The USF1 dream is over tonight after it was confirmed that the factory in Charlotte has closed and production stopped on the 2010 challenger. It has also been confirmed that the staff have been sent on “leave”.

The line is now drawn under the whole “will they, wont they” saga of the past few months, as to wether USF1 would be on the starting grid in Bahrain, when the 2010 formula one season gets underway in just under two weeks time.

US F1 have put a request in to the FIA to hold their place until 2011 and team principal Ken Anderson explained that his team made the choice to stop working on its 2010 car while waiting for a decision from F1 governing body.

The decision means there is now a realistic chance that F1 hopefuls Stefan GP could be on the grid for the opening race of the 2010 season. The decision on that however will depend on wether the FIA decide to allow USF1 to skip the season and take part from 2011.

Meanwhile today it has also been confirmed that the new Campos team have been granted their request of a name change and will now be known as Hispania Racing.

Are you bored of sending the same gifts to your Cafe World neighbours on facebook? Cafe World have just introduced some new limited edition free gifts which are sure to get your friends mouth’s watering!

Hit the Free Gifts tab and you can choose from 3 new gift items. Will it be a generous portion of onion rings with dip, or maybe you have a sweet tooth and prefer a delicious chocolate sundae, or how about a rack of meaty ribs. All 3 new gifts can now be sent to your Cafe World neighbours.

Onion Rings: Instant Serve.
Chocolate Sundae: Instant Serve.
Rackasaurus Ribs: 56 servings.

The more free gifts you send to your neighbours or friends each day, the more likely it is that you will recieve gifts in return, so your own cafe customers could be enjoying these new items very soon.

All new cafe world gift items are limited edition and wont be around for long so start sending to your Cafe World friends today before it’s too late.

The final day of testing, before the 2010 F1 season gets underway finished in Barcelona today, with Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren top of the timesheets.

Hamilton’s McLaren was a shade faster than Mark Webber in the Red Bull with a best effort of 1:20.472. The times were incredibly close, alot closer infact than we have seen through most of the winter with the top 8 cars sepearated by less than half a second.

Most teams went out and did low fuel runs for the first time, in preperation for the opening Grand Prix in Bahrain, which is now less than 2 weeks away! After today’s testing times the season looks like it could be one of the closest ever.

Winter testing is now over for all teams, with the cars and equipment heading back to the factories ready to be shipped to Bahrain early next week.

The majority of teams are expected to bring further updates to their cars for the first race so things could change dramatically by the time we see the first grid line-up of the 2010 season in Bahrain in 2 weeks time.

Recently I needed a way to create anti-aliased round corners without the extra server calls that are incurred when using external JavaScript files or images and came across a great website called Spiffy Corners which generates rounded corners for me with no images or javascript, just HTML and CSS.

To use this great free tool simply enter a class name for your css file, then the foreground and background colour you require. Click the size border you need and the site generates the nessecary HTML and CSS code in seconds.

Then all you need to do is copy and paste the code into your website. It really is as simple as that and a great way of achieving rounder corners without using images or javascript.

If your looking to create rounded corners with no images or javascript give www.spiffycorners.com a try today and let me know what you think.

Does your farmville farm have what it takes to become farm of the week and win 100 FV cash? Farmville are now running a weekly competition to find the “Farm of the week”.

The competition is free to enter, you simply need to submit a screenshot over at the zynga forums and you could be in with the chance of winning 100 FV cash!

From the creative and unique to the downright impressive, all designs can be entered by submitting a screenshot to the zynga forum here.

Each weeks winner will receive:

• 100 Farm Cash
• Featured spot on the Official FarmVille Fan Page

Full rules and details can also be found at the link above, but a few points worth noting are:

• Farms do not have to have any specific “theme” to win. Just show us your best work! Farm Art is allowed.
• No photoshopped (or edited) images are allowed. And yes, we can tell.
• Make sure you are creative! The FarmVille team will be judging the pictures based off of originality, effort and presentation.

Submit your entry today to farmville farm of the week today for your chance of winning.

Ant & Dec’s Push The Button – Saturday 27th February 7.45pm

Ant & Dec are back with a brand new series which challenges families to win a big cash prize when they Push The Button.

Each week, in a series of hilarious and madcap games, two families go head to head in a race against the clock and each other as they try to hold onto their cash. Both families start with £100,000, but with each game designed to reduce their total winnings, the only way to stop the money slipping away is to Push The Button.

And Ant & Dec have some surprises up their sleeves, as each game will be uniquely different and designed to test the families’ skills, nerve, judgement and general knowledge.

But what will be in store for the families when they face games that include, Get it Sorted, It’ll End In Tiers, Ant and Dec’s Bath Night, Back Me Up?

Source: ITV Push the Button

Recently farmville launched an official toolbar which you can download and install as an add-on to your browser for free from the official zynga website.

The free farmville game bar tells you in real time if there are any bonuses available to collect from your friends wall and also how long until your crops are ready to harvest.

Installing the game bar means you never need to miss another harvest and go through the frustration of finding all your crops have withered and the hard work you put in planting and ploughing has gone to waste!

Not only do you get the real-time alerts of bonuses and crops ready, you are able to collect the bonus in one simple click, saving you stacks of time scanning the news feed for items your friends have posted.

The toolbar is fairly descreet along the top of your browser and you are free to uninstall or just hide it if you find, after trying it, it’s not for you. Plus, as an added bonus for downloading and installing the game bar, you will find out the latest news and features before anyone else!

Download the farmville game bar from the official zynga website (here) and let us know what you think of it, good or bad?

The seven time formula one world champion Michael Schumacher does not believe Mercedes GP have a car that is ready to fight for the F1 world championship or even race wins yet.

Schumacher was only 7th fastest in the testing time sheets at Barcelona today and admitted afterwards that Mercedes GP team will be facing a damage limitation exercise during the first few races of the upcoming F1 season.

Mercedes GP have failed to make much of an impact on the time-sheets at any of the pre-season tests so far, so it looks like defending their title from last season may be unlikely in 2010.

This season is one of the longest in F1 history though, with 19 races on the calendar and Schumacher claims his Mercedes GP team are hard to work to bring updates to the car reguarly throughout the season, which could see them fighting for race wins by the time the european season starts in May.

Just a quick post for all you Cafe World fans (or addicts) like me! Zynga would like your vote to decide which themes you wish to see introduced to the game.

You can vote in the poll by simply visiting the Zynga Cafe World forum here.

There are 10 theme options to choose from which may be introduced into the Cafe World game depending on how many votes they recieve so make sure you have your say!

The 10 themes are: St. Patrick’s Day, Palace/Royalty/Medieval, Earth Day, Vampire, Fantasy/Magical, Underwater or Under the Sea, Grocery Store, Urban/Hip Hop/Graffiti, Pirates & Indoor City/Roads.

Which is your favourite theme? Vote Now.

New Formula One team Stefan GP claim they are expecting “significant developments will take place between now and this time next week” and that the team will be on the starting grid in Bahrain in just over 2 weeks time.

The team which took over the 2010 Toyota Formula 1 car design and has been preparing for a late entry this season if either Campos and USF1 does not make the grid has already signed ex-williams driver Kazuki Nakajima and is also on the verge of signing 1997 F1 world champion Jacques Villeneuve who will make a sensational return to F1 action.

Stefan GP have been confident of an entry for a while now, having already sent a container of equipment to Bahrain over a month ago. Today Zoran Stefanovic (Stefan GP owner) spoke about the plans:

“Definitely, we are waiting for something to happen because the time is very short and the deadline for Bahrain is approaching,” he explained to Reuters. “If you are going to Bahrain, you have to be packed by next Wednesday and we think we will be able to reach something by then.”

If the plan does not come together in time for the season opening Grand Prix in Bahrain, Stefanovic is confident that his team will be able to participate later in the season.

There does however seem to be a major stumbling block for Stefan GP, in the shape of Ferrari. Stefan GP would need the consent of all current F1 teams to participate in the 2010 F1 season, but for as long as disgraced former McLaren designer Mike Coughlan is working for the team Ferrari will not agree to their entry.

It will be an interesting week…