The Weekly Round-Up: 18.09.09

A lot of people think their broadband service is bad. You probably think your broadband is bad. Even people that don't have broadband have an opinion about how bad their broadband would be, if they had it.

It's Britain's new favourite topic to moan about, now that we can't really moan about our national performance at cricket or football.

But no matter how bad you think your internet connection is, it can't be slower than Kevin Rolfe's.

Rolfe is a South African businessman who suffers from really slow broadband. He leapt to the Round-Up's attention by conducting an interesting experiment recently that pitched new technology against old technology.

Specifically, he pitched his internet service's upload speed against a pigeon.

Not just any pigeon, but Winston the homing pigeon armed with a 4GB memory stick full of data. Rolfe wanted to see if the bird could carry the data to the company's other office - 60 miles away - quicker than the office could upload the same amount of data.

The pigeon won. It crossed the 60 miles in two hours. In the same time the service had only managed to send four per cent of the data.

You have to say that's a bit of a coup for Winston the pigeon. Ahem.

But those of us who are tempted to try the same experiment in the UK should hold on just a moment before heading out to hire a pigeon (or a snail if you want a fairer fight). These are giddying and exciting times for UK broadband lovers.

BT has been demoing its super-fast broadband in the high-tech destination of…Muswell Hill.

On top of that, BT is even trying out broadband technology that could potentially offer fast speeds far far from the exchange.

On top of that BT (which is clearly having a busy week) also announced this week that it is partnering with O2 to provide a joined up service offering landline, broadband, mobile broadband services in one package. Phew!

See? In Blighty modern communications technology juts out its jaw and continues the march of progress.

That said, the pigeon method has its attractions. Manufacturing costs are lower, there'd be no need to dig up roads or lay cables in sewers.

There'd be no talk of an urban-rural divide as the pigeons would love a break from the city hullaballoo. Plus, if the pigeon got a bit old and knackered you could always braise it in red wine and mushrooms and buy a new one - a truly sustainable communications infrastructure. Tasty, too.

What a brave new world. A green technological utopia in the skies above Britain. Line after line of diligent pigeons clutching memory sticks in their little claws, swooping into homes and offices and keeping the information economy ticking over.

Of course, the public sector pigeons carrying civil service memory sticks would be half blind and have no sense of direction...

Think of clothing and technology and you'll probably come up with…sandals with socks and shirts with lots of pens in the breast pocket. Not exactly high fashion. But this could all be set to change.

If you've ever felt the pain that comes from a gadget ruining the fine cut of your suit (and who hasn't) get ready for the commuter tie. The tie, from Thomas Pink, includes a pocket in its reverse which is where you can tuck away your iPod Nano.

"Technology has transformed the modern commute but it has also created a dilemma - how best to store gadgets safely and stylishly on the go?" the company said.

The Round-Up is sure it's going to be a hit, and is already working on a kipper tie that can store an iPod Classic or a netbook…

And finally this week: Britain is a nation of mobile phone squirrels. First pigeons, and now squirrels - this week the Round-Up is getting back to nature.

Anyway, that we are all turning into squirrels was the central message of a press release which plinked into the Round-Up's inbox this week and saved you from an 'and finally' story about Skype founders arguing with Skype's management.

Sadly there was little to the story to do with squirrels or fluffy tails and sadly no jokes about nuts.

Instead, the Round-Up learned that as a nation we are obsessed with having the latest mobile phone models with cutting-edge technology.

Although the lifespan of the average mobile is around seven years, a whopping 87 per cent of survey respondents claim to have had their current handset for less than two years, while 81 per cent admit to upgrading their phones every year or two.

But what happens to all the obsolete mobile phones replaced when an upgrade is taken? According to The Recycling Factory, the answer is very little.

The survey reveals that more than half of us hoard our unused phones at home in case our current handset is stolen, lost or broken. Meanwhile, 68 per cent admit to having more than one mobile phone collecting dust at home. The Round-Up has to confess to having seven. The shame.

Unsurprisingly, the company is trying to encourage us to recycle our obsolete handsets in return for cash. But it's facing an uphill battle. Only 22 per cent of us recycle old phones, with 21 per cent opting instead to hand down old mobiles to friends and family. Four per cent actually throw their mobile phones in the bin.

A spokeswoman for the company said there are now well over 90 million unused mobile phones lying around in drawers throughout the UK, or even worse, being binned. Yep, there's gold in them there bricks...

Before the Round-Up heads off to stuff seven mobile phones into an envelope it leaves you with the following choice articles from silicon.com:

For all the talk about reducing its carbon footprint and doing greener IT, what has our government actually achieved?

When is a Snow Leopard like a second-hand Volkswagen?

Peter Cochrane takes a hard look at 3G data.