It has been sometime since I've seen a public MSN Messenger bot based on Blobsy, a PHP-based Messenger bot framework I developed a couple of years ago. So I was quite surprised to see the Thailand-based Lady Yang bot when its developer informed me about it recently.

The bot, billed as "Lady Yang - The Gay Cupid that help you find friend or lover" on its site, makes interesting use of the Blobsy framework by adapting it to build a dating chat bot. The main function of the bot seems to be its "matchmaker" mode, which requires users to enter some details about themselves in order to assign an "animal" to match the user's personality. Users can then search for matching users that have the same "animal" as themselves.

This is certainly a departure from the usual applications that I've seen Blobsy put to use! Good luck to the developer.

The BBC regularly broadcasts quality, extremely interesting science programmes that, at least in my opinion, exceeds that which you may find on the popular science and nature channels like National Geographic or Discovery. I just watched the first episode of the new nature series called Life which began airing on BBC One last week. The first episode opens with breath-taking shots of a pod of very smart dolphins that have developed the strategy of kicking up a cloud of mud in a tight circle to entrap the fast moving, hard to catch fish that they call their food. The awe-inspiring footage continued throughout the episode with various other animals and plants.

If this first episode is indicative of what's to expect, then this is definitely a series I would definitely reserve some telly time for. Life is available for viewing and download at http://www.bbc.co.uk/life. If you do watch it, make sure you watch it in HD - it's worth it. There is also some interesting supplementary material on the dedicated series mini-site by the co-producer The Open University.

I would also recommend catching the BBC's Bang Goes the Theory science series which takes a very hands-on approach and is especially great for kids. I love the little projects that Jem undertakes in each episode!