The tracks will be MP3-encoded, and unencumbered by DRM, the firm said. A representative said that the files will be encoded at 192Kbps.

Advertisers will pay We7 between £0.30 and £0.60 per download, and by listening to an ad-supported song a few times the consumer wins rights to access a version without a commercial. The firm is quoted in today's Times saying "three, four or five" listens will be needed.

The ads will be demographically-targeted on age, location and gender, but the option will be there for fans to pay for tunes sans-sponsorship from the get-go if they want; the rep said that 320Kbps was under review for these customers. The We7 site also has a limited Last.fm-style social recommendation facility.

It emerged earlier this year that legal download sales growth was beginning to flatline, and the record industry continues to examine its busness model in the face of declining global revenues.

Unfortunately, We7 doesn't have the backing of any of the four major labels: EMI, Warner, Sony BMG and Universal, who are keen to get paid every time anyone hears anything they own a slice of. Accordingly, Gabriel is pushing the indie angle. He said: "We7 provides artists - even across the more experimental or minority genres - with the opportunity to build a new source of income from their music."

However, the majors control about 80 per cent of the global music market, and therefore access to the mainstream casual music consumers who are least likely to object to adverts being grafted onto their music. [Mainstream music? Adverts? What's the difference? Ed.]

Don't give up

We7 will be run by Steve Purdham, who founded British censorware developer Surf Control, which sold to Websense for £201m last week. Purdham said that We7 will have only a few thousand songs when it comes out of beta in July. iTunes topped a million back in 2004, so We7's licensing people have a way to go if it intends to be a genuine competitor, rather than a niche curio.

The ad-supported model is by no means unique either. Way back in August last year, US start-up Spiralfrog attracted much international fanfare by announcing its download service, which had received Universal's blessing. It was supposed to have launched before Christmas, but is still only available as a limited trial for Canadian residents.

Gnutella-based P2P ad-supported service QTrax signed up Sony BMG last week, but on the proviso it would drench music in DRM to allow only a few free plays.

History may have a lesson to give here. Gabriel's last download company, OD2/Loudeye, was sold to Nokia last year for $60m. Nokia coughed for the technology behind Loudeye, rather than the brand.

A similar fate for We7's dynamic ad-grafting platform - being swallowed a firm with more negotiating grunt with the majors - isn't difficult to imagine. ®

A Japanese actress inadvertantly blew the lid off a scam which had duped thousands of women into buying coiffured sheep in the belief they were poodles, the Evening Standard reports.

Maiko Kawakami appeared on a TV talk show with snaps of her pet, and admitted she wondered why it "didn't bark and refused to eat dog food". She was soon set straight - her dog was in fact a sheep.

The revelation provoked a stream of women to contact the cops with "similar problems". The powers that be reckon that as many as 2,000 have fallen victim to the audacious ovine poodle con, perpetrated by internet company "Poodles as Pets", which offered the animals at £630 a pop.

A police spokesman told The Sun: "We launched an investigation after we were made aware that a company was selling sheep as poodles. Sadly, we think there is more than one company operating in this way. The sheep are believed to have been imported from overseas - Britain and Australia."

In case you're wondering how on God's Green Earth you could mistake a sheep for a dog, the Standard explains that poodles are "extremely rare in Japan, with many people having little idea what they look like". No, we're not convinced either. ®

UK airline pilots spot giant UFO

'Mile wide' mystery object hovers off Channel Islands

Japan says it is going to roll out (or possibly levitate out) a network of "maglev" trains by 2025. It will be the first commercial magnetic levitation line anywhere in the world outside of China, which has one line running in its Shanghai province.

The trains will have a top speed of 310mph and will run between Tokyo and Nagoya, the BBC reports. Eventually, authorities plan to extent the line to run to Osaka. This route is currently served by the famous "Bullet Trains", which have a top speed of 186mph.

The Chinese track cost around £63m per mile, according to reports.

Maglev tracks, for anyone who has fallen behind on their science fiction reading, hold their trains aloft thanks to powerful electromagnets. Because the trains don't actually touch the rails, there is considerably less friction, meaning they can run much faster.

Inevitably, there will be questions over the safety and reliability of the technolgy, after a fatal crash last year at a test track in Germany. Both Japan and Germany have test lines running.

The UK, which ran the first ever commercial magnetic levitation service, has no plans to reprise the technology*, since it would be too expensive to install. But for 11 years, the UK ran a low speed shuttle between Birmingham airport and its railway station. The system was swapped for a pulley-based shuttle in 1995, after it was hit by reliability issues. ®

*Not in England anyway. The Scots are doing it for themselves, apparently. Thanks to Vulture-eyed Adrian Jones for the tip.

The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed -- for lack of a better word -- is good.

Greed is right.

Greed works.

Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.

Greed, in all of its forms -- greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge -- has marked the upward surge of mankind

Some of the best night's I ever had out happen to be at Lazerdrome a Drum and bass club in the heart of Peckham south London. Top notch and I  would get the VIP and guest list for my brother and a few friends as we would put it ( it would always surprise Barrington as it was between 15-30 people on our list alone) Sandra was always kind to us but I guess back then me and notch had such kind faces lol.

More than not Notch and I would be in the club way before the doors opened playing on the video games chatting to security or listening to Mc Reality ( often wonder what happened to him) warming up. Bigatron then an MC and Swift would make us laugh all night it was hard to go up stairs when they stood side by side. I remember swift telling us how he would be on radio soon it turned out to be Kool FM.

 I guess we found it so thrilling as so many of our friends got to do what they did best at lazerdrome "PARTY".

I was reminded by these days by seeing a pic of Ash- A- Tack on a friend's site and remembered him Mcing for Gachet on a few occasions.  

Journalism used to mean something.

We openly criticism our political figures when they fail to impress, and as a journalist it's your job to write the truth. For the editors to not allow you to report the truth it shows they are in the corporate pocket.

 If you cannot publish the truth how can we trust anything a journalist says ( not that I ever believe much in the news these days anyway) or the media as they will always be swayable by the corporations with the biggest pocket. Do not get me wrong the media is often swayed by the corporate figure but that is a sign of bad greedy editorial staffers.

To some degree you have to court the corporate figures to gain access to the exclusive interview or news. Yet when that turns in to no longer printing the truth then how dose that journalist sleep at night?

What ever happened to good old journalism no swayed by political or corporate gain?

Is there any media groups that stand independent of corporate and political sway?

How often are we actually told the truth rather than the swayed opinion of the journalist and editorial staffers?

Windows Vista suffers from a bug that causes many machines to stall while deleting, copying and moving files, a flaw that has provoked consternation in online forums.

"I've seen this bug in action, and trust me, it's as if you're copying over a 64k link using only 256mb of RAM," one Reg reader complained. "To add to the problem, you can't cancel or anything."

According to a thread on Microsoft's TechNet site, Microsoft has issued a hotfix for the problem, but it has failed to quell the outrage. For one thing, individual users must get Microsoft's approval before the fix can be downloaded, according to our tipster. And for another, hotfixes are more of a pain to install than patches.

We've contacted a Microsoft spokeswoman, who promised to see if a patch for the problem in the works. Meanwhile, Vista users continue to grumble.

MY Hip hop top 10

Strictly Business          1988 –  Epmd

RAW                             1988 -  Big daddy Kane

Microphone Fiend        1988 -  Eric B. and Rakim

Don't Scandalize Mine  1988 - Sugar bear

Bring the Noise            1988  - Public Enemy

Rebel Without a Pause 1988  - Public Enemy

Jam On Revenge          1983  - Newcleus

Criminal Minded          1987 -  Boogiedown Productions

Make It Funky             1987 -  Ice T

Down by Law               1987 -  MC Shan