Erwin van Lun's Mensmerk.nl

Japan uses QR codes to deduce the origin of food products. This allows you to determine where food comes from and whether it comes from somewhere safe and healthy. By checking the QR codes with a suitable reader you're led to a website which tells you the product's story. From origin to the way of growing the food to the shelf it's on at the moment.

A robot that can think using rat's brains has been developed at the University of Reading. The robot can avoid objects without the use of additional support from humans or technology. The brains aren't physically located in the robot, but are kept in a food-rich environment. They communicate with the robot using Bluetooth.

With TinEye, a new search engine, people can use a picture to look for similar ones. Useful if you're looking for a pretty version of something. After uploading a photo, TinEye gets to work. It can also help photographers track their work on the internet. It's still a beta-version, but on the site you can find a few cool examples.

Emily is an artificial character that moves exactly like a human being. She is, after all, based on the video recording of a real person. And copied so precisely that you can't tell the difference. As such Emily displays all the emotions that a regular human being would also display.

This screen acts like a normal mirror, until you stand in front of it a little longer. Then your reflection will slowly disappear.

Disney World, the theme park in Florida, can be found on Google Earth in complete 3D vision. On this page there's a video and instructions.

The NS, the Dutch railway company has built a 3D station world on virtueelproefstation.nl. Here consumers can test the new Leiden trainstation, that'll be the pilot station for others in the Netherlands. The website can only be run properly under Internet Explorer. Furthermore the 3D model can be seen on Google Earth. This way choices that are expensive in the physical world can be tested more easily. The site is a part of the website mijnproefstation.nl where the NS shares a lot of information about surveys in new stations and where consumers can react. There are also, for example, contests for children that can share their vision. (This 3D information is found under the heading 'entertainment'.)

This new photo frame by Kodak is connected to Flickr through a wireless home network. It automatically shows you the newest photos on your own photostream, of those of someone else if they register on your photos (and if they're public). You can also look up the news, weather and sports through the touch screen. Obviously you can also play videos. Other than that, the frame fronts can be replaced by something more suited to one's own interior.

On HappyMeal.com, the children's gaming site of McDonald's, McDonald's has made an announcement about a new version of this site (the HTML title is after all Happy Meal 3.0). In this world children can meet each other, chat, watch videos, dress up their avatar, above all play lots of games.

In a contest children can suggest a name for this world and then vote on it. At the moment they can choose between ScaddImon (a mixture of McDonalds letters), McD Zone, McDonaldLandia, McIsland, McWorld (of which the last is winning and the .nl domain name is still free too.) There's also a link to the physical McDonalds: who enters a code from a Happy Meal box or bag, or other products, can gain exclusive items.

An outfit designed by a player of The Sims 2 is now available in almost 1,000 H&M stores world-wide. The clothes are the result of a design contest in which all Sims-players could take part. The context involved designed a piece of clothing based on the style of H&M. The uploaded creations could then be seen in six virtual fashion shows. Entries by at least 1,000 designers were judged by over 100,000 people. It generated around 500 million impressions. The winning design is recognizable in H&M stores by a special The Sims 2 label and brand.

The technology to copy humans with animations is going ever further. In this movie you can see that movements are built up from the bone and onwards. This makes animation far more realistic.

Marek Michalowski of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, US, and Hideki Kozima of the National Institute of Communications Technology (NICT) in Kyoto, Japan, programmed the squishy, yellow robot, called “Keepon”, to pick out the beat in a piece of music and move along in time. It can also track the rhythmic motion of a person or another object and move in time to that. Inside the hollow robot’s silicone body are motors, wires and a mechanical device called a gimbal that tugs it like a reversed marionette. Keepon responds by nodding, bobbing, twisting and shaking in time to audio or visual stimulation.

Google launches its own 3d world under the name Lively. In this world users can create avatars, communicate with others and build their own spaces and objects.

Dutch popfestival Lowlands is now also available on the iPhone. Not just the map, but also the program can be seen. What's playing now on which field? It happens in the blink of an eye.

Dutch housing site Jaap now also shows homes that have been placed for free on second-hand site 2dehands.nl by individuals. This allows consumers to sell their home without the use of a broker through a big housing site. 2dehands.nl is currently the only Dutch demand and answer site that offers this service for free. Currently around 1,000 of the individual homes are transferred to Jaap.nl.