I went to a website the other day after hearing a link on the radio and noted with interest that they had included my IP address at the bottom of every page I visited in BIG BOLD LETTERS!

Thank you..

Having had the same static IP address for the last 5 years I actually know my IP address, although it does leave me to wonder though, why they thought this was a good idea.

It does nothing at all to enhance the site and just serves as a distraction. It may also cause some alarm in none technical users who are unaware that all web servers need this information to serve the requested page.

Noting visitors IP addresses should only ever be done on checkout pages of shopping carts, usually along the lines of "To protect against fraud, your IP address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx has been recorded". 

The other completely unnecessary addition to a website is the visitor counter. I occasionally I get requests from clients to include some form of  counter on their site, something that I am loath to do on a commercial web site. While I have one on this site, I feel it is generally out of place in most applications and in the end no one really cares how many visits you have had.

Personal websites are the only place that I would add a visitor counter. Commercial sites do not need them.

All decent commercial web hosting packages should give you access to statistical analysis that will translate the data from the servers logs to something that is easy to understand.

If that's not enough, Google offer some fantastic web tools including analytics which can track where your viewers are coming from.

It's well known that I am someone who loves gadgets and I've always had an interest in consumer electronics and computers.

As a result, I have quite a few toys around my house and, having children, I am also forever turning things off after them. The biggest areas of forgetfulness being the entertainment system and their computer, both often left on long after the play has stopped.

They are getting better though, remembering to turn off the TV after watching but many an evening I have come home to find the house in darkness but the lounge room faintly lit by the glow coming from the display on the amplifier.

On the weekend I was in the hardware shop and was wandering through the electrical section looking for something that would allow me to turn off all the power to the various componants attached to the television but I didn't expect to find something as cool as this..

A powerboard with a master socket and four slave sockets which, when power is cut to the main one (ie. by turning the device attached off) the slave ones also lose their power.

Genius!

It was market as a "green" device designed to save you around $70 a year based on shutting down items that normally have a standby mode, such as audio visual equipment but conceivably it's going to save more than that because, once set up it shuts down all the equipment that forgetful people leave when they turn the TV off. 

I have the TV now plugged into the master socket and when it goes onto standby mode it shuts off power to everything else. 

Now.. to get them to turn their computer off!