More and more companies are looking at ways of making computing and accessing the Internet accessible to those with disabilities. For example, researchers unveiled a "mental typewriter" controlled by thought alone at the recent CeBit electronics fair in Hanover, Germany.

Researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute and the medical school of Berlin Humboldt University are developing the computer interface so paralysed people can operate computers.

The Berlin Brain-Computer Interface (BBCI) allows anyone to type messages onto a computer screen by mentally controlling the movement of a cursor. As described on the project's site, BBCI records cerebral electric activity via electrodes attached to the scalp. The signals are amplified and transmitted to the computer, which transforms them into device control commands.

Other researchers, this time from Spain, claim to have invented the first keyboard to combine the function and movement keys we normally use with eight Braille keys that allow the user to write in any language. The keyboard was developed by researcher Jordi Roig of the Universitat Aut?noma de Barcelona, Spain.

He has been visually impaired for three years. His aim was to make a computer much easier for blind people who are accustomed to using Braille typewriters.

He also geared it to help blind people work with mathematical formulae and musical scorewriter programmes. Until now, assistance was required from a sighted person for these kinds of tasks he says. Users can select between a cumulative and a corrective writing mode. In the cumulative mode, the dots of a Braille symbol are indicated by pressing the keys one after another. In the corrective mode, this is done by pressing the necessary keys simultaneously.Yesterday I received a new smarter type of e-mail scam that almost had me fooled (I wasn't going to accept. For the first few paragraphs I really thought someone was trying to hire me). Avoid pitches like this, which is simply another attempt to find a way to your bank account.

"I am writing to inquire if you might be interested in part-time employment with our company," the writer says. "Baikal Finance, Ltd. is a registered investment advisor offering hedge fund research and due diligence and investment trust management to sophisticated investors looking for absolute returns."

Then it goes on to say it needs someone to act as receivables clerks/associates in the US. As a receivables clerk/associate, you will be in charge of processing investment funds transfers supposedly initiated by US clients under the supervision of a regional manager. The scam: "Your core responsibility will be to receive the investment funds from our clients into your designated account, reconcile the payments if required and transfer the funds into our investment accounts. You will be in charge of contacting your bank in order to obtain transfer status information and confirmations, as well as handling daily communications with your bank."

This in return for a three percent commission. You'll never see it I bet. This seems to be a scam to get hold of your account details. There is no website www.baikal-finance.net . There exists a Baikal Finance Group. It is the one that gained control of a Russian gas company, Yuganskneftegas, for $9.37bn in 2004.Google continues to innovate, launching for a select few a Web page creator publishing program. The online software is in test mode, available to a few Gmail account holders. If you're one go to http://pages.google.com and sign up. Google is overloaded with requests for its beta Web publishing tool, called Page Creator, so you might have to wait, as I am. As described by Google the software lets you create web pages in your browser and publish them for free on a Google server with an address like "http://yourgmailusername.googlepages.com".