Today begins the final countdown to the winter solstice festivities, cleverly rebranded by the arriving Christians as a way to appease the resident pagans. It is the time of the year when it is justifiably acceptable to eat chocolate first thing in the morning, as a celebration of that countdown.

It's that time of the year when we are obliged to buy gifts for people who already have way too much stuff.

A paradoxical observation of the spiritual with rampant materialism. As such, we will run an occasional list of suggested gifts. And because it is Cyber Monday, another day invented to celebrate the aforementioned materialism, what better way than with a retro-style robot, with a speaker embedded in its body.

As the mythical gift-giver hails from the Nordic regions, and given the Scandinavian affinity with flat-packs, this robot speaker comes as a pre-cut kit that needs gluing together (I suggest a Pritt Adhesive Roller for the job). It comes with 3.5mm jack to plug into the headphone socket of your portable music device/tablet. It's not exactly hi-fi stereo sound, but it's a great improvement on the internal speaker on said devices, and it has geek cred.

The Beat Bot is available now from PrezzyBox.com for £9.95