’s that?”
	“So you want me to put down that your band takes lives?”
	“No no, don’t put that, put the second one, the second one!”
	“It’s going in.”
	“Haha ok..”
	“Anyway more seriously, you are kind enough to give a freebie to the readers of this article?”
	“Ok well it’s a new track called Criminal, it’s the first of these twisted love songs that I’ve mentioned. It’s a collab with this guy from New Jersey, ‘Epic Da Rapper’ is his name. I think he’s 17 and I think he’s really good, I mean he’s really good! I sent a track to him, he said he loved it, he sent it back to me in about 2-3 hours all recorded, done! We didn’t really even speak during the whole thing, all emails and things. I remember my ones would all be like ‘Dear balah blah blah, I hope you are well etc etc’, very polite, very English, very Andrei and he replied with “Ok….sent from my Blackberry”. So we have a very professional relationship Haha! There was one embarrassing thing actually…my first few contacts to him were addressed to ‘ERIC the rapper’ (rather than Epic) which eventually I got a succinct correction on… ‘It’s Epic….sent from my Blackberry’ Haha! Anyway the track is called “Criminal”, it’s got a dancey dirty analogue synthy hook to it. It’s a twisted love song with a chorus line ‘I want to break into you.’ When we wrote that line I thought that’s great, it’s really hooky, but I don’t think any man could get away with signing it. However we’ve got Ashleigh, who’s a girl, which in my head at least makes it more acceptable. Ultimately it’s a commercial dance tune made to get you groovin’. So ‘Criminal feat. Epic da Rapper’ give it a listen!”
	“You mentioned a new track?”
	“Yeah, we are doing a new one! It’s along the lines of Dizzee Rascal – Bonkers its a really driven filthy UK electro track. It’s called ‘Electric Shock and well… it’s going to be HUUUGE….hopefully…that’s the idea…etc etc.”
	“I like the name! I want to hear it.”
	“Soon.”
	“So going back to Epic and in general, do you do collaborations often, do you plan to?”
	“Well yes I’m always open to collaborating, I love working with new singers, new rappers, new writers, other musicians really. I think it’s great today that you can literally almost email a track to someone and they can send it straight back with their vocals or whatever input they have. It’s nice being able to having that something new which others can bring to the table whilst still maintaining what makes Sugar Jesus Sugar Jesus, something I think we do well.”
	“When I listen to your music, I honestly feel that something which is left in gives an interesting lifting feeling, it’s certainly something which makes one feel lighter.”
	“Well, thanks! I think for me, what I want well I think it’s best described by a feeling, you know when you are walking somewhere, anywhere, with your headphones on, you don’t have to talk to anyone, then is when music can act as pure escapism. It lifts you upwards and outwards, allowing you to live 100% in the moment. A sort of euphoria, a feeling of absolute confidence in oneself.”
	“Looks like we’ve run out of time…”
	“Yeah, I was just going to say I need to shoot off now.”
	“Well, thank you very much for your time, and giving us an exclusive download to offer our readers, your recent track – Criminal feat. “Epic da Rapper”
	“Yes, thanks a lot!”
	No problemo, hopefully see you both at my next gig! Keep an eye on our myspace!

Sugar Jesus from the Net and Press – As Well as their Exclusive Free Download to Members of This Site!!!:

Myspace

Youtube

Facebook Group

SoundCloud

Sugar Jesus Official Website (Under Construction)

Sugar Jesus – Music Videos for “Solarize” and “Man On Fire”

Recent Comments on Sugar Jesus’s Debut Music Video “Solarize” which was entered into the “Pepsi Max It Legends Music Competition”:

Pepsi Max were so taken with the Sugar Jesus video for Solarize, the title track of their recently released debut EP, that they have included it in their show reel to highlight the very best entries into the Pepsi Max (Max it Legend’s – Music Highlights Round Two) Music Video competition. Solarize was shot in and around London including footage from one of the bands live gigs. Sugar Jesus have consistently earned rave reviews for their live performances and some of that is captured in this video. The external shots were primarily shot on Hampstead Heath. The video was directed by Andrew Nicholas.

What Andrei said about this video in the interview:

“We are shooting another video for one of the songs on our EP called ‘Man on Fire’. It’s one we are actually doing ourself this time. I thought it would be quite cool, so I borrowed a friends camera and all that and so we set off to do it. ‘Man on Fire’ is about body image and weight and all that stuff yadda yadda yadda. You know drugs and eating disorders and things like that. It’s not done in an emo way though, it’s a happy song…I swear!”

Exclusive Free Download of Criminal Ft. Epic Da Rapper

Below is a (kindly offered) exclusive free download to the track “Criminal” featuring Epic Da Rapper.  To download please sign up to this site and then the download link below here will activate.  It is very easy, you can even use your Facebook details so you don’t have to remember any more passwords! Sign Up Here.

Download

Sugar Jesus in The News

SUGAR JESUS’ “DEBUT EP” is **OUT NOW**

iTunes

Amazon

There is also a limited run of physical copies available. If you would like a CD, please email: info@sugarjesus.com

• “Sugar Jesus, London’s hugely tipped “Indie Disco Kings” (TimeOut) have today released their debut EP.”
• “The untitled EP comprises four tracks and is now available on iTunes and on limited physical release.”
• “The award-winning electro pop act will follow up with a debut album, due to be released early next year.”
• “The release of their EP comes after a frantic year of touring their live show alongside such acts as Calvin Harris, Data Rock, The Whip and Filthy Dukes.”
• “The group won “Best Dance Song” for their opener ‘Here Comes the Storm’ at the 2009 EMAs, where they also received a nomination for “Best Live Act”.”
• “Hailed as “The forerunners of Synth Pop’s thriving underground” by ArtRocker and labelled “Dance Floor Dynamite” by New York’s Z100″
• “They have recently received widespread radio-play, and the music video for their euphoric track ‘Solarize’ has been brewing a storm on YouTube and Vimeo.”
• “They are the band that everyone seems to be talking about, and it is little wonder that there has been great interest in the build up to this release.”

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This article really makes me feel like Apple are going to get what’s coming to them soon.

Sony tried something similar and it resulted in their worst dip in sales ever and that’s not counting the massive loss in brand loyalty (it definitely affected my opinion of them).

I wonder if the now officially termed “Apple Addict” will be bothered by something like this something like this?

Steve Jobs Is Watching You: Apple Seeking to Patent Spyware | Electronic Frontier Foundation.

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http://new.digg.com/login/ba56237f00ab095a38576753b298e2a32

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Happy Digg-ing

Many of you may have already heard and read xkcd, if you haven’t and you have even basic “geek”, physics, maths knowledge or just appreciate that kind of humour then you should at least check it out.  It is a brilliant time waster.  Nevertheless this article is a brief notification of another webcomic which has kept my interest on and off over a couple of years.

This webcomic is called SMBC – Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.  It has a similar rough and ready style to xbmc and concentrates more on humorous content rather than aesthetics.  Regular submissions are made (one a day, give or take) and done so in a light hearted manner which makes reading the authors comments relaxing and promotes a feeling of familiarity, like you are part of some small following (certainly not the case – there is a large subscription base).  Below I have included some of my favourites from the past few months – note some contain slightly more adult based humour. If the images come up too small to read on your screen after clicking on them then use the ctrl and + buttons to zoom in to read. (ctrl and – to zoom out)

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If you like this kind of content go over and check them out here.

Know any other webcomics like this or maybe you have a webcomic of your own?  Let us all know in the comments below!

People who follow even the slightest information on the internet are at least aware of the risks associated with your public face.  The ones which spring to mind first for me are things associated with employers checking your personal life out and possibly more seriously, identity theft.  You might think “Oh it’ll never happen to me!”, the fact is it could, and it ?might, so you might as well spend a few minutes lowering the risk.  After all ignorance isn’t really an excuse when you find out you are being held up when coming back from holiday because you’ve committed fraud in another country you’ve never been to.  Sure you might be able to sort it out in the end but it sure wouldn’t be easy to fix and can be avoided.

Why pick on Facebook? There are plenty of other sites which make your information public.

Why this article picks Facebook as it’s example isn’t only because of it’s size and popularity but mostly because of the ideals behind it’s development.  Amongst many online communities there has been a huge backlash against Facebook for their “irresponsibility”.  In fact some large communities which I read regularly have published several articles showing guides how to quit or at least “cripple” your Facebook experience.  The “irresponsibility” that a large number of people have backlashed against is because of how Facebook fundamentally operates an “opt out” mentality rather than the usual “opt in” method of offering new services to its users.  It also happens that these functions happen to always result in your information being public by default.  Ok…so what you might say?  Well there are some pretty important reasons which you should at least know about…

Well one particular feature which was released for Facebook not so long ago was something which basically allows other websites to look at information on your Facebook and therefore tailor content on their sites to your interests e.t.c  Well sure you might think that’s great, when I go to other sites they’ll be more applicable to me, so for some I suppose it is good.  The thing is I personally don’t like the idea of my personal information being spread across hundreds of databases all over the internet without my consent.  That in essence is what Facebook did to every user on it without doing anything except that privacy notice at the top of your home page feed saying they updated their privacy policy.  I read it, but I know most people probably just clicked close.  So for many of you who haven’t altered you profile privacy settings then in all likelihood your information is still being spread…all over the internet.  There was also the most recent update which opted you in to having your status updates and logins from several other online communities (Foursquare for example) post your location on your profile.  This is not something I’d advise anyone doing – having some people know where you are is safe, having the whole world know where you are…is not.  If you don’t care about this issue then this article isn’t for you so you can save some time and go elsewhere.  For others continue below:

So if it’s so “bad” and “irresponsible” then why does Facebook continue in the same way update after update?

Now I don’t have anything against Facebook for doing this.  After all Facebook is a business and businesses aim to make money, in fact I think it is a brilliant business model.  Irresponsible it may be, but if I was in Facebook’s position I’d do the same thing.  Having information public on Facebook is the main way Facebook makes money.  The more information you have public, the more adverts on the site can be catered to your needs by sharing that information, the more clicks the adverts get, the more Facebook can charge for adverts (very very basic explanation).  There are also issues with Facebook applications sharing information and themselves making money, further increasing the spread of information.

So you’ve read this and you want to make your profile a bit more secure and manage the information you want to be visible to the outside world.  You could quit Facebook (safest option) however that isn’t really practical for many of us as we use it as an easy method of communication and to keep up with distant friends (although I really don’t condone it, talking on Facebook does not count in my opinion).  So what can you do?  You can do what was done in the article here if you like but once again I think that is a little too extreme for the average student or professional (probably suitable if you are a high powered banker or going into a very public career such as politics).  Well the fundamentals lie in the privacy settings on Facebook and in order not to cripple your Facebook experience, Friend Lists.

The nitty gritty of it.

In all likelihood now that you are aware of the situation you probably don’t require much more information from me.  However just in case you feel uncomfortable fiddling with settings in your Facebook account I will outline the basics below.  The first thing you should be aware of that privacy on Facebook means putting the least amount of information on your account as possible.  That means things like not having a wall, not showing pictures or videos, not showing your interests or information such as personal email accounts or mobile numbers on you profile.  Bearing that in mind you may still want some information to be available to select friends and that is where friend lists come into play.  The idea is to create a new list of people who you are giving the OK to seeing your Facebook content – I’d recommend this be people you regularly see in real life rather than that hottie you added who worked at that bar (you can create another list for them if you want later).

The way you create a list is shown as step by step instructions through the gallery below – instructions are shown below the images if you just click on them – for a more cinematic guide click on the “view with PicLens” link just below:

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If you have any trouble with any of these steps then please feel free to comment below and I will either explain to you directly how to deal with your issue, or amend the guide to make your step clearer for you.

Making friend lists can have more uses than just staying private on the web.  For example it can also be used to control who can and cannot see you are online in Facebook Chat.  When you create a list – that list and the people in it appear in your chat list in the bottom right.  If you click the little green toggle switch next to the title of these lists then you can go offline for just that list rather than completely.  So you could create a list called “No Rubbish Chat” and add people to it that annoy you.  This allows you to just go offline for those people when you just aren’t in the mood for “Rubbish Chat” but still want to talk to someone else like family or a loved one.  I’d like to add that I’d quite like it (since I explained it) that none of my friends do this to me… no matter how annoying I get .

You can use your Facebook, type in your details one off (your email remains private), or register on the site.  Please do share this article with your friends using the buttons below if you believe this post to be helpful to them.  Any questions?  Use the comments below – I’ll get back to you pronto!

Note Lifehacker just recently released it’s top ten tips for Facebook.  It is probably worth quickly popping in there just to scroll down the list to spot a few more things you can do to improve your safety even further.  It also links to a few examples of the problems with the Facebook “opt-in” mentality.

Also – REMEMBER next time Facebook updates anything or the privacy policy notification comes up – check your privacy settings haven’t been changed back to public.  This does happen on occasion and is something which I think is really bad.  Adding more things which you are automatically public for is one thing, but changing the settings you have gone through and changed back…well that is something I don’t agree with, and you should watch out for .  Happy (Safe (er)) Facebooking!