Here in the States, we've got our fair share of pet-related social networking sites (DoggySpace, Fuzzspace, and countless others). So far, these seem to be good enough for us. In India, however, netgoers apparently can't get enough of social networks and online dating for dogs, according to Reuters.

DogMateOnline.com, which launched back in 2008, faces competition from sites like the two-year-old PuppyLove.in and the brand new dateyourpet.co.in. These sites are helping dog owners in India find mates for their furry friends and, in turn, find some companionship themselves. Mumbai-based Mekhala Lobo, founder of Date Your Pet and an MBA student, told Reuters, "Believe me, in the dog world, finding a mate is next to impossible."

Former Nova Scotian police officer James Symington (pictured) had quite the attachment to his German shepherd, Trakr. Not only was Trakr man's best friend, but he was also instrumental in the search and rescue effort following 9/11. The dog, according to CBS, found the last survivor in the rubble of the World Trade Center. So, when Symington heard of California company BioArts's contest to clone an 'exceptional' dog, he wanted to immortalize his heroic pet, because, he reasoned, none were more exceptional than his life-saving pet.

Not just one, but five clones were created from Trakr's DNA. Symington received all five at his Los Angeles home at the right time, since Trakr passed away two months ago. He told CBS, "Trakr was so much a part of my life, and, you know, he was more than just my partner....Seeing and having his legacy live on in these puppies is a tremendous gift." Hopefully, a heroic sense of smell is hereditary. [From: CBS.com]

Here's a tip: If you are going to rat someone out to the cops, make sure the cops don't end up busting you instead.

The Smoking Gun reports that Michelle Owen, a 24 year-old Indiana woman, suspected that her ex-boyfriend had used her computer to look up child pornography. Embroiled in a custody dispute with the man and concerned by the criminal nature of such searches, Owen requested that police search the laptop for illegal content, which, in hindsight, might have been a mistake.

While searching the computer, detectives found no evidence of child pornography, but instead found video files containing footage of Owen performing illicit acts with a dog. In case you were wondering, the dog is believed to be a beagle named Toby. Owen has been charged with two felony bestiality counts despite her explaining to police in their official report that the incident was "just something she did while she was drunk and barely remembers it."

Sorry honey, next time you might want to empty your computer's recycle bin. May we also suggest that you stop drinking immediately? [From: the smoking gun]

Related Links:

• Would-Be Voyeur Puts Spy Cam In Bathroom, Leaves Video Of Himself
• Bad Economy Leading Folks To Steal Electricity
• Now You Can Give A Flying F*ck, Literally

Strapping a GPS tracker to a dog is nothing new, but British start up company Retrieva is offering a smaller and much more feature-packed version that in better economic times might have become quite a hit.

Unlike earlier models, which were so large they needed to strapped to a dog's back, the new GPS collar is worn, well... as a collar around the neck. The collar is waterproof, made of cut-resistant webbing, and has a key-lock mechanism to make it all but indestructible and impossible to remove by anyone but the dogs owner.

The collar uses a built-in cellular radio to send text message alerts if your dog wanders beyond a programable distance from the base station. The unit then sends constant updates about its location, which can be viewed on either a mobile phone or on downloadable mapping software.

This is great for someone who has a dog that tends to wander off or escape on a regular basis. Unfortunately, at £250 (about $370) it's probably only going to make it on the shopping list of the most paranoid dog lovers. [From: Daily Mail]

We're going out on a limb here and assuming that the Haute Diggity Dog iBone comes jailbroken and ready to rock, or at least that's the impression we get from checking out that heretofore unseen bevy of icons. Customized for the "tech savvy dog on the go," this here iPhone chew toy gives dear Fido access to bark / hand-shake training, posture lessons, Washington Huskies sports updates (it's the Clemson Tigers in all honesty, but work with us here), a mysterious fitness app and a bone application for times when supper just seems too far away. You know your pup's worth the $11.95, you just know it.

[Via textually]

Just under a year ago, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced his hopes that one day he could pinpoint the location of his black Labrador, Koni, at any time of the day. Today, a dream has been realized. Mr. Putin has finally procured a satellite collar that will enable him to track the lab regardless of which of the eleven times zones she may be in while waltzing through Russia. Once the collar was slipped on, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov immediately said "she looks sad, her free life is over." Putin didn't miss a beat when snapping back: "In Soviet Russia, GLONASS track you!"

[Image courtesy of Picasa, thanks MJ]

1. Lolcats
Lolcats are funny pictures of cats doing dumb things with broken, misspelled English captions placed over them. The result is often hilarious, such as a cat jumping out of a toilet with the following caption: "I'M IN UR TOILET USIN' UR FACILITIES." The central hub for all things lolcat, icanhascheezburger.com, is currently enjoying a resurgence of popularity after a few months of hype-trend-overload. The site has been online for two years and now includes a constellation of sites for lolcats, loldogs and political lolz -- the same thing, but for dogs and politicians. If you're wondering how to make your own Lolcat, which is as simple as taking a goofy picture of your cat, adding a caption, and uploading it here, then check out the site's "wiki" tutorial designed to help people learn lolspeak, the broken English used on the site. The site also has a "lolz builder," which allows you to create your own lol-based-image with minimal effort and no software (they even supply pictures for you to caption). This means that there are new lolz posted all the time, which makes Lolcats the ultimate place to go for hilarious cat humor.

We understand that dog is supposed to man's best friend, but we couldn't possibly imagine dropping nearly 20 grand on a bionic leg for one of our beloved pups. Don't get us wrong, we love our canine companions, but we could buy a pretty nice car or dig ourselves out of credit card debt with that kinda cash.

We assume that Reg Walker has money to spare since he spent £10,000 (a little more than $18,000) to fit his eight-and-a-half-year-old American Bulldog, Coal, with a specially-designed prosthetic limb. What makes the implant unique is that the titanium alloy used mimics animal hide, so the skin and bone will grow and seal the prosthetic to Coal's body.

The successful surgery means that Coal can return to his normal place by his owners side. "He goes everywhere with me - he goes on tour, he's the only dog to have allowed into Live 8 and the only dog that has ever been backstage at the Royal Albert Hall," Walker said.

That's one lucky dog! [From: Daily Mail]

We've all seen the "I've fallen, and I can't get up!" commercials and chuckled, but what if you actually did fall and weren't able to get up? What if you couldn't even push a button to call for help? What would you do? That's the situation Scottsdale, Arizona resident Joe Stalnaker found himself in this past weekend, and thankfully someone else -- his dog -- was there to help him .

Joe suffered a head injury during military training ten years ago, and has had crippling seizures ever since. He adopted his dog Buddy at the age of just eight weeks, and trained the now 18-month-old German Shepherd to check on him and to press a button on the phone to dial 911 in case of an emergency. Over the weekend when Joe suffered a seizure that left him unable to move, Buddy made the call. Amazingly, this is the fourth time since Joe has owned him that he's managed this feat.

You can hear a part of the call, and Buddy's whimpering for help, in the above video -- it's enough to make even a jaded blogger misty-eyed. [From: Telegraph.co.uk]

People love to talk about how smart their dogs are. They'll tell you about how Fido can identify their car just from the sound of the engine, that he knows when he has done something wrong and that he'll punish himself, or that he can do so many amazing tricks. The sad truth of the matter, however, is that dogs are stupid. Adorable? Sure. Friendly? Sometimes. But smart? Not so much.

Take the case of Nero, a Doberman-Great Dane mix, from Valhalla, South Africa, who got himself into a little hot water when he swallowed his owner's cell phone. Driekie Boojens, daughter of the dog's owner Marie Matthews, was feeding Nero when he snatched the woman's Nokia handset right out of her daughter's hands and swallowed it whole.

Nero was rushed to the local animal hospital and had surgery the next day to remove the phone. While they were in there, vets also found a small collection of rocks in the dog's stomach. More evidence of the intelligence of our canine friends.

Nero is fine now. The twelve-year-old mutt has a large scar on his abdomen, but is otherwise healthy. The Nokia on the other hand, had to be put down. Nero's stomach acid simply proved to be too much for it to handle. [From: Telegraph]

One of the most problematic items of contraband that are sneaked into prisons are cell phones. More than drugs or weapons, cell phones cause headaches not just for the corrections officers, but also for law enforcement on the outside. With a cell phone, criminal masterminds can continue to direct actions outside the prison walls and have unmonitored communication with potential suppliers of additional contraband. Cell phones are even sold and rented by prisoners for sky high prices.

But in Maryland, prisons are fighting back with a trio of dogs trained to smell out cell phones instead of drugs. In a recent demonstration for the press, two dogs were charged with finding cell phones stashed in cells. In all but one of the trials, the dogs tracked down the phones in under 30 seconds.

Like drugs and people, cell phones have a unique scent the dogs are trained to pick up. Even so, it's still more difficult for dogs to sniff out a cell phone than, say, a brick of marijuana, 'cause phones just aren't that smelly.

Gosh, being a prisoner just keeps getting harder -- first they took away their pigeons, now they're taking away their cell phones. You'd think they did something wrong. [Source: Washington Post, Via: Textually]

When a dog barks, do you know what it is saying – or at least trying to say?

A system designed by an Israeli tech firm is being employed by the Israel Prison Service to help guards understand when a guard dog's barking is "normal" and when the dog is stressed, which could mean that a dangerous situation is developing.

Guard dogs are often able to sense a developing situation well before people or automated systems recognize danger – but human guards often don't hear the dogs or ignore the barking until it is too late.

Watch a video demonstration here.

That's why the developers at Bio-Sense, a high-tech company near Tel Aviv, created the program to interpret dog barks. They recorded thousands of dog barks from a variety of situations, from playtime to cat encounters to real emergencies. They then analyzed the barking to differentiate between normal and emergency situations. Now they claim the system identifies when a dog senses a problem and when it is just, ahem, crying wolf.

This goes well beyond the the LED light that purportedly interprets what a dog's wagging tail means, although a group of Hungarian scientists have developed a fairly complex program to interpret the language of the Mudi herding breed. The Hungarian system does not appear to be used by anyone yet for practical purposes.

The system from Bio-Sense, however, is in place with more than 100 clients in Israel, from prisons that want to prevent jail breaks to farmers who are trying to prevent theft. [Source: USA Today.]

We've seen toys that claim to decifer dog barks (and even fancy computers that can decode the barks of a particular breed of dog better than humans can), but we still haven't seen a big glowing sign that spells out what your dog is trying to say -- until now.

Okay, truth be told, you still won't, at least not at home, unless you run to New York's MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) for a demo at the Elastic Mind exhibit, since this device is just a concept.

The proposed device would attach to the dog's tail, measure his or her WPM (Wags Per Minute) and use that to figure out what he/she is trying to say. It would then spell out your canine's message in LED lights in mid air as the your dogs tail wags, turning it into a tacky novelty message board.

From Engadget

Related Links:

• Computer Interprets Dogs' Barks
• PetCell, the Mobile Phone for Dogs
• Truth About Cats and Dogs (and Photos)

A Maryland sixth grader has combined her interest in animals with a healthy dollop of Web-page-building skills to build a site that matches cats, dogs and other animals that need homes with people who are looking to adopt the furry friends.

Eleven-year-old Jennie Lupkin of Ijamsville, Md., went from matching pets at a local animal shelter with people placing requests on Craigslist but soon went well beyond, creating the site "Helping Animals One At A Time" (www.freewebs.com/frederickanimalcontrol/).

Lupkin -- who has a bichon frise dog, a hermit crab, two birds and fish -- posts pictures of cats, dogs and other animals that are waiting for adoption at the local animal shelter. The site includes highlights of pets in need of homes and encourages people to volunteer at local animal shelters. It also features a page where site visitors can leave comments. So far, response has been on the positive side.

Besides Lupkin getting lots of attention for her age, the site stakes a claim to perhaps a new type of matchmaking Web site, in the spirit of dating sites like Match.com or Jdate.com.

Everyone is looking for companionship. Maybe a little furry friend is in your future?

From Examiner.com.

Related links:

• Computer Interprets Dogs' Barks
• PetCell, the Mobile Phone for Dogs
• Truth About Cats and Dogs (and Photos)

A Hungarian scientist has developed computer software that interprets the barks of a certain breed of Hungarian dog. This is exciting news, especially for so many dog owners who are convinced their pets are saying intricate and purposeful things whenever they bark. Turns out, they may be right.

The software analyzes distinct barks that indicate the emotional state of the Hungarian Mudi herding breed (pictured above) in six situations: when the dog is alone, when it sees a ball, when it fights, when it plays, when it encounters a stranger or when it goes for a walk.

Not quite a full range vocabulary but it's a start. Down the road, he and colleagues expect the software to be applicable in consumer products to allow easy human-dog dialog.

For now, though, the software was only three percent better than humans at correctly determining which of the six scenarios was in play while one of the dogs barked, so it may be a while before you can find out specifically what your canine pal really thinks of the new chew toy you got him.

But wait. We seem to remember a little toy from a few years ago called the Bow-lingual. A little digging confirms this device from Japan's Takara company, which was clearly marketed as a toy, claimed to interpret dog barks and relay statements like, "I'm feeling great!" or "Come on, play with me!" Interestingly enough, the toy maker also determined there were six distinct vocal patterns do be identified within dogs' barks and took into account the differences between the barks of 50 breeds. Impressive. To our disappointment, the official Bow-lingual Web site is no longer active. (But back in 2003, the folks at ExtremeTech took a close look at the toy.) And cat lovers, don't feel left out -- there was also a Meow-lingual.

As for the Hungarian scientist, he says there is work to be done and improvements to be made to his software. The first thing we want him to do is develop a program that automatically helps us understand his Hungarian accent so we can figure out what else he's been saying.

From Reuters.

Related links:

• Gadget Silences Noisy Neighborhood Dogs
• The Dog That Speaks French, Sort Of...
• PetCell, the Mobile Phone for Dogs