This week's Gadget Watch fires up the world's smallest consumer HD vidcam, lends an ear to a mobile phone with voice enhancements, looks into a mini telephoto lens for keitai cams, and uncovers new ways to hide secrets.

I had an interesting question from a reader worried about whether she would be too old to start applying for jobs after spending many years acquiring three languages and an advanced professional qualification. While it is true that companies in Japan prefer younger employees if they are going to take on someone with limited work experience, the attraction of fluent, multiple regional language skills is so great at present (remembering that unemployment is still very low) that employers will make concessions when they see someone who has really tried to improve themselves.

The SoftBank 922SH 'Internet Machine', the Sanyo Xacti DMX-CG9 digital movie camera and the Karada Trainer 'Walking and Jogging Navi' from Sega are the focus of this week's Gadget Watch plus a round up of gadget news Read Now

It's been said that one of the major reasons Japanese couples don't have more children is because of the costs involved in raising children. With the average employee's monthly income in July last year being around JPY386,000, there isn't a lot of discretionary spending going on after the costs of rent, food, and travel are counted. In particular, there isn't really enough to warrant the cost of JPY23.7m, or a bit over JPY1m per year, that it costs for each extra child present in the family.