Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that since last year more than 400,000 Iranians began surfing the uncensored Web using software created for the Falun Gong, a spiritual movement that has been suppressed by the Chinese government since 1999. More than 20 countries now use increasingly sophisticated blocking and filtering systems for Internet content, according to Reporters Without Borders, including Iran, China, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Syria. The creators of the software seized upon by Iranians are members of the Global Internet Freedom Consortium, based largely in the United States and closely affiliated with Falun Gong. Interestingly enough, the United States government and the Voice of America have financed some of the circumvention technology efforts, and a coalition is organizing to push for more Congressional financing of anti-filtering efforts, bringing together dissidents of Vietnam, Iran, the Uighur minority of China, Tibet, Myanmar, Cuba, Cambodia, Laos, as well as the Falun Gong, to lobby Congress for the financing. 'What is our leverage toward a country like Iran? Very little,' said Michael Horowitz, a fellow at the Hudson Institute. 'Suppose we have the capacity to make it possible for the president of the United States at will to communicate with hundreds of thousands of Iranians at no risk or limited risk? It just changes the world.'"

hackingbear writes "According to a report by Hong Kong newspaper Mingpao Daily (poor Google translation), quoting the Director of Jiuquan Launch Center, China is set to build a space station by snapping together four spaceships (Shenzhou 7, 8, 9, and 10), to be launched sequentially. Though other reports indicates that taikonauts abroad SZ 7 will return to Earth on September 28, the official said the ship will remain in the orbit to be docked with unmanned Shenzhou 8 and 9. Finally, the manned spaceship Shenzhou 10 will be launched and dock with the other three, completing the space station." A story at Space.com also briefly mentions Shenzhous 8 and 9 (with no mention of number 10), and adds that China has selected its first spacewalker.

chromoZ writes with word that because of the serial blasts in Indian cities (and terrorist outfits claiming responsibility via email, often sent via Cyber Cafes and open Wi-Fi spots), sharing unsecured wireless access may get much tougher in India: "The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) after studying open Wifi networks is coming up with a set of guidelines and recommendations to secure them. 'All ISPs may be instructed to ensure that their subscribers using wireless devices must use effective authentication mechanisms and permit access to internet to only authorised persons using wireless devices.' An open Wi-Fi could be as much as illegal in India after this."

Barence writes "Asus is accidentally shipping software crackers and confidential documents on the recovery DVDs that come with its laptops. The startling discovery was made by a PC Pro reader whose antivirus software was triggered by a key cracker for the WinRAR compression software, which was located on the recovery DVD for his Asus laptop. Along with the key cracker the disc also contained confidential Asus documents including a PowerPoint presentation that details 'major problems' identified by the company, including application compatibility issues. The UK reader is not alone, either — several users in the US and Australia have also found suspicious files on Asus discs."

Gonzalo Martinez-Sanjuan Sanchez writes "The PC-BSD team is pleased to announce PC-BSD version 7.0! (Release Name: Fibonacci Edition.) This release marks a milestone for PC-BSD, by moving to the latest FreeBSD 7-Stable and also incorporating the KDE 4.1.1 desktop. Users will immediately notice the improved visual interface that KDE 4.1.1 offers, as well as a large improvement in hardware support and speed from the update to FreeBSD 7-Stable."

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-CA) has introduced a bill that would add accountability to the DHS searches conducted upon the laptops of those crossing the border. Specifically, it would require the issue of receipts to those who had their property confiscated so that it could later be returned, would limit how long the DHS can keep laptops, would require them to keep the laptop's information secure, and would create a way to complain about abuse. Finally, the DHS would be required to keep track of how many searches were done and report the details to Congress. Rep. Sanchez also has also issued a statement about the proposed bill."

Da Massive writes "The government of Peru will run the first ever trial of the One Laptop Per Child association's XO laptop running Windows XP. This puts the nation at the heart of a software controversy that has been raging for years between those who advocate making software and its source code free, such as Linux OS developers, and those who charge for software and keep the development recipes secret, such as Microsoft."

Hugh Pickens writes "Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin have achieved a breakthrough in the use of a one-atom thick graphene for storing electrical charge in ultracapacitors. They believe their development shows promise that graphene could eventually double the capacity of existing ultracapacitors. 'Through such a device, electrical charge can be rapidly stored on the graphene sheets, and released from them as well for the delivery of electrical current and, thus, electrical power,' says one of the researchers. Two main methods exist to store electrical energy: in rechargeable batteries and in ultracapacitors, which are becoming increasingly commercialized but are not yet well known to the public. Some advantages of ultracapacitors over traditional energy storage devices such as batteries include: higher power capability, longer life, a wider thermal operating range, lighter, more flexible packaging and lower maintenance. Graphene has a surface area of 2,630 square meters, almost the area of a football field, per gram of material."

Mike writes "In what appears to be a first-of-its-kind case, the Sheboygan city attorney ordered Jennifer Reisinger to remove a link to the city's police department from her Web site. The city went further, she claims, launching a criminal investigation of her for linking to the department on one of her sites, and in response she's suing the mayor and the city. 'The mayor decided to use his office to get back at Jennifer for her efforts in the recall and picked this to do it,' said her attorney, Paul Bucher. It appears this will go to court, and the question will be can a city (or any business or Web property) stop people from posting a link to its site?"

Da Massive writes with a ComputerWorld article about a grid computing approach to the malaria disease. By running the problem across 5,000 computer for a total of four months, the WISDOM project analyzed some 80,000 drug compounds every hour. The search for new drug compounds is normally a time-intensive process, but the grid approach did the work of 420 years of computation in just 16 weeks. Individuals in over 25 countries participated. " All computers ran open source grid software, gLite, which allowed them to access central grid storage elements which were installed on Linux machines located in several countries worldwide. Besides being collected and saved in storage elements, data was also analyzed separately with meaningful results stored in a relational database. The database was installed on a separate Linux machine, to allow scientists to more easily analyze and select useful compounds." Are there any other 'big picture' problems out there you think would benefit from the grid approach?

lisah writes "Ubuntu's next release, Feisty Fawn, is due out in April and, according to company CTO Matt Zimmerman, proprietary video drivers failed to make the cut for the default install. Zimmerman told Linux.com that although the software required for Composite support is not ready for prime-time and therefore will not be included in Feisty, Ubuntu hasn't given up entirely on including video drivers in future releases. '[T]he winds aren't right yet. We will continue to track development and will revisit the decision if things change significantly.' Ambiguous or not, the decision to exclude proprietary drivers for now should satisfy at least some members of the Ubuntu Community. In other Feisty Fawn news, the Board also decided to downgrade support for Power PC due to a lack of funding." Linux.com and Slashdot are both part of OSTG.

48 hours have passed since Steve Jobs's MacWorld keynote and the reality distortion field is beginning to wear off. Lists of the drawbacks of the announced iPhone are sprouting all over the Net (and there is the occasional defense by true believers). Now narramissic writes, "The iPhone may be poised to take over the high-end cell phone market, but is it a market worth taking? Not if an InStat survey from July is any indication: Of 1,800 consumers surveyed, just 21 had spent more than $400 for a cell phone. Prices for the iPhone, admittedly more of a handheld computer than a cell phone, start at $499 for the 4G-byte version with a required two-year contract with Cingular. So, is Apple pricing it right? Analysts quoted in this article seem to think Apple's going to have a hard time getting the 1% of market share that Jobs called for."

shadowspar writes, "Recent restructuring and production cuts have left Lego unable to fill orders for the upcoming holiday season. Affected products include Duplo bricks, Lego City sets, and (horror of horrors!) Star Wars and Lego Technik sets." According to the article Lego stands to lose $127 million in holiday sales.