We all thought that the sequel to PlayStation 3 hit MotorStorm will be titled Motorstorm: Pacifica, but we might have another thing coming as a slight change seems to have been made. The essence, however, should remain the same. The news bit awaits after the jump.

Dismaying rumors going around accused Apple of spying and recent discoveries hinted that the iPhone did send out information to Apple. Speculations ensued and it was apparent that much of the growing concern revolved around IEMI.

Want to know more? Read on to the full article.

Talk about being watched by Big Brother. A school uniform maker in England is considering putting GPS trackers into uniforms so that parents can keep track of their children's location at all times.

The idea was born from a survey which said that 44% of 800 parents were worried about their kids' safety. 59% were interested in outfitting uniforms with trackers.

Personally I'd feel like a test subject tagged and then set loose in the wild, but nevertheless it's a practical answer to parents' concerns. As parents, it's their job to secure their child's safety. But what do the kids have to say about it? From the same survey, nearly half the kids aged 12 and below said they're willing to give it a shot, but teenagers weren't as amenable.

The idea may just be taking the next step from new clothing line of Bladerunner - the school uniform makers - who also offers stab-proof apparel. A GPS tracker in uniforms isn't that big a leap from the idea of "Safety First." Hopefully it doesn't eventually extend to "Privacy Second."

What's a street racing movie or game without the babes? Fortunately, NFS: ProStreet won't be holding back on us. Krystal Forscutt, former Big Brother contestant and currently sizzling model, will be waving arms as a starting girl in the game.

She seems pretty excited about being one of the girls that all NFS fans around the world would see. Now joining the ranks of other celebrities immortalized in video games, our girl is the first Aussie to ever appear on an EA game.

Forscutt admits that she went through breast enlargement, but that's all there is to her smoking body. Well, if that would make someone qualify as a DOA babe, it's not too bad right?

Look forward to hitting the road with her when NFS:ProStreet comes Q4 2007 for the PS3, 360, Wii, PSP, DS, and PC.

 

Okay, this may cause some alarmists to scream "Big Brother!" so before all the speculation, here are the known details - just so all you privacy advocates can relax a bit.

Google has filed a patent that reveals that they plan to compile psychological profiles of millions of gamers by covertly monitoring the way they play online games. Now you may think that this only concerns folks who play MMOs on their PCs, however, the patent apparently says that Google can also monitor people playing on any game console that hooks up to the internet, including the Sony PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, and Microsoft Xbox 360.

What's even more hair-raising is that it says that information could be retrieved from previous game details saved on memory cards. To quote: "Such saved information may be thought of state information, and offers a valuable source of information to the advertisers." Yes, if you've played 350 hours of Oblivion, they'll know. Yep, the patent is that creepy; it even says:

In a car racing game, after a user crashes his Honda Civic, an announcer could be used to advertise by saying 'if he had a Hummer, he would have gotten the better of that altercation', etc... If the user has been playing for over two hours continuously, the system may display ads for Pizza Hut, Coke, coffee.

Now here's why we're asking all those privacy advocates to calm down and not cry foul. Google has said that they do not plan to roll out the technology in the near future. They say that it was just one of the patents that they wanted to file. The Guardian reports that a Google spokesman had this to say: "Google registers different patents irrespective of whether we actually intend to use them."

So no, Big Brother, er, I mean, Google isn't watching you. Not yet. *insert cheesy B-movie sci-fi music* It's not paranoia if they're really out to get you.

 

Nintendo Australia is kicking up its Wii console promotions further into mainstream media, as we pick up a report stating that the company is sponsoring this year's Big Brother show (Australia). For the benefit of the guys here who've never heard of Big Brother, it's a highly popular (albeit controversial) television program based on George Orwell's 1949 novel, 1984 .

In this show, 14 contestants are chosen to live in a house under the complete control of Big Brother - a disembodied voice who monitors the "housemates" 24 hours a day, gives them set tasks, punishments, and works as the group's link to the outside world. Rewards are given out to the longest remaining housemates, with recent grand prices ranging from AUS$ 836,000 (US$ 686,473) to AUS$ 1,000,000 (US$ 821,108).

Nintendo is reportedly planning to award AUS$ 2,000 (US$ 1,642) to every housemate upon eviction, with details regarding how the company plans to market their Wii console in the program still unavailable. We imagine a scenario where the  housemates will be asked to sit down to play with their Wiis (hilarity ensues)...

That's all for the moment - stick around in case we pick up any related updates, or if Nintendo will have ample console supplies to compensate for this new promotional campaign.

Electronic Arts is cooking up another new venture, and this time they've enlisted the help of TV company Endemol to develop Virtual Me, a new digital entertainment concept that "bridges the divide between traditional TV and videogames."

This online offering will let users create their own avatars - or "astonishingly lifelike cyber-clones," according to a press statement - which they can use to meet, compete, and socialize with other gamers. Users can also join virtual versions of Endemol's TV series such as Deal or No Deal and Fear Factor using their avatars.

"With Virtual Me we are at the forefront of a new, hybrid form of entertainment that takes gaming beyond the console," said EA International boss Gerhard Florin. "Endemol is a great partner to help us bring together the best of TV and video games for an offering that can appeal to mass market audiences and change the face of entertainment."

Virtual Me is slated to debut alongside the new Big Brother series which is coming to British TV screens this summer. A website is also in the works.

Miniaturization's good and all (it leads to a lot of cool ship upgrades in Galactic Civilizations II) but this recent post on Pink Tentacle is something else entirely.

Remember the whole RFID issue? While it certainly has its uses, a lot of people are still kind of freaked out by the whole RFID thing. If you're one of those people, prepare to get even more scared. The aforementioned Pink Tentacle article zooms in on Hitachi's new "powder" chips, which measure in at 0.05mm x 0.05mm. These new chips are 64 times smaller than the previous record holder - 0.4mm x 0.4mm mu-chips - yet are still able to hold a 128-bit ROM that can store a unique 38-digit ID number.

We concur that these chips will most likely be used for anti-counterfeit and anti-theft stuff, but since these things are actually small enough to get inhaled, conspiracy theorists should find it ridiculously easy to formulate new theories regarding Big Brother and the Number of the Beast.

No, no, not THAT mind reader, silly! Ushering a possible "Minority Report" age to our lives, a brain-scan technique developed by neuroscientists now can help pattern a person's thoughts in their brain before they act. Something like thinking about someone and then hearing the phone ring a few seconds after...

How do they do it exactly? Well, it revolves around the principle that the brain generates certain thought patterns whenever it sends signals to the rest of the body or thinks. It is also believed that a thought is formed right before it becomes action, which is called intention.

Predicting, or reading, intention, is what functional magnetic imaging resonance does. Well, actually it is used to scan the brain for thought patterns in periods before the targeted thought occurs or while it is occurring. Coupled with software that spots subtle differences in brain activity, the method predicts a person's intention with a 70% accuracy.

So you can be sure 70% of the time, you know what your date is going to do (hurray?). While it isn't anything precognitive (precognition is knowing the future before it happens), it does make us think about the ethical ramifications of it's uses. No one likes a telepathic Big Brother...well, not yet.

Barbara Sahakian, a professor of neuro-psychology at Cambridge University, said that a neuroethics society was formed following the rapid advances in neuroscience. It was to monitor and single out the impact of each research being conducted in the field. She said:

Do we want...a 'Minority Report' society where we're preventing crimes that might not happen? A lot of neuroscientists in the field are very cautious and say we can't talk about reading individuals' minds, and right now that is very true, but we're moving ahead so rapidly, it's not going to be that long before we will be able to tell whether someone's making up a story, or whether someone intended to do a crime with a certain degree of certainty.

Professor Colin Blakemore, a neuroscientist and director of the Medical Research Council, said that people shouldn't go overboard about the power of these techniques at the moment, but what others can be absolutely sure of is that the developments will continue to roll out. By then they will have more ability to probe people's intentions, minds, background thoughts, hopes and emotions.

The method is now being looked into, so it can be made to discern between an actual intention and just a passing thought.

UK's Channel 4 will be the first broadcaster to make radio content available wirelessly on PSPs when it sends daily updates from its new season of "Celebrity Big Brother".

According to the company, the move will help 4Radio connect with PSP users - a young, mobile audience - by making its programming available whenever and wherever they want. The initial content, which also includes Channel 4 News and music programming, will be delivered in podcast form.

The "Celebrity Big Brother" podcast features a daily round-up of the antics in the house plus extra interviews, news, opinions and highlights, of the show.

Aside from "Celebrity Big Brother", Channel 4 also offers other "everything you love about Channel 4 television but now as radio programmes." These podcasts cover anything from showbiz gossips, physical fitness, book clubs, and the hit TV show "Lost". PSP users can access the updates by connecting to a Channel 4 portal from any of 7,500 Wi-Fi locations throughout the UK. In the future, PSPs are expected to access not just audio but TV broadcasts.

Those of you outside the UK can access the podcast from Channel 4's website by clicking the link below.