Bangu Prison is likely a lonely enough place for the two poor lads who popped over to enjoy a bit of sport for the summer. Pat Hickey and John Delaney would appear to have years of (alleged) debauchery and swindling catching up with them. Fortunately, technology can help even those who are (allegedly) up a certain creek without the O’Donovan brother’s paddles. So assuming Pat and John could get their hands on a smartphone, what are the most helpful apps they should download?
Tripadvisor to review Bangu Prison
First of all, when travelling the world and seeing the sights, Tripadvisor acts as a fantastic guide to ensure you always see the best bits. Right now, Pat and John might be a little limited in what they can review. With that said, we’re interested to see how the two lads rate the standard of food and hairdressing inside Bangu Prison.
Ticketmaster/Vibe could have avoided this mess
We do feel for the lads. Simply trying to sell off a few tickets they had acquired. Little did they know tech could have helped. Ticketmaster has been providing a fast and convenient way of buying tickets for years. Perhaps even more fitting is Voom Finalist Vibe.
Startup Vibe is a new platform allowing people to sell tickets to each other at face-value. Ironically, we previously covered this app during Ireland’s Euro 2016 campaign as the touts were out in force. If only Pat and John knew such avenues were open to them.
Duolingo to brush on up their Portuguese
Sharing a prison cell with Felipe who doesn’t speak a word of English is rough. The lads could be in for quite a lonely time. Duolingo is a fantastic resource for anyone to brush up on their language skills, or learn from scratch. If Pat and John get their hands on a smartphone, this should be the first app they download. The cúpla focail as Portuguese could be a life saver for the two lads as they try to continue their life of schmoozing in Bangu Prison.
Snapchat for disposable pictures
For any of these apps to benefit Pat and John, the pair will first have to get their hands on a new smartphone. The reason being Brazilian police have confiscated their own phones. Police interest in phones means they are looking for texts and photos. Now, the last thing the two lads want the police to find is them rolling around a Rio bed covered in Olympic Tickets. Snapchat provides just the perfect app for the job, with self-destructing photos.
Snapchat also has the added benefit of being able to return the locks of hair Pat has reportedly lost on entrance to Bangu Prison. Daily Snapchat filter updates with different hairstyles and generally humorous augmented reality scenarios will surely keep spirits high.
RTÉ Player to keep up with current affairs
There is a fair chance that Bangu Prison officials aren’t keeping the lads up to date with progress in their cases. Pat also had the bad luck of being nabbed before the Olympic games ended. A great way for the lads to pass the time is RTÉ Player and keeping up with the latest news in their cases. It’ll also give them a great avenue to watch the final few days of Olympic events they missed. It’s not like they won’t have the time.
Twitter purely for Paddy Barnes
It’s debatable as to whether or not this is a good idea. Believe it or not, the two lads have had a nation’s anger directed towards them for their ticket touting shenanigans. Not least of whom is boxing light flyweight and social media heavyweight, Paddy Barnes. Paddy was quick out of the blocks as he heard about Pat’s capture. Not one to miss an opportunity is our Paddy.
@olympiccouncil can I have Pats 1st class ticket home?
— Paddy Barnes (@paddyb_ireland) August 18, 2016
Netflix
True crime has become a hot topic lately, with the likes of “Making a Murderer” capturing the world’s attention. In the fallout of the series, one of the main protagonists might even get out early. There are plenty of other shows to keep Pat and John busy once they finish the true crime stuff too. Let’s not forget Netflix boasts “Orange is the New Black”.
Pat Hickey and John Delaney can probably expect an extended stay in Bangu Prison. While they might be there for a long time, it doesn’t have to be a bad time. Thankfully, technology should help time fly past for them.
Those ads you see on Facebook claiming to be selling magical Android TV boxes are indeed offering an alternative. It’s somewhat of a grey area if you can throw your mind back to the Showbox days, it’s very similar. Dreamboxes are effectively Android TV boxes, and will set you back anywhere between €70 to €150. The humble Android TV box comes in many shapes and sizes and run everything from Kodi to Showbox and beyond. Dreamboxes are setup with Kodi to stream access to premium sports and movies. This does come with a warning that the party is unlikely to last forever and is, at best, a legal grey area. Still, several benefits of having an Android TV box are completely legit making them great value.
Have you ever heard Kodi or XBMC mentioned? If you already know what it is, great – for those of you who don’t know what it is, it’s an all in one media centre app, it can provide streaming for music, video and more, but wait. Kodi is also the brains behind the Dreambox replacing your TV subscriptions, but again remember this is a grey area.
Wunderlist is a must have for those seeking to inject a bit of organisation into their lives. Such a craving for organisation normally comes during the planning phase of a wedding. Our in-depth research (a season and a half of “
Yes, you need to have a wedding hashtag. A hashtag has become one of the most interactive and rewarding elements of a smart wedding. By deciding upon a unique hashtag and making it known to your guests, you are growing the number of photographers present exponentially. Your smart wedding hashtag will also act as a unique identifier for IFTTT – which we will discuss later.
It’s perfect timing for Samsung to release their new watch as smart watch sales 
From the teaser images Samsung has released, we expect the watch to have a rounded face. This seems to be the preferable trend from smart watch consumers. They seem to want to keep their watches similar to your standard watch, but with the added perks of it… well… being smart.
A great crowd in attended the launch of Samsung’s latest superphone at Dublin’s 
The Note7 is slightly bigger than the Galaxy S7 Edge. On paper, that equates to a 5.7″ screen versus a 5.5″ screen. Side by side, you would be hard-pressed to tell the two handsets from each other. Holding the handset doesn’t make it any easier to tell the two apart. You wouldn’t notice the bigger Note7’s design as it fits really snugly in your palm. The curved edges of the screen is extremely subtle and the blue model is gorgeous – much nicer that the blue Galaxy S5 that we feared was being resurrected.
Lots of the hardware onboard the Note7 echoes the Galaxy S7/S7 Edge, but two big features stood out on the bottom of the device. Many of those accessories you have will no longer be directly compatible with the Note7 as Samsung finally opt for a USB-C charging port. For the user, this means faster data transfers, faster charging and the knowledge that the local pub is unlikely to be able to give you a charge.
You won’t feel like you’re living in a futuristic world until you unlock your 
Production delays led to delays in the availability of the Gear 360. Such delays should be in the past now, as the latest in image capturing was on show at the Note7 event. Combined with the companion app, users can capture stunning 360 images with no visible stitch line. The Gear 360 is rumoured to be entering the market at £450 so whether or not it will be accessible remains to be seen.
Quite the opposite to the Gear 360 is the Gear VR. Coming in at just €99, the Gear VR is an affordable alternative to high-end virtual reality devices. The latest, black version, of the Gear VR will be much like the model that shipped with the Galaxy S7. Notable differences included an updated touchpad and interchangeable connections for micro-USB and USB-C.
The wearable accessory specialists offer a wide range of bands for various smartwatch users. Some of the pioneers of the market feature including our beloved 
The range of colours available ensures all users will find a band that suits their taste. Better still, the options are not limited to the colour of band, but the combination of band colour with buckle style. You can choose a buck from a nice variety, including brushed steel and rose gold.
And to our favourite feature: the quick release. Obviously, given our desire to find a band that we could quickly pop off and swap out, traditional watch straps simply wouldn’t cut it. The guys over at Clockwork include the quick release functionality seen on the official Huawei Watch bands, making it extremely convenient to change between business and sports.
Tynker is a web based coding application
ScratchJr is an online tool providing written and animated guides for coding. Kids can create their own stories and watch them afterwards. We already imagine the kids loving the look on your face as you watch their creation unfold, making this a great bonding opportunity.
This is 16-year-old Josh Bell. Last year, Josh’s company turned over £250,000. This company, founded in Josh’s bedroom, was a hotel-booking website which over 95,000 hotels signed up to. The idea started after a conversation with a hotel owner and at the age of 15 he owned a company. Josh achieved these amazing feats because of self-taught coding. Imagine the possibilities for a generation immersed in coding. That’s why we believe in coding for kids.
With many ISPs blocking access to the Pirate Bay, the first port of call for users is often using a proxy site. A proxy site is a carbon copy of the original site on a different domain, allowing users to bypass roadblocks. Right now, if you Google search for 
Google regularly displays rich content at the top of searches – Rio 2016 (above) being a great example. A very similar snippet appears for Pirate Bay proxies. Listed for the user are sites broken down by how fast they operate. Such a service, while likely automated, is some sort of showing from Google that file sharing doesn’t really bother them.