How to watch Hulu and US Television in the UK.

Ok, given that my most popular post ever concerns how to unblock the videos on a certain American broadcasters website, I reckon I should turn it up a notch. What if I reveal how to watch the programming of nearly every channel in America!

Got your attention? Good, because what follows is gold Jerry gold!

Because Hulu is for American TV a kind of super BBC iPlayer, 4OD, Demand 5 and ITV Player all rolled into one. Hundreds of channels, a smorgasbord of US drama, a cornucopia of American comedy, and for that matter, a cesspit of crappy reality shows.

But that’s not the point, what you watch is up to you, the perennial problem is that from this side of the Atlantic all the precious content is ceremonially blocked once they realise that you’re not a damn yankee.

Not now though, now there’s a dandy way to doodle Hulu into thinking you are a yankee and it really could not be simpler.

All you need is to use Firefox or Chrome as your browser, download one single add-on called Media Hint freely available for each, and that’s your lot. No further instructions necessary, no extra fiddling, not another solitary thing to do except go to hulu.com and start wasting some more of your life.

Now then, apart from directing certain traffic through a US proxy I’m really not sure how Media Hint’s clever voodoo actually works, but work it definitely does. And you can download your own Media Hint for Firefox and Media Hint for Chrome by clicking these links to whichever flavour you prefer.

All I can confirm is that both versions work perfectly for me, access to the videos is fast with great quality and it doesn’t seem to affect other web browsing either. It is fairly new though and its origins are Latvian so if you’re the nervous type at all I suppose you can simply disable it when you aren’t using it.

The other bonus with Media Hint is that it doesn’t just fool Hulu’s geo-blocking, it’s the key that unlocks other previously stubborn network websites as well, like Fox.com and CBS.com. That’s right folks, finally a way to watch Letterman and Craig Ferguson! And it’ll let you into US Netflix (don’t get too excited, you would still have to pay) and Pandora the music radio site which is free and rather good.

In fact the only trouble with Media Hint is that it works so well, without the VPN hassle/expense usually required to crack Hulu and the networks, that the bastards will surely try and stop it soon.

So what are you waiting for, download Media Hint immediately. Make the most of this gloriously simple way to all the American TV we don’t get, the latest of what we do get and what we’ve already gotten but want to watch again, while you can.

But I’ll let ya know now, Dave Letterman’s wig still doesn’t look convincing.

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Top 10 Internet Predictions for 2013

Rule Britannia, Britannia rules the…well, it was just about everything in 2012.

A Diamond Jubilee, a Champions League, a triumphant Olympic Games, a Tour de France, a tennis US Open, James Bond better than ever and ahem…One Direction.

It’s a shame they wouldn’t allow a Brit to be US President, we might have won that too. I bet Simon Cowell could have done it, he’s used to running things and getting people to vote. As it was, apparently a Kenyan won it again.

Still if it can’t be that good for ol’ Blighty in 2013, what can we expect to happen this year? And specifically what’s next for us, and the wider World, on the series of tubes they call the internet.

Because regular readers of my blog (although I concede there hasn’t been much new stuff to read lately) will know that at this time of year I always try to predict the web based wonders of the next 12 months, even if I don’t really try too hard.

But why shouldn’t one of my predictions come true, I mean the law of averages must kick in eventually. Always the optimist me.

And so without further ado but with suitably overblown fanfare and fingers crossed I present to you my TOP 10 INTERNET PREDICTIONS FOR 2013.

1. Apple will launch a radical plan to justify all the glaring errors on their Apple Maps service. Their first step is to buy The Eiffel Tower and move it to a suburb in Lowestoft where they say it is.
2. After Piers Morgan’s rant about gun control sparked a US online petition to have him deported, and a UK one was launched not to have him back, a third poll is created to promote the obvious compromise. Millions vote to drop him somewhere in the middle.
3. A shocking decline in medical training at NHS Direct is highlighted after a member of staff suggests using Google Docs for a second opinion.
4. The Pope will soon regret opening his new Twitter account. One glass of Communion wine too many and he announces ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ is his new second favorite book. #NaughtyPontiff.
5. A fresh but extremely ill conceived Viral Marketing campaign for the new zombie movie ‘World War Z’ goes horribly wrong. Within 28 days the World looks like a scene from The Walking Dead and box office takings are terrible.
6. As online gambling sites proliferate, 888.com cause outrage by inventing a new niche in the market. Based on very poor taste betting they launch a companion website called 666.com
7. A Monty Python fan makes a terrible error by setting up a Google Alert for ‘Spam’ instead of Spamalot’. The next time he opens his email account there are 7 Trillion messages in there.
8. Someone will hack into Wikipedia and edit Wikipedia’s own page about Wikipedia. Changing the text to say Wikipedia closed as soon as it started, the resulting space time paradox makes it disappear off the web and millions of students retroactively fail their exams.
9. After much criticism for not paying any UK corporation tax for years, Amazon and the government finally reach a settlement. Ministers will get first dibs on all the best deals on Black Friday.
10. Twitter will follow Facebook by floating on the stock market. Frustration sets in though when investors are restricted to a maximum of 140 shares at a time.

I actually had another one but it’s just too obvious really. That when Wills and Kate’s baby is born every celeb in the western World will be poised by a computer to be the first to say they are so happy for them. Well ok, maybe not Morrissey.

Top 10 Internet Predictions for 2012.

2012, oh er.

As if 2011 wasn’t bad enough, we have either a financial armageddon to look forward to in the coming year or a real one if the Mayans or Roland Emmerich are to be believed.

On the bright side though, if cataclysmic seismic shifts do begin to destroy our planet, someone is bound to create an app for that. At least it’ll be nice and easy to follow our spiral into oblivion.

I wouldn’t have to rack my brains for the 2013 version of these unlikely predictions either.

But without such a ready excuse for this year, here then…after great deliberation and viewing many hours of internet related programming, if ‘Rude Tube’ counts, are my Top 10 Internet Predictions for 2012.

And as in previous years they are presented in absolutely no order of accuracy or probability, so let history prove me right or wrong. If the Mayan prediction is right it won’t matter anyway will it.

1. The fairy-tale Royal Marriage of William and Kate will come to a sad and acrimonious end once she discovers his Google history includes multiple searches for ‘Pippa Middleton’s arse’.
2. Following the film success of ‘The Social Network’, plans are made for a sequel. About how looters used Facebook to co-ordinate the London Riots, this one will be called ‘The Anti-Social Network’.
3. Beleaguered social network site Friends Reunited have a brilliant idea for a new advertising campaign. Unfortunately they can only afford Gunther for it and not Joey, Ross, Rachel, Phoebe, Chandler or Monica.
4. When the new iPad 3 is released, Microsoft will again demonstrate how far behind Apple they are by saying that once you put a mouse and mousepad on it you still can’t see the screen to use it.
5. It won’t matter who wins the Republican nomination for the US Presidential election, they are all so poor that after a YouTube only debate is broadcast, Keyboard Cat will play them out.
6. The term Googlewhack, known previously as a search request producing only one result, will become something far more sinister when Google unveil their new Assassination service.
7. Famous in the US, classified ads site Craigslist will recognise a chance for some free publicity in the UK. When the new Bond film is released it will change its name to DanielCraigsList for a week.
8. For those watching The Olympic 100m final on BBC iPlayer via broadband it will be over in less than 10 seconds. For those on dial up it will last 2 minutes and then freeze just at the end.
9. Britain will realize its obsession with celebrity has finally gone too far when someone tweets a rumour that Z-Lister Rik Waller has hemorrhoids, and even that starts trending.
10. Given that the Mayans have predicted the end of the World on December 21st 2012, Amazon are careful to include a disclaimer that this may effect Christmas delivery times.

So there you have them. And I really, really hope at least one of them does come true.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m just off to my Twitter account. I’m sure that was Rik Waller in Superdrug buying Preperation H.

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Amazon – The funny reviews it’s worth shopping for.

Ah, the mighty Amazon, that all embracing river of commerce we all dip our retail oar in.

It’s the biggest, it’s the best and it’s the most authoritative when it comes to purchasers feedback.  A clutch of positive or negative reviews on there can make or break a product being sold.

But what happens when the whole purpose of a review is not to make or break that product, rather to make you laugh so hard that you break a rib. When a review is so funny that the only thing the buyer should beware is soiling themselves. When the, um, er…oh sod it, I’ve run out of shopping superlatives but you get the idea.

The thing is, there are certain products that are so familiar or so entirely unremarkable that reviews in the normal sense are superfluous anyway, y’know for stuff like Bic pens, T Shirts, milk, and Katie Price and Peter Andre’s album.

Take the humble Bic pen for instance, what could be more ubiquitous or its use so obvious. I mean nobody needs a review of a Bic pen do they.

Except when they’re this inspired…

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And those are just a few appetizers for the feast of funny you’ll find on the real Amazon page, there’s another 234 on there.

Actually you can make that 235 now…

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Well, if you take other peoples reviews, you gotta give one back of your own haven’t ya. And I do love my Bic.

So if you want to read more ribaldrous reviews and comedic critiques, and I really urge you that you should, go to this ready-made list of funny Amazon reviews on the Amazon site itself.

Be warned however, with all those aforementioned Bic reviews and similar hilarity for Paul Ross’s and Hitlers portrait (not together of course), a ‘Jesus – He’s my No. 1′ Mug and some total classics about the Original Three Wolf Moon T-Shirts, you will definitely fall into one of two categories.

Either you will have tears running down your trouser leg, or your colostomy bag will explode.

But you will piss yourself.

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AllMyApps – The App Store for PC owners.

If there is one word that sums up what people love about computers these days, that word has got to be apps.

Because apps are everywhere and for just about everything, apps for productivity, apps for the office, apps for games, apps for maps, and probably apps for laps, gaps, raps and naps.

But so far it is Apple who are synonymous with the rise of the planets of the apps and it was only a few weeks ago Apple triumphantly announced its 15th Billion app download.

Admittedly most of those have been for iPhones and iPads through the iTunes store, but Apple also launched a very successful dedicated App Store for its Mac computers too.

But if you don’t have a Mac and you ‘just’ own a PC with Microsoft Windows as your operating system, you may have been feeling a bit left out lately, where are all the apps for you?

Well I’ll tell you. They’re all collected on a website called AllMyApps, it’s the closest Windows equivalent of the Apple App Store there is and best of all…practically all of those apps are free.

Now of course as an independent website it isn’t quite as slick as iTunes or the Apple App Store but it’s all set out by category, name and icon and just by hovering over an icon a handy little dialog box pops up to tell you all about that App, along with its star rating. Actually that’s a better feature than what the Apple App Store gives you.

And also conveniently it places the most popular apps in any particular category first and foremost, an endorsement from all those before you that those are the Apps you really ought to consider downloading.

Apps like CCLeaner for instance, in the Utilities category, a brilliant way to regularly clean out the crappy unused files on your PC and generally speed it up.

And in Security, there’s the most popular free anti-virus program around in the form of AVG Anti-Virus. If you don’t have Nortons, Kaspersky, Mcafee or the like on your PC, hurry, download it while you still have a computer to use.

In fact whatever the app, if it’s made for Windows this is the perfect one-stop shop to find it, whether you looking for a specific app like Skype or just browsing for a particular task you need fulfilling and you want to see all the options in one place.

To top it off, AllMyApps is also its own app, which automatically collates all your other Apps or Program on your PC, whether downloaded from AllMyApps or not, will alert you whenever they’re updated, and install that update for you.

For yet more features of everything AllMyApps can do they’ve even created a video about it.

So I urge you, do have a look at AllMyApps and you can use the following link, Allmyapps App Store to take you there. It’s worth it just to see all the free goodies that are available for your PC, you don’t necessarily have to download anything now.

Because if this is the age of the app, this is one place you’re bound to enjoy many appy returns to.
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Angry Birds – Now you can play it in a browser.

Y’know, it used to be that the only Angry Birds I ever knew was when I’d tread on their handbag dancing down Ritzy’s on a Saturday night. Although I’ll be honest, they were never that friendly even when I wasn’t stamping on their fake designer bag and I just tried talking to them.

But these days Angry Birds also equates to something else. Because with 300 million downloads on iPads, iPhones and other clever devices, there are a lot of people very familiar with an entirely different kind of Angry Birds, the game.

Me, I’m certainly well acquainted with it, because I’ve got an iPod Touch and for the 59p that I spent to download Angry Birds it is simultaneously the best value of anything I’ve ever purchased and positively the most costly, time robbing, counter-productive thing I ever, ever did.

The hours I’ve enjoyed/wasted catapulting little birds at green pigs, wooden planks, glass panels and stone slabs I wouldn’t like to calculate but it is the epitome of a ‘one more go game’. Only usually I’m saying those words to myself over and over again and still been bloody playing.

In fact I’ve deliberately allowed my iPod battery to drain down to nothing so I couldn’t have one more go.

Only now I can’t even rely on that fail-safe because they’ve only gone and made a version for the browser as well. And viciously they’ve even made it totally free, the bastards.

That’s right, now anyone has access to Angry Birds, although for this new browser based version they’d like you to think it’s available in only one particular browser, that being Google Chrome. Actually it plays exactly the same in Firefox 4 and above, Safari and IE 9, it just has the Chrome branding all over it still.

Where the Chrome exclusivity does kick however is that you can download it as an Chrome app (the fancy name for add-on these days) and then you can play it offline as well.

You have to hand it to Google, if a multi-million pound promotional campaign isn’t enough for people to adopt Chrome, hooking them in with the gaming equivalent of Crack is a credible Plan B.

Not that they really need it, already embraced by 20% of computer users in the UK, Chrome is an excellent browser, secure, stable, with thousands of cool add-ons but most crucially, it is very fast.

If you don’t have it yet, perhaps you should, you can download Google Chrome here.

But what of Angry Birds itself, and its hours of fun/frustration. Well to play it directly in Google Chrome, or the other browsers I mentioned, all you need to do is to click this link – Angry Birds for Chrome.

You’ll soon get the hang of the controls, zoom in and out with your mouse scroll wheel, or the up and down arrows of your keyboard, and use your cursor to pull back on the catapult. Don’t worry it will all make sense when you’re there.

Oh and look out for the Chrome logo in later levels to aim at and unlock some extra Chrome inspired levels (you can still play them on any browser though). To download the offline app for Chrome, you’ll see the link featured prominently anyway.

Whatever method you choose, if you’ve been curious to play Angry Birds but not had the right gadget before, this is your chance. At least it’s something different to playing Solitaire when you should be working.

But if you do start playing it, may I just say two things.

Enjoy it and I’m very, very sorry.

The 107 best websites on the web…apart from this one.

Now you know I like to keep up to date with all the latest and greatest new web apps and web sites don’t you.

But finding them and then finding the time to tell you about them are two different things. These days you see I can barely find the time to scratch my arse if it itches…and unfortunately I can’t find the volunteers for that either.

Nevertheless I remain as committed as ever to bringing these great websites to you, even if I can’t always tell you about them in my own inimitable fashion. Namely long-windedly and with a few bad jokes.

And so it is with pleasure that I present a ready formed run-down of some of the websites that I’ve been wanting to to tell you about, plus a few extra for gravy, in a new list from MakeUseOf called The 107 Best Websites on the Web.

Now why they chose the 107 best websites on the web when it’s such an arbitrary number I cannot say. Or indeed how they can claim it’s a definitive list of the best websites when [spoiler alert] this one isn’t on it.

But that obvious quibble aside, it is a list to include many other great websites broken down into 20 bite-size categories like Entertainment, Productivity, Software Downloads and Security/Privacy so there’s bound to be something of interest to everybody, whatever you’re looking for.

Although I think the best discoveries from lists like this are the ones you didn’t know you were looking for.

There is one which should appeal to everybody however and that’s Groupon in the Local Category. Which given it’s a discount shopping portal may make it a strange candidate for a Local section. But it’s a discount site with a twist because the deals come to you, they are all for your local town and when they’re usually at least 60% off, it doesn’t matter where they put it, you should look at it and sign up for it. Their link takes you to the American site though, use this one for Groupon UK.

So there we are, that’s the 107 best websites on the web according to MakeUseOf. Funnily enough they include themselves on their own list but I don’t blame them because it really is a great resource for everything web related. They certainly have plenty of free how-to guides on subjects like Facebook and Twitter and all sorts of other computer stuff which are available here.

I can’t say that ALL the other websites would be on my list though, I mean Wikileaks is on there. Wikileaks! Surely the best websites are the ones that are the most useful to the most amount of people. How is that Wikileaks?

Its readership has gone down by at least one in Pakistan recently as well.