Get a tight grip on your doughnut because you are about to be shocked. IT workers are some of the fattest and unfittest people in the country according to a new survey seemingly designed to make you feel even worse about your job than you already do.

Yes there is a recession, and yes jobs are being shaved, workloads are shooting up and you are being asked to do more with less, but don't you realise that you are neglecting one of the most important things in your life? No, not the Tamgotchi or the novelty venus flytrap. Your health, you sugar and larded up fools!

The survey, which comes from scale botherers the Fat Free Fitness Weightloss Agency, found that amongst the 1700 people that managed to shift their ample bulk in the direction of researchers, a large (geddit?) proportion of them were IT workers, and more alarming than the fact that these under-desk scurriers actually have time to fill in surveys, is the fact that less than 20 per cent of them eat their recommended five-a-day.

Ignoring this medical mumbo jumbo - eating five apples doesn't count apparently and plays havoc with the colon - is done so at workers' peril. Fat Free Fitness recommends that you do something about it, such as eating the occasional sprout and getting half an hour's exercise five times a week, and we don't mean jogging to McDonalds so that you don't miss the early-bird  Egg McMuffins either.

And there was us thinking that you looked so pale, sallow, and unhealthy because of all the time you spend in the server room. With surveys like these you unlearn something every day.

November 17, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Shock news: The President of the United States of America actually has more important things to do than update his Twitter profile all day.

The news is rather surprising since the Prez has a rather active Twitter account, and actually one of this last posts reads, "In Singapore, continuing the visit to Asia." Strange then that while on this Asian trip Obama took time out to tell a group of Chinese students that he doesn't use Twitter now, and never has.

Twitter apparently has attained legendary status amongst Chinese students in much the same way that Bruce Springteen records and blue jeans used to have amongst Russian ones, so one of them took the opportunity to ask Obama whether he thought it was fair and right that they could not use it behind the Chinese firewall.

"I have never used Twitter but I'm an advocate of technology and not restricting internet access," he replied. Plainly so, as he obviously doesn't have a problem surrending his login details to his lackies.

Obama's account has some 2.7m followers and is one of those fancy 'verified' accounts. Regular readers will either be disappointed, or relieved that he has decided he has better things to do than tell people every time he goes to the toilet.

Perhaps the leader of the free world is trying to cosy up to Tory leader David Cameron in refusing to be associated too closely with the micro-blogging tool - a popular haunt for self-obsessed morons. Cameron famously told breakfast radio listeners a couple of months ago that politicians who use Twitter risk making "a twat" out of themselves.

November 16, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)

Google has added a new feature designed to help parents and teachers ensure that younglings are not looking at inappropriate material when using its search pages. However, Sneak thinks that the tool may also find favour in those workplaces where shoulder surfing is the best defence against desk-bound rudity.

Google has long offered a safe search feature, and workers have long turned it off, but from now on anyone who walks past a desk and sees a number of big balls at the top of the screen will know that the person is 'safe searching', as opposed to the opposite. So yeah, they weren't the balls you were thinking about.

"While no filter is 100 per cent accurate, SafeSearch helps you avoid content you may prefer not to see or would rather your children did not stumble across. We think it works pretty well, but we're always looking for ways to improve the feature", said Pete Lidwell, product manager at the firm. Should you not see the balls, you will be in a position to throw all sorts of accusations at the person involved. A past-time that Sneak particularly enjoys.

Of course, it is not an enterprise-specific tool, and obviously it isn't going to solve any ongoing workplace tom-foolery, but it might help in its own little way.

November 11, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sneak thinks that Stephen Fry can't ever have read the reviews for Jeeves and Wooster, his ITV update of the Wodehouse classics. Because if he had he would certainly have a thicker skin that it currently appears.

This week Sir Fry of Twittingdon was upset by one of his 900,000 devoted followers, who had the audacity to label one of his tweets 'boring'.  Fry responded, "Think I may have to give up on Twitter. Too much aggression and unkindness around. Pity. Well, it's been fun."

He's since said that the post was down to other issues, Fry is known to suffer from bipolar disorder, and admitted to feeling sheepish about the whole incident.

Sneak is saddened by the news and seeks to give Fry just this simple message. Feeling sheep only makes you feel better in the short term.

November 2, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sneak is rather impressed by the mightiness of one particular blogger's sword.

The operator of the Much&Brass blog obviously has a bit of a thing for his council representatives, and a rather critical eye. In fact so critical is he, that apparently his blogging has forced a number of council leaders to up and walk out of a meeting, and just because he called them 'jackasses' and some other flattering things (they want to try being Sneak!).

Niall Connolly is the blogger in question. He seems reluctant to accept responsibility for the incident, but Sneak would like to buy him a beer all the same.

The incident was covered live on the Much&Brass blog and went a little something like this, "about 33 minutes into the meeting, it all started to go Pete Tong...

The Vice Chair stood up, put on his jacket and started a brief speech about how he was sick and tired of something or other and how he was going to leave it all up to the Town. At that point it seemed like he was presenting his resignation and this stunning news was greeted by the audience with rapturous applause. This seemed to trigger of a convulsion of action on the part of most of the rest of the council. As one they rose up and the Chair was subject to a proverbial avalanche of resignation letters before he himself resigned."

According to the BBC, Ex-vice chairman and businessman Anthony Canvin, said, "I'm not going to tolerate it when I'm working for the town. I started it. I said 'I've had enough' and handed in my resignation."

Sneak thinks that whoever encouraged Mr Canvin to watch the Tom Cruise film, Jerry Maguire, the night before is owed a beer as well.

"Who's with me?"

October 30, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Here's another bit of news to file under the 'accident waiting to happen' banner, alongside 9/11, the economic downturn and Gordon Brown. Microsoft has pulled out of sponsoring a TV spin-off of risque cartoon Family Guy, after execs attended a taping of the show and found it to be, well, not a good fit with its core values.

Eyebrows were raised a couple of weeks ago when Redmond announced it was sponsoring the show, and not through regular advertising either, but by weaving Windows 7 messages into the script. Family Guy fans everywhere gasped; could the show which brutally lampoons the Fox Network on which it runs on an almost weekly basis, finally be going soft?

Well, thankfully, we'll never find out, as Family Guy Presents: Seth & Alex's Almost Live Comedy Show, to give it its full title, was decided to be "not a fit with the Windows brand". Who would have thought jokes about deaf people, the Holocaust, feminine hygiene and incest were not what Microsoft was quite looking for?

October 28, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Facebook apparently doesn't subscribe to the idea that when you lose contact with someone it is often for a good reason. Sneak, who once started a group on Facebook just for the pleasure of kicking everyone else off it, does.

Because of this, he's rather disappointed to have started to get messages via Facebook encouraging him to reconnect with people that in the real world he would choose to avoid through such drastic measures as hurling himself under a train.

Like some sort of pushy mother, concerned that her 33-year-old son doesn't have enough friends, Facebook, the social networking site, has become social busybody, and started hurling ghosts from the past into the faces of people who have probably suffered enough already.

The new feature, launched this weekend along with a confusing new Live Feed/Live News Feed split on the homepage, has not only irked Sneak, but also a lot of other users. Not least of all because it has in some cases urged them to reconnect with dead people, animals, and people that they used to be in relationships with.

The twitterati has of course gone mental for it. And everyone who ever thought of a snappy screen name for themselves and has 140 characters to burn has been quick to comment on the feature.

Sneak's favourite post so far comes from daveisanidiot, who sounds a lot like a sulky, younger brother pushed into hanging out with a sibling.

'Dave' said, "Facebook told me i should reconnect with my sister. You're not the boss of me Facebook!"

October 26, 2009 Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0)

Analysts at Gartner have urged IT leaders to adopt a 'pattern-based' strategy to driving business change.

The analysts say that there are four parts, or disciplines, to adhere to in order to make such a change, which seem to be just about paying attention to business trends and changes - something that makes sense even to Sneak's addled brain.

Regardless of that, however, the analysts have used a lot of clever terms to jazz it up. These include: pattern seeking, optempo (operational tempo) advantages, performance-driven culture, and transparency.

"A Pattern-Based Strategy provides a framework to proactively seek, model and adapt to leading indicators, often-termed 'weak' signals that form patterns in the marketplace," Gartner said, once again muddying Sneak's waters by suggesting that 'leading indicators' were 'weak signals'.

Val Sribar, group vice president of Research at Gartner, said, "We believe that significant market advantage will be gained by organisations that adopt all the disciplines needed to implement a Pattern-Based Strategy, and by those technology providers that seek to enable this transition." Sneak recommends waiting for the tech solution.

Ironically while discussing transparency, which Sneak always assumed was another word for clarity, the analysts added, "If organisations can proactively evolve transparency from a once-a-quarter financial-results event to using it to set the right expectations of seeking new patterns and responding with consistent results, this proactive use will enable them to enter new markets, gain access to funds that competitors can't access and demonstrate differentiation to customers and suppliers", at which point Sneak totally gave up and defenestrated himself.

Punters can find out more about pattern-based strategies at one of Gartner's upcoming symposiums. Sneak will stick with his own PBS, which in his own small little world, means making sure that his socks match.

October 23, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Windows 7 is out now and Microsoft is spending rather a large amount of time and money on stunts designed to raise awareness of something that you are probably already reminded of every time you turn on the telly, walk down the road, or heaven forbid, use your Windows Vista machine.

It takes a lot to impress Sneak, but it looks like Microsoft has finally managed to do just that. Having spent far too long this morning scouring the net for marketing lunacy Sneak has finally found his favourite piece of complimentary marketing fun - an insanely large Burger King burger from the land that bought us dolphin game fishing, and bizarre cartoons ... Japan.

The Windows 7 burger looks like it could choke a horse, or a very hungry Japanese salaryman, and has made us weep for cows everywhere. Not only does it come with two halves of a bun, and a nod in the direction of some salad, but the bastard creation boasts seven burgers! Seven, get it?

Apparently it will cost you about £5, or if you prefer, heartburn and a rather bloated tummy.

October 22, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Lucky couch potatoes with an aversion to high streets can now expect Amazon to deliver their items on the same day that they order them.

You have to be around til eight in the evening, but we suspect that the firm isn't really pitching the service at people that get out much, and the firm isn't offering weekend deliveries. Which seems fair.

The same day service is currently only available in the US and even there only in a number of states. For example if you live in New York, the city that never sleeps, you can order goods for same day delivery up to 10am in the morning, meanwhile people in Las Vegas, the city that never goes to bed, can order up til 11am - which depending on whether you are working there or living there, is either early in the morning or very late at night. The other cities covered are Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston, Washington DC and Baltimore

This means that the morbidly obese in San Francisco will still have to hop on a tram to go and buy their books and whatnot. Girish Lakshman, vice president of Transportation at Amazon said, "We're continuously working to speed up delivery times and customers receiving items on the same day as ordered is an exciting step. Now, if a customer needs a last-minute present for a birthday or wants a copy of their book club book before the weekend starts, they can order from Amazon instead of the hassle of a last-minute trip to the mall."

Yeah man. Forget all THAT hassle...

October 16, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)