

By Kate Russell

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Kate Russell gives us her latest selection of the best sites on the World Wide Web. Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. CYBER MENTORS (www.cybermentors.org.uk) Cyber Mentors The Internet can be a worrying place for children, especially when you hear stories about online bullying. Cyber Mentors is a UK charity and a community where children can get support and advice from other children, as well as trained professionals - whether they are experiencing problems online or out in the physical world. The young volunteers who make up the cyber mentor fellowship have all been trained by the charity to be children's first port of call if they feel they cannot talk about their problems with a grown-up. They will support and encourage youngsters - urging them to go to a parent or teacher - but there are also councillors available to deal with any serious issues. Since the site went live a few months ago they have helped 70,000 children, and have just trained up their 1,000th volunteer. Users need to register to talk to a mentor, and they do ask for some details about your mobile phone, which the site's creators say is not used for marketing purposes - just their own internal research. DETOUCH (http://detouch.org) The Art of DeTouch The media is often criticised for presenting a distorted view of society with fashion magazines and Sunday supplements crammed with images of impossibly beautiful people. But they are not as perfect as they look. DeTouch.org lays bare the tricks and cheats used in photographic publishing, showing you what those picture perfect models looked like before the touch-up artist got involved. Drawing from a number of online sources where before and after photographs are displayed, this site uses an open source tool called Processing to compare the images pixel by pixel and generate visualizations of the alterations. Waists are sucked in, chests pumped out. Lines and shadows smoothed and removed. There is even one lady who has had an eye shifted up - all in the pursuit of creating the illusive perfect beauty. SEA SALT WITH FOOD (www.seasaltwithfood.com) Hasselback potatoes are one of the recipes on Seasaltwithfood.com Sea Salt with Food I love food - and not just eating it. I love to cook for friends and family, creating stunning starters, magnificent mains, and of course a totally delightful dessert. Seasaltwithfood.com is a scrumptious blog providing some of the easiest recipes to create the most amazing meals. The site caught my attention with the recipe for hasselback potatoes. This Swedish variation of the baked potato makes my mouth water every time I look at it - and it really could not be easier to make. All the recipes are beautifully illustrated with clear and concise instructions on how to make them. From Malaysian prawn fritters to irresistible chocolate tarts there is something to appeal to every taste in these pages. Subscribe to the RSS feed for regular home deliveries of tempting ideas to concoct in your kitchen. If you are looking for inspiration for a specific occasion you can surf the recipes by category from the panel on the right. OMEGLE (http://omegle.com) Omegle Sitting down for a chat with a total stranger is not something we generally do in our day to day lives, but the results can be fascinating as I found out when I tried Omegle.com. This is one of those curiosities where you will never have the same experience twice. No registration is required, and you are thrown into a two-way conversation with a complete stranger on the Net. You are represented as a stranger and there are no defining features in this chat which give away age, race, sex or whatever. It allows you to anonymously have a completely frank and unbiased conversation with someone. This is not a site for younger users, as with any content of this nature, you are going to come across the odd bad egg who might randomly spam you with abusive language. There is a disconnect button. It is a fascinating insight into the diversity of life and culture on the Web.



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