Thumbs down:With the property market stalling, people with more money than sense might think of investing in a rainforest treehouse, a snip at €100,000.

Canadian carpenter Tom Chudleigh's Free Spirit Spheres sound like high-tech tents equipped with a fridge, microwave and sink and suspended in forest trees. They are accessible by rope bridges and sleep four people. The creators say that "uses for these durable spheres are limited only by one's imagination". And the fact that they are suspended in trees and are accessible only by rope bridges.

Movies on the move

Thumbs up:An Post is making it even easier for lazy movie-lovers to avoid going out in the rain or paying late-return fines. Its new movie club develops a partnership with online DVD rental site Screenclick and allows customers to register online and have up to four DVDs delivered at a time, with fees from €7.99 per month. Any further rented DVDs are not sent out until customers have returned the old ones.

Eastwardly mobile

Thumbs up:Nearly 20 per cent of EU households have abandoned landlines in favour of mobiles, according to Eurostat. The number of households relying on mobiles tends to be higher in EU newcomers (42 per cent in the Czech Republic, 11 per cent in Germany). - Conor Pope