You may or may not know that TechRadar has many sister magazines in print in the UK and abroad. MacFormat, PC Plus, PC Format, Home Cinema Choice are just a few of them – there are currently ten in total – the number is growing.

One of these sister titles – the venerable PC Answers magazine, no less – received a very interesting piece of snail mail this morning.

It was a handwritten letter from a 419 scammer in Nigeria, who was offering to promote "the PC Answers" in exchange for the meagre fee of a brand new laptop, a projector and a fat wad of cash.

Excerpts:

"Permit me to say that I admire the PC Answers," begins Frederick Akabai Fidel of Rivers State in Nigeria, in his hand-scrawled note.

"Having perused the noted previous publications of the 'PC Answers' here in Nigeria, I Frederick Fidel an undergraduate of the Rivers State University of Science and Technology would like would like projecting the magazine Continuously via 'Allstates newspapers' and other National publications- which I serve as one of the distributors," he writes.

Translation: I'd like to promote your magazine because it's so awesome.

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It was only a few short months ago that we were reporting on the white-hot HD war between Toshiba's HD DVD format and the BDA's Blu-ray Disc.

At IFA 2007 (and 2006 for that matter), we reported from various press conferences. Blu-ray Disc Association members bravely bragged that Blu-ray was on the verge of slaying HD DVD. And likewise, Toshiba was insisting that the HD DVD format would prevail despite the odds stacking up against it.

Eventually, the HD DVD format fell on its sword and conceded the industry to Blu-ray. Those people who bought BD players and PS3's rejoiced. And those who'd bought Toshiba HD DVD players were miffed and cried into their morning oats.

But if you're one of those irritated HD DVD early adopters, you've got one last chance to laugh in the face of all those smug Blu-ray owners.

Because while most Blu-ray Disc movies still cost around £18, you can now snap up a plethora of HD DVD titles from just £2.99.

Indeed, there are plenty of HD DVD movies available online for £2.99, which aren't even available on Blu-ray yet.

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With a vague taste of sick in the back of my mouth, I've been reading the press coverage of the recent BPI announcement.

In case you missed it, the British Phonographic Industry has rounded up the six biggest UK ISP's and collectively they're sending out letters to thousands of us, telling us not to steal music on the internet - or else.

Unfortunately, the reaction across the board seems to be a whitewashed, 'oh my golly gosh, how dare they do such a thing'.

The music press has reacted angrily. Forums are buzzing with comments made no-doubt by outraged teenagers.

Not so simple

Most people would agree that the music biz is in this mess because of its own failings - it entirely failed to embrace the web in the early years. And then Napster arrived in 1999 and the music world changed forever.

However, just because the music business failed to notice the internet until too late, it doesn't mean we all have a right to go out there and illegally download as much music as we please.

It's an extremely complicated situation, and it was quite refreshing to read comments by Mark Mulligan, an analyst at JupiterResearch.

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The 'press release of the day' trophy goes to Focus PR, who sent out a dire warning this afternoon.

Chills thundered down the spines of every person in the TechRadar office when we read these alarming words:

"VHS tapes are at high risk of being destroyed all thanks to a virulent mould which is destroying tapes at an exponential rate across the UK"

Tape-eating mould

Yep, apparently a weird strain of necrotising mutant mould has decided that it doesn't like eating away at stale bread anymore and has lost its penchant for days-old take-away. It now much prefers invading your treasured VHS tape collection and gobbling up your recordings.

According to one mould colony which prefered to remain anonymous, illegal copies of Jurassic Park taste very gamey, while BBC drama taped off the telly tastes very much like chicken.

Rumour has it that this special super-mould chooses to eat the tapes with the best stuff on it, first - it has good taste. So beware! Lock up your wedding video and hide the porn. And ye Gods remember to preserve your copy of Steven Seagal's Under Siege - mould is coming to ruin your life!

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Eight months ago, we discovered that Facebook had suddenly become more popular than online free porn.

And this week we found out that the site has finally overtaken MurdochSpace as the King of social networking.

Facebook it seems, is unique in its ability to make everyone hate it with a passion, and yet it still manages to tempt most people into logging in multiple times a day.

I used to think Facebook was the cat's pyjamas. I was full of praise two years ago. These days however, I find the site every bit as irritating as that tiny bit of toenail that always catches when you put your socks on.

It's like the brittle sludge that sticks to the top of tomato ketchup bottles in dirty pubs – bad enough to induce general abhorrence, but not so irritating as to persuade people to do anything about it - we all need ketchup, after all.

We get a lot of emails about Facebook and all its annoying quirks. So after collating them and polling the TechRadar team, here's our list of the top five most annoying things about Facebook.

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