Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8, once the undisputed kind and the holder of world’s most-used browser is no longer on the top of the ranking which it had enjoyed for so many years but like every rise has a downfall, the same is the case with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 who faces a tough rival in form of Google Chrome.

If you want to vanquish the enemy, render him absurd. Most recent case in point? The viral stardom of University of California, Davis, police Lt. John Pike. A week ago, you didn’t know his name. Now, he’s Pepper Spray Cop. And Pepper Spray Cop is considerably more entertaining than Lt. John Pike.

Lt. John Pike, as the world was made painfully aware last Friday, is the officer who pepper sprayed a phalanx of peacefully linked protesters who refused to move from the university’s quad. . .

A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."

(Article)

(For more pictures, Click "Read Article")

Interesting list. Some you would've expected-- plus a few surprises.

Instead of focusing on job creation, congressional Republicans have spent their time passing socially conservative legislation like the “Let Women Die” bill that would allow hospitals that receive federal funds to deny women life-saving abortion procedures.

Now Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), one of the most die-hard anti-choice lawmakers, has jumped on the bandwagon by sneaking a radical anti-abortion amendment onto a completely unrelated piece of legislation. DeMint’s amendment would ban women and their doctors from discussing abortion over the Internet:

The loose band of global hackers known as Anonymous has claimed another scalp in its ongoing fight against tyrants, corporate crooks and naysayers, taking over the Syrian government Ministry of Defense website and replacing it with message of support for the Syrian people.

News of the hack, just the latest in a string of high profile takedowns that include Rupert Murdoch's News of the Word newspaper, and others, spread like wildfire over Twitter Sunday night as social media users echoed support.

The hacking excursion comes just hours after Syrian forces were accused of firing on civilians, killing an estimated 50 people in the rebel-controlled city of Deir al-Zour.

Looking for a public space full of nasty rhetoric? It’s hard to beat the comments sections next to online articles. These spaces, for all their great potential for exchanges, often devolve into flame wars with commenters attacking the writer, and each other, personally.

In this way, the web is like a 2.0 year old. It’s become more social. It can express simple thoughts. But it’s not very good at listening yet. Commenting interfaces on the web makes us all look like two year olds to each other — and we often respond by acting like we’re toddlers.

Why?

My name is Cory, and I’m the co-owner and co-editor of Boing Boing, a widely read blog with a thriving culture of commenters and suggesters. Boing Boing’s best commenters and suggesters are almost all pseudonymous, and for me, knowing the names my readers and collaborators choose is much more interesting than knowing their “real” names — the name someone’s parents chose is a lot less telling than the name that person chose, after all.

(H/T: Tyler)

Cat humour

I've often noticed the same thing myself!

Timed suspension works, but much like democracy itself, it is a highly imperfect, noisy system. The transparency provides ample evidence that moderators aren't secretly whisking people away in the middle of the night. But it can also be a bit too …entertaining for some members of the community, leading to hours and hours of meta-discussion about who is suspended, why they are suspended, whether it was fair, what the evidence is, how we are censoring people, and on and on and on. While a certain amount of introspection is important and necessary, it can also become a substitute for getting stuff done.

"The common wisdom these days is that social-media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are playing a key role in popular uprisings like the one going on in Egypt.

"Facebook and Twitter, this story goes, allow millions of people to communicate and organize themselves, and they thus trigger revolutions and make them much more effective.

"But that's bunk, says Hani Sabra, an analyst who covers the Middle East and Africa for the Eurasia Group.

"Confirming what a few have reported this evening: in an action unprecedented in Internet history, the Egyptian government appears to have ordered service providers to shut down all international connections to the Internet. Critical European-Asian fiber-optic routes through Egypt appear to be unaffected for now.

But every Egyptian provider, every business, bank, Internet cafe, website, school, embassy, and government office that relied on the big four Egyptian ISPs for their Internet connectivity is now cut off from the rest of the world. Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt, Etisalat Misr, and all their customers and partners are, for the moment, off the air.

'The Federal Bureau of Investigation said it had executed more than 40 search warrants in the United States on Thursday as part of an investigation into an international group of computer hackers who attacked corporate Web sites last year in a show of support for WikiLeaks.

"Mandatory data retention 'raises serious privacy and free speech concerns'

"The world has gone social. In 2010, the industry truly reached a tipping point. 2011 seems to be more of the same, but with new innovations that will likely shift how we spend our Facebook and Twitter time into new directions.

This graphic by Online Schools puts it all into perspective for us. Enjoy!

Click to enlarge.

Commentary by the Oatmeal.

"This is the largest spying facility that I have ever seen on earth"

"Many of us sit in front of a computer for eight hours a day, and then go home and head for the couch to surf the Web or watch television, exchanging one seat and screen for another. Even if we try to squeeze in an hour at the gym, is it enough to counteract all that motionless sitting?

A mounting body of evidence suggests not.

"Hollywood portrays hackers as superpowered math geniuses who can intimidate computers into giving them whatever they want through intense keyboard mashing. Even outside of movies, they are feared as something like mysterious and powerful wizards -- the infamous hacker Kevin Mitnick was ordered to never use any networked technology more advanced than a pay phone, for fear that he could whistle a tone that would start a nuclear war.

But in reality, almost every "hacking" exploit that you hear about compromising some database or other is done with very simple methods that, many times, require no computer at all.

"A quarter of children have looked at pornography in the last year, according to LSE research used in a Panorama programme about the sexualisation of young children.

"It showed that one in eight of young people aged between nine and 16 have received messages of a sexual nature while surfing online or through their mobile phones.

A new law to take effect in California:

"Once just a cruel joke, assuming another person's identity on the Internet and fabricating an e-mail or Facebook account is no longer a laughing matter.

"A state law effective Jan. 1, authored by Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, makes online impersonation, when it seeks to harm someone, illegal.

"Lake Superior State University released its 36th annual List of Words to Be Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness on Friday."

"Al-Qaeda has produced a new bomb-making manual in English with the aim of encouraging self-starting terrorists to launch their own attacks.

"The 102-page manual, seen by the Daily Telegraph and available on the internet, explains how to find ingredients from everyday sources and how to mix explosives, including those used in the July 7 bombings and the recent ink cartridge bomb found at East Midlands airport.

"It has been endorsed by two leading al-Qaeda strategists and marks an explicit attempt by the terrorist group to encourage followers to launch their own attacks, without training.

"It may be the holiday season, but scammers don't take vacations. If you spot a post in your Facebook news feed about a teenage mother being jailed for posting a "disgusting photo" of her baby, don't click on it.

"As in the real world, cyberspace has bad neighborhoods. But unlike the real world, risks in cyberspace are not easy to spot -- and the location of those digital bad neighborhoods can change all the time.

When security experts look back at 2010, they will see a major turning point in the world of cyberscares. The virtual and the real collided in new, dramatic ways during the past 12 months, and the Internet will never be the same.

"This toast animation stuff is really cool (and probably took ten thousand years to make), but I can't help but wonder how far OK Go's videos are going to go before they aren't music videos anymore and they're just plain internet art.

"The computer security world is currently abuzz about one of the latest computer viruses to hit the computing world, W32.Stuxnet. Containing a record four zero-day exploits, Stuxnet is the subject of much speculation about the intended target, as it infects and allows for exploits in Siemens systems control software, which is widely used in industrial systems. Security firm Symantec has disassembled and analyzed the virus, finding that it uses four previously unknown exploits in Windows and other software. Due to the complexity, sophistication and nature of the virus, many are theorizing that it was created by a large group, or potentially a governmental intelligence agency.

So, we decided to take a look back at 10 of the most destructive computer worms and viruses to ever be created. From the incredibly ancient (in computer time) worms such as CIH and Melissa, to the latest and rapidly spreading Conficker, these viruses and worms maximized their damage and wreaked havoc on the computer world.

"Bank of America has set up a swat team to combat Wikileaks in case it is, as suspected, the target of the next leak, says Charlie Gasparino.

"Science fiction is by far the nerdiest of the fictions, and its bread and butter consists of robot uprisings and unexpected time travel consequences. But for every Martian invasion and robocop-related mishap it has warned about, science fiction has made some stunningly accurate premonitions.

We're not talking about broad predictions, like "thinking machines" or "interplanetary travel." That stuff's easy. It's the weirdly specific prophecies that impress us.

"A star Australian rugby league player has quit after a photograph of him performing a sex act with a dog was distributed on the Internet.

"It wasn't until recently that I fully understood that my kids were as much a part of the online world as me. They play online games, they watch Youtube videos, they visit message boards. Half of their human interaction is going to happen online, maybe more.

"The war between Google and Facebook is heating up: Google just made one small tweak to its Terms of Service that will have a big impact on the world's biggest social network. From now on, any service that accesses Google's Contacts API — which makes it easy to import your list of friends' and coworkers' email addresses into another service — will need to offer reciprocity. Facebook doesn't, so it's going to lose access to this key piece of the social graph.

"While some may argue that social networking tools, like Twitter and Facebook, are a waste of time, and others consider them to be innocent fun, there are a few people who would say these innovations are so much more.

"Detectives are to get training on using social network websites like Facebook and Twitter in order to catch killers.

"Google's street-level mapping and image service is wicked-cool, until it gets a photo of your home in disrepair or captures your data when you don't want it to. Here are some "ways" you might fool it.

(Technology ... "Social Commentary")

"Up until a couple of years ago, I used to say that the average person could protect his or her privacy on the Web. Even as the founder of an online reputation-management company, ReputationDefender, I believed it was possible—so long as you were willing to commit some time to doing it.

"Imagine that a company could use the Web to rate your health, your employability—even your dating appeal. Welcome to the credit score of the future.

In the course of my studies I stumbled across a great site for investment research. Not only is the information very thorough and complete, but it is presented in a very user friendly manner. Kudos!!!

Wikinvest.com

OK-- this is a bit old. But it still comes up every now and again!

This video is quite informative...

"People have been complaining about computer glitches since the punch card days. Honestly, it's 2010. Why don't we have simple stuff like drivers and software compatibility fixed yet? Can we blame it all on Bill Gates?

Well, the bad news is that there are really good reasons your PC doesn't work quite right, even now. The worse news is that it's probably never going to get better.

You can blame ..."

Pictures of "Cigar guy" are going viral on the Internet! (For an explanation of the origin of these pictures, please see the original NV seed on the matter).

Stupid and /or obnoxious emails people might send-- which would really piss someone off bigtime!

(Humour-- sort of :-)

"Browse through a few typical online comment threads, and the need for anger management quickly becomes clear, likely sending sane people scurrying off to more pleasant corners of the internet

. Now scientists at Yahoo and their colleagues are devising ways to automatically flag inordinately irate commenters to keep them from ruining online conversations for others.

"The basic process of eating has remained unaltered throughout humanity's history: chew, swallow, digest. But of course, what we put in our mouths, and how we find it, has evolved a great deal over the last century. To help us track that evolution--from Julia Child to Guy Fiere, from cookbooks to allrecipes.com--we picked the brains of two professional foodies: cookbook author Barbara "B" Smith, and restaurateur Michel Nischan. Together, they helped us compile a juicy list of 10 things that changed the way we eat. Bon appetit!

""They trust me — dumb @!$%#s," says Zuckerberg in one of the instant messages, first published by former Valleywag Nicholas Carlson at Silicon Alley Insider, and now confirmed by Zuckerberg himself in Jose Antonio Vargas's New Yorker piece. Zuckerberg now tells Vargas, "I think I've grown and learned a lot" since those instant messages.

"Eyestrain isn't known to lead to permanent damage of the visual system, but it can keep you from doing your work. The causes of eyestrain vary for each individual, and may change for an individual over time. The three main types of causes are: inadequate workspace set-up, inefficient lighting, and lack of proper eye care. Let's look at how to address all three to avoid eyestrain.

"Facebook is now worth as much as $33.7 billion, after investors have paid up to $76 for a share in the company ahead of its much-hyped flotation on the stock market, according to a report.

An "old' video (2006)- One of the all time most viewed videos on the 'net .

"The High Priest of Pop-Culture

In this article we will begin an examination of someone who most people do not know, but who is considered by many to be the first father and leading prophet of the electronic age,

I love webcomics, I must read 20-25 a day, and have to prevent myself from adding more to my list. I really do need to actually get some work done so I have to limit what I read. I get almost all of them through RSS feeds, making them an easy read with my morning coffee. And because I live in a timezone that is ahead of the producers of most of them, my morning is happily spruced up by a steady trickle as they come alive in my reader.

So what exactly do I mean by "webcomic"? Well, obviously it's a comic that is read on the web. It is more than this, though. Most webcomics are non-syndicated, meaning that they are not reproduced in hundreds of newspapers around the world. The authors do not typically make much, if any, money off their creations. This labour of love means that they can be edgier - there is no danger of the syndication dropping the comic because of something said or drawn. In fact, some are not edgy but downright crude or offensive. The internet has given an outlet to anyone who can draw (and some who can not), and when this happens then everyone wants a go. If you're looking for a comic on a particular topic, or of a particular sort, there is at least one out there for you. I wonder if there is an equivalent of rule 34 for webcomics?

"One of the threats to Microsoft's Windows dominance is the idea that companies will increasingly give employees the option to buy Macs -- especially now that more business software is web-based and will work just as well on a Mac as on a Windows PC.

"A 30-year-old woman sudden death while watching internet pornography was probably due to her state of sexual excitement, an inquest was told.

"Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one." So began the "letter from the founders" penned by Sergey Brin and Larry Page in the company's securities registration form in 2004. Despite ever-increasing commercial success since that date, Brin and Page have kept to their word.

Google (Google) is an unconventional company with a huge stake in our online lives....

"Despite an apparently sophisticated attack on their online presence, the Afghan Taliban continue to operate a site here:
(Information about the website "Voice of Jihad" - "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan")

"The type you see on the Web is under going a revolution. Beginning Tuesday, Monotype Imaging made 2,000 of its fonts available to web designers. The move follows FontShop, which put several hundred of its fonts online in February. Web designers, understandably, cannot overstate how big of a deal this is. "It's like the 'Wizard of Oz' moment when they go from black and white to color," said one.

(Note-- this article is from mid-May)

* A new computer program can identify sarcasm in online messages.
* The program is about as effective as a real person with bad social skills.
* It can help people avoid confusion in a medium where there are normally few social cues.

"The notorious realtime tape-fed LaughBox invented by Charles Douglass and used to create the laugh track for virtually every sitcom from 1960s and 70s. "

"If you use facebook, chances are you've encountered a few of these before."

"Bluegrass ain't dead. Not according to No Speed Limit, a young progressive bluegrass troupe from Southwest Virginia. A majority of the band's members are in their 20s -- singer Amber Collins is all of 21-years-old.

As usual-- an astute observation re: Internet culture (especially Twitterers!)

The Supreme Court of Canada, in one of its first cases dealing with the spread of information on the Internet, will decide whether the everyday practice of hyperlinking can expose a writer to a lawsuit if a linked article is defamatory.

"This case affects almost everybody on the Internet because the Internet works by linking from website to website to website," said David Fewer, director of the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic.

This was delivered at the National Convention for the Teachers of English [NCTE], November 28, 1969, Washington, D.C., but it still has relevancy today-- and not only to educators but to anyone involved in communications...

Last year, Hewlett-Packard began a project it grandly calls "Central Nervous System for the Earth," a 10-year initiative to embed up to a trillion pushpin-size sensors around the globe. H.P. researchers, combining electronics and nanotechnology expertise, announced in November that they had developed sensors with accelerometers that were up to 1,000 times more sensitive than the commercial motion detectors used in Nintendo Wii video game controllers and some smartphones.

More Articles

This is the website of an actual store (Bridal gowns) in Panama City, Florida. For full effect, make sure your speakers are turned on.

Isn’t that just like the Internet? Just a whole bunch of banal, self-important jibber jabber … until something of actual substance occurs.

If you’re not with Conan “Coco” O’Brien, then you damn well better be texting “Haiti” to 90999 to get your $10 to the American Red Cross … or one of the other Haiti earthquake charities everyone and their mom is posting anywhere cyberspace still has room.

Indeed, it is with eye-rolling efficiency Internet do-gooders are getting the word out about what YOU need to do RIGHT NOW to help Haiti. And to a comparatively inconsequential degree, how you can support “Tonight Show” host Conan O’Brien.

Just so we're clear: The Conan vs. Leno crap is inconsequential. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, when a bunch of scrawny hipsters rallied on both coasts to support a multimillionaire’s right to host the “Tonight Show” precisely at 11:35 p.m. was, to say the least, off-putting.

Remember two weeks ago when ladies on Facebook attempted to spread breast cancer awareness by posting their bra colors as status updates? Yeah, that was pretty silly, too. The Internet attracts many gestures, most empty, some not. And because the Internet is made of humans, you never know which one is going to take. So if you want the Internet to occasionally entertain gestures of stunning compassion, you have to accept them all.

A social network’s response to Haiti is one such gesture. Immediately following news of the quake, Facebook users posted status updates containing the word “Haiti” at a rate of 1,500 per minute, the company reported. Notably, people in Haiti and elsewhere used the social network, as well as micro-blogging site Twitter, to send and receive news about loved ones. (While cell phones were down, satellites kept the Internet going.)

Those without direct involvement to the disaster used social networks to share news stories or their own horror. The State Department quickly got the word out about text donations, and then people used Facebook and Twitter to spread the numbers and urge their friends to use them.

Naturally, as it is the Internet we’re talking about, sanctimony quickly set in. Plenty are still using the popular Internet equation: “How can you X when Y is occurring?!” Others suffer from abnormal eye fatigue brought on by the involuntary rolling that occurs every time another Facebook “friend” announces his or her latest effort to save victims of the island’s devastating earthquake.

While you’re well within your rights to demand (and please do demand) a “Tonight Show”-free zone in your personal cyberspace, this Haiti Internet meme is one of those rare (but not unheard of) occasions when the indulgences of the Internet mean something. What’s more, it’s something that can be measured, at least in part, monetarily.

The millions of dollars raised through online nagging and text-messaging ease enforce among us that philanthropy is not the province of the rich. One person still doesn’t make a difference. But when joined via the various paths of technology, the crowd sure does.

That $27 million-plus hasn’t yet surpassed Conan O’Brien’s (reportedly) $32.5 million NBC buyout, but it still makes up a nice chunk of the money raised for Haiti’s recovery overall. That’s $27 million raised at just $5 and $10 a texting pop. Dude, that’s seriously HUGE.

Consider: Text-messaged donations reached $400,000 after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, and $200,000 after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, according to a Verizon Wireless spokesman.

So why now? And why Haiti? Social scientists and Internet culture bloviaters alike will blather on about this one for weeks to come. You know, like that one time us Americans turned our Twitter avatars green to support the protesters in Tehran? Except this time, we’re actually making a difference … you know, with money.

Does our increased dependency on cell phones equal second-nature texting habits? Do the social pressure from charity-promoting “friends” on Facebook and Twitter actually work? Could it be the unavoidable American Red Cross commercial featuring first lady Michelle Obama personally urging you to text “Haiti” to 90999 ASAP (thus adding your $10 to the cause)? Maybe. But it’s so much more complicated than that.

Here’s the thing. Early on, the amount rolling in after the earthquake calculated out to roughly 10,000 micro-donations per second. Math-wise, it means even Americans feeling the worst of the economic crisis, the ones without houses and/or jobs, texted donations. That obnoxious jerk blathering into and about his iPhone while you're trying to enjoy "Avatar" — that guy added at least $5 to his AT&T bill. Your sanctimonious friend upset that you tweeted about the state of your garden and not “what really matters now”? Her nonstop proselytizing made a difference.

Of course the Haiti charity scams showed up, ready to take advantage of our impulsive giving nature via bogus e-mails, text messages and Facebook groups. This is standard business anywhere society congregates, virtually or in real life.

One would hope the monumental generosity would finally take the steam out of that tired-ass argument about new-fangled techno-bobbles ending civilization — or at the very least, civility. Technology is neither good nor evil — at least not until Skynet takes over.

Until that time, technology is simply a tool that reflects human nature. If word gets out that donating to Haiti is easier than buying Starbucks, people will donate to Haiti. Is that bad? Not as far as the Red Cross is concerned. Go technology!

You can never underestimate the strangeness of the human creature. The dopamine rush that makes us frantically bid more than we can afford on eBay for a "Munsters" lunchbox that’s missing the thermos, dog pile a grammatically incorrect Internet post, or pull together over the “Tonight Show” is the same thing that made so many of us impulse donate using a tool that’s become second nature. It’s an impulse that can sometimes have unfortunate results, and as we’ve seen recently, moments of astonishing humanity.

Iran's police chief on Friday warned opposition supporters not to use cell phones and e-mail messages to organize protest rallies against the government, saying those who do so will be prosecuted and punished.

"Chinese Internet users flooded the web on Thursday, appealing for Google not to close down its operations in the country after the US giant's ultimatum to Beijing over censorship and cyberattacks.

Google announced on Tuesday it would no longer censor search engine results in China and possibly pull out of the world's largest online market, complaining about cyberattacks and censorship by the communist regime

Only 8.4% of Gazans use Internet cafes, though. Which is probably a good idea, since those cafes have a habit of blowing up.

"You should actually do this every year. Even more often if you spend a lot of time on the computer. This is recommended by Kim Komando (the computer guru) in one of her recent emails."

"After much good-natured debate at its annual meeting in Baltimore, the American Dialect Society has made its selections for Word of the Year and Word of the Decade. As proof that we're truly living in a digital age, the winner of Word of the Year for 2009 was tweet ("to post an update on Twitter") and the Word of the Decade for 2000-09 was google (the generic verb meaning "to use Google or another search engine").

"We're entering 2010 with all kinds of new gadgets, gizmos, and tech tools, but let's not forget that we've lost a few things this decade, too.

"The Internet has played a key role in radicalizing a number of key players in alleged terror plots this year. From Fort Hood accused shooter Nidal Hasan to the five young Americans detained in Pakistan this month allegedly en route to fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan, authorities claim the suspects needed no face-to-face contact with jihadist recruiters. Instead, the Internet is serving as an electronic funnel for extremists to infuse U.S.-based Muslims with a justification for jihad.

In the previous blog post about the Iranian firewall, we explored macro level Iranian traffic engineering changes (showing that Iran cut all communication after the election and then slowly added back Internet connectivity over the course of several days). Like many other news reports and bloggers, we also speculated on Iran's intent — how was the government manipulating Internet traffic and why?

Thanks to the cooperation of several ISPs in the region and Internet Observatory data, we can now do a bit better than speculate — we have pieced together a rough picture of what the Iranian government's Internet firewall appears to be doing. The data shows that DCI, the Iranian state run telecommunications agency, has selectively blocked or rate-limited targeted Internet applications (either by payload inspection or ports).

I'll step through several of these applications.

On average, Internet traffic is dominated by web pages (roughly 40-50% of all Internet traffic). And the vast majority of this web traffic (unless you happen to be Google or Facebook) goes into ISPs and the millions of associated end users (as opposed to traffic going out of a country or ISP). Iran is no exception.

The below graph shows web traffic (TCP port 80) into Iran over the days before and immediately after the election. Though the graph clearly shows a brief post-election outage followed by a decrease in web traffic, the Iranian web traffic was comparatively unaffected by Iran filter changes. Based on reports of Iran's pre-existing Internet filtering capabilities, I'd speculate DCI did not require significant additional web filtering infrastructure.

If your wardrobe includes a shiny tin-foil hat, then you will love these free Ma Internet tools. Whether you want to protect yourself from Internet snoopers, want to spy on those out to get you, or want to be able to track trends that you know will lead to something big, then these tools will help you get the job done.

Without a Trace

If you want to use the Internet without anyone knowing who you are or leave an untraceable phone number, then these tools are for you.

President Barack Obama prodded China about Internet censorship and free speech, but the message was not widely heard in China where his words were blocked online and shown on only one regional television channel.

China has more than 250 million Internet users and employs some of the world's tightest controls over what they see. The country is often criticized for its so-called "Great Firewall of China" — technology designed to prevent unwanted traffic from entering or leaving a network.

During his town hall meeting in Shanghai on Monday, Obama responded at length to a question about the firewall — remarks that were later played down in the Chinese media and scrubbed from some Chinese Web sites.

"I'm a big supporter of non-censorship," Obama said. "I recognize that different countries have different traditions. I can tell you that in the United States, the fact that we have free Internet — or unrestricted Internet access — is a source of strength, and I think should be encouraged."

Obama may have been hoping to set a personal example for China's leaders when he said he believes that free discussion, including criticism that may be annoying to him, makes him "a better leader because it forces me to hear opinions that I don't want to hear."

One prolific blogger who goes by the name of Hecaitou said that a transcript of the exchange posted on the portal Netease was taken down by censors after just 27 minutes. A full Chinese-language transcript of the event was later posted on the official Xinhua News Agency Web site but required four clicks to locate the relevant section.

Only local Shanghai TV carried the event live. It was streamed on two popular Internet portals and on the White House's Web site, which is not censored, though both the video and audio feeds were choppy and delayed inside China.

The People's Daily online briefly summarized Obama as telling the crowd that the Internet has "enormous power in assisting information dissemination," but made no mention of his comments on censorship.

China has the world's most extensive system of Web monitoring and censorship and has issued numerous regulations in response to the rise of blogging and other trends. But the Web remains far more open than the country's tightly controlled print and television media, which is the only source of news for the vast majority of Chinese.

Yang Hengjun, 45, a blogger and novelist based in the southern city of Guangzhou, said he was impressed by Obama's frank admission that some free speech irks him, and by U.S. laws that are intended to keep the government from censoring criticism.

"You see, freedom of speech in America is not given to the people by the president but is something that the people use to supervise their government and president, to protect themselves," Yang wrote in an essay titled "Why do I Blog? Obama has answered that question." Posted online late Monday, links to the essay were spread via Twitter.

Because Twitter is blocked in China, Yang and others use proxy servers to get around the controls.

In the aftermath of the disputed Iranian election, Internet companies and individuals around the world have stepped in to help Iranians communicate and organize.

Some stories that have been spreading-- which are true, which are false.

"The Iranian regime has developed, with the assistance of European telecommunications companies, one of the world's most sophisticated mechanisms for controlling and censoring the Internet, allowing it to examine the content of individual online communications on a massive scale.

Interviews with technology experts in Iran and outside the country say Iranian efforts at monitoring Internet information go well beyond blocking access to Web sites or severing Internet connections.

Iranian authorities have arrested over 20 reporters and bloggers in the country for sending out stories of the street riots and beatings. There is a rumor that Mousavi and his wife have been arrested but this has been hard to confirm.

The country is falling into chaos with civilians lining up against well armed and hard nosed government secret police and militia. This is hardly how a democracy works. People should be entitled to a truly free election and say in the politics of their government.

The internet is a brilliant machine for spreading information. Data shoots across the network at the speed of light, passing from one node to another. It's unmotivated by fear or repression or greed, and can shine a torch into the darkest corners to help bring what was hidden to the world.

The era of the internet has revealed over the previous years of the real dangers associated by the use of it by terrorist groups that have managed to gain strength and much valuable information for their attacks.

Microsoft has unveiled its latest effort to take on its internet rival Google – a new search engine called Bing.

Described as a "decision engine", Bing is the latest attempt by the Seattle software giant to gain popularity in the search market and wrestle some momentum back from its Californian adversary.

Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of English-language websites have sprung up specifically devoted to proselytising for the 9/11 Truth movement. In addition many "independent" or "alternative" media sites routinely replicate 9/11 conspiracy material uncritically, and many of these sites link to or cite each other. Sites endorsing 9/ll conspiracy theories, and those subscribing to them in passing, far outnumber sites devoted to debunking or refuting such theories.

"The number of state-sanctioned executions almost doubled last year. A report by Amnesty International shows Iran, Saudi Arabia and China as being responsible for 90 per cent of all executions in 2008.

Now, Iran is proposing a new law that could see the death sentence imposed on internet bloggers who post offensive material on the web.
Al Jazeera's Nazanin Sadri reports.

Interesting short video on the explosion of technology and changing of times. Worth a quick watch.

"In the jungles of South American thousands of Columbian rebels are laying down their weapons and attempting a return to normal life. Yet they lack basic society skills after living so long in the Jungle. A unique program from Hebrew University in Israel helps them gain these skills quickly.

Cartoons deopicting what http errors really look like (humor)

(Yes--of course its satire!)

"In an unprecedented and historic event Monday, the "I Am Under 18" button, an Internet security device which if selected restricts access to websites featuring adult content, was clicked for the first time ever..."

I was a newspaper journalist in the Islamic Republic, but censorship forced me to blog. My blogging led to my arrest and eventual departure from my homeland. To comprehend how pervasive censorship is in Iran today and how difficult it is for Iranians to access a wide range of accurate information about everyday news, it is essential to understand how the Iranian government censors journalists. Iranian censorship is enforced by six major entities. ...

Canada: "The country's most notorious hacker, Mafiaboy, has written a tell-all book about his Internet attack of 2000 when he paralyzed the Web sites of CNN, Yahoo, eBay and other businesses for several hours.

"Its rush hour on the Internet and traffic is looking bad. Yet again the routes are jammed until the loading clog up clears… But wait, help is on the way and it seems to be coming from Herzelia based PeerApp"

This is their title-- IMO, a more accurate title would be, simply, "Godwin's Law FAQ". While this article explains various nuances of Godwin's law, it really raises some interesting points about the dynamic of online discussions.

"It wasn't easy for Madeleine Robb to send an e-mail to another mom warning that her baby might have a deadly form of eye cancer. But she's glad she did it — and so is the mother of 1-year-old Rowan Santos

Santos and Robb first met online through chat on a pregnancy Web site, BabyFit.com, when they were both expecting. Their respective daughters, Rowan Santos and Lileth Robb, were born on the same day last August, spurring a continuing friendship through regular e-mails and photo-sharing.

When Santos posted a photo of 1-year-old Rowan on the Web site, her friend across the Atlantic noticed a white shadow in the baby's left eye.

Robb, a 32-year-old business analyst with no medical training, found the image curious, so she did some research on the Web. She learned that the white area could be a symptom of an eye cancer called retinoblastoma.

"Louis Gray believes the importance of blog linkage is declining, noting that, "I've seen traffic from other blogs to be driving an ever-declining percentage of visits to my site, swamped by social media tools, aggregation sites, and of course, Google search." He offers three likely explanations:

Media censorship in China is an institution. Driven by the necessity to propagate a unique thought system, the communications branch of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) - formerly known as the Propaganda Department - is in charge of selecting information to be covered by official media.

In the 1980s, in the framework of a new legal structure, CCP chief Den Xiaoping implemented economic reforms where the written laws gradually replaced China's existing informal 'rules', which were unpublished and open to interpretation.

However, no law concerning media rights was implemented. Eric Meyer, independent journalist in China for over 20 years, says that "all organs of the Chinese media belong to the Chinese Communist Party, and are thus vehicles for their ideology. The media relays the Chinese government's hardline messages to the people in order to modify their conscience."