According to Mark Ward, technology correspondent for the BBC News website, "Shadows are being used by Japanese researchers as an non-intrusive way for friends to stay in touch."

Eh..? Sneak tries not to get sucked into this kind of thing. Mostly because he finds that often it is his shadow that intrudes on his friends – when it is illuminated on their back wall as he peers through their window. Because of this, whenever 'shadows' are mentioned Sneak blushes so deeply that even his shadow looks like that radioactive bloke off the porridge adverts.

Anyway, he hasn't just been caught peeking, and it is not April 1, so Sneak will indulge Mr Ward, even if he will only skim-read his article.

Called Teleshadow the system sends video from one house to another, much like a web cam does. But, and here is where the shadow bit comes in, it turns the images into lovely shadowy outlines and projects them onto the inside of a lamp. This means that you can kind of interact with your friends, in as much as you could ever sort of interact with a lamp that has some flickering shadows on it.

Sneak – who doesn't see glasses as half full or half empty, but rather, as being potentially poisoned, is deeply concerned about all this.

How annoying if one evening you forgot to turn it off at your end, or your friend did at the other. What they might be getting up to – especially in Japan – is one of those thoughts that boggles the most sternest of minds.

And that is not the only reason why Sneak will avoid this sort prototype invention. Having once spent a night in a tent, with a tube of ointment and a rather embarrassing part of his body, all the while back-lit by a torch against the canvas, Sneak has had more than enough of scaring people with his shadow, and will now focus on his privacy, wherever he goes.