Technology News and Gadgets Updates: 12/03/10

Friday, December 3, 2010

China passenger train hits 300 mph, breaks record

A Chinese passenger train hit a record speed of 302 miles per hour (486 kilometers per hour) Friday during a test run of a yet-to-be opened link between Beijing and Shanghai, state media said.
The Xinhua News Agency said it was the fastest speed recorded by an unmodified conventional commercial train. Other types of trains in other countries have traveled faster.
A specially modified French TGV train reached 357.2 mph (574.8 kph) during a 2007 test, while a Japanese magnetically levitated train sped to 361 mph (581 kph) in 2003.
State television footage showed the sleek white train whipping past green farm fields in eastern China. It reached the top speed on a segment of the 824-mile (1,318-kilometer) -long line between Zaozhuang city in Shandong province and Bengbu city in Anhui province, Xinhua said.
The line is due to open in 2012 and will halve the current travel time between the capital Beijing and Shanghai to five hours.
The project costs $32.5 billion and is part of a massive government effort to link many of China's cities by high-speed rail and reduce overcrowding on heavily used lines.
China already has the world's longest high-speed rail network, and it plans to cover 8,125 miles (13,000 kilometers) by 2012 and 10,000 miles (16,000 kilometers) by 2020.
The drive to develop high-speed rail technology rivals China's space program in terms of national pride and importance. Railway officials say they want to reach speeds over 500 kph (312 mph).

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WikiLeaks dropped by domain name provider

WikiLeaks' American domain name system provider withdrew service to the wikileaks.org name after the secret-spilling website once again became the target of hacker attacks.
EveryDNS said in a statement that it dropped the website late Thursday because the attacks threatened the rest of its network. WikiLeaks responded by moving to a Swiss domain name, wikileaks.ch.
EveryDNS said in a statement that "Wikileaks.org has become the target of multiple distributed denial of service attacks. These attacks have, and future attacks would, threaten the stability of the EveryDNS.net infrastructure." EveryDNS provides access to some 500,000 websites.
In a tweet on Friday, the owner of EveryDNS, Dynamic Network Services Inc., wrote that "trust is paramount: Our users and customers are our most important asset." It did not specify whether it was referring to WikiLeaks, however.
WikiLeaks confirmed the move in a separate tweet, saying "WikiLeaks.org domain killed by US everydns.net after claimed mass attacks." It was not clear where the alleged attacks were coming from.
Earlier this week, WikiLeaks' Swedish server host, Bahnhof, confirmed that the website had been hit by a cyber attack just before it leaked thousands of classified U.S. diplomatic cables.
In addition to the latest batch of sensitive documents, WikiLeaks has angered the U.S. and other governments by publishing almost half a million secret documents about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is not clear how WikiLeaks obtained the diplomatic documents, but the U.S. government's prime suspect is an Army private, Bradley Manning, who is in custody on charges of leaking other classified documents to WikiLeaks.
On Wednesday, Amazon.com Inc. — who had provided WikiLeaks with use of its servers to distribute embarrassing State Department communications and other documents — evicted it. The site remains on the servers of its Swedish provider.
The ouster from Amazon came after congressional staff questioned the company about its relationship with WikiLeaks. Sen. Joe Lieberman praised Amazon's action and said it should "set the standard" for companies WikiLeaks is using to distribute "illegally seized material"
In its decision to terminate the service, EveryDNS cited what it called a violation of the provision stating that a member should "not interfere with another member's use and enjoyment of the service."
Andre Rickardsson, an expert on file-sharing and information technology security at Sweden's Bitsec Consulting, said domain name providers normally don't drop their clients unless the clients themselves have breached their user contract. "WikiLeaks is not behind the disturbance here, but individuals trying to disturb WikiLeaks' operations," he said.
Rickardsson said he had never experienced a user being shut off under similar circumstances. "I don't believe for a second that this has been done by EveryDNS themselves. I think they've been under pressure," he said referring to U.S. authorities.
Mark Stephens, the London-based lawyer for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's, also speculated that outside pressure had forced EveryDNS to pull the plug on WikiLeaks.
"Pressure appears to have been applied to close the WikiLeaks domain name," he wrote on the micro-blogging website.
Australian Assange, 39, has been out of public sight for nearly a month. Sweden has issued an Europe-wide arrest warrant for him over allegations of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion, but the exact nature of the allegations are still unclear. Assange's Swedish and British lawyers claim their client has attempted to assist in the questioning but that his offers have so far been turned down. According to his lawyers, he has also yet to receive formal notice of the allegations.
An American defense official has also indicated that U.S. government lawyers are investigating whether Assange can be prosecuted for spying. He is also risks legal action in his homeland, where Australia's Attorney General Robert McClelland has said Australia would detain Assange if possible in response to the warrant filed in the Swedish case by Interpol.

Computer-shy CPI-M now logs on to Facebook

Their party was once vehemently against the introduction of computers and modern technology in India as it would mean loss of jobs for the proletariat, but West Bengal's ruling Marxist leaders are now swearing by the revolutionary reach of social networking sites like Facebook.

With the state gearing up for assembly polls next year, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) is eager to reach out to as many people as possible, particularly the younger generation.'It is a social networking site. I use it to remain in touch with my friends and comrades. It's true that I may be tagged in someone else's album. It is true to an extent that it is being used as a means of propaganda and communication,' admitted Students' Federation of India (SFI) state secretary Kaustav Chatterjee, one of the young faces of the party. SFI is the student wing of the CPI-M.

Front-ranking party leaders like Sujan Chakraborty, Moinul Hassan, Samik Lahiri, Manab Mukherjee and state Industry Minister Nirupam Sen are regular visitors on Facebook.The site is not only being used to reach out to the young generation but also to serve as a podium of propaganda against archrival Trinamool Congress and its chief Mamata Banerjee.

The wall of Manab Mukherjee's Facebook account, for example, includes articles related to the alleged Maoist-Trinamool violence against CPI-M workers, and a picture of Mamata Banerjee chatting with the pro-Maoist tribal body People's Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA) convenor Chhatradhar Mahato.
In the late 1980s and early 90s, the CPI-M was burning with ideological fury against computers, saying it was a bourgeoisie conspiracy to take away jobs from the hapless proletariat.

But the party, which has ruled Bengal since 1977 and was famously derided for being 'on the wrong side of history', has taken a remarkable U-turn. The CPI-M now showcases the information technology sector as a success story in its industrialisation efforts.With the CPI-M-led ruling Left Front going through tough times following a series of electoral debacles recently, the communists are leaving no stone unturned to rebuild their dwindling support base. Even if it means camping on digital highways.

However, leaders maintain that joining Facebook is their personal decision and there was no party diktat. 'It's not a party decision, it's my individual decision to join Facebook. I am using it as an effective tool of two-way communication where the young generation can reach out to me and I can also reach out to them,' state Tourism Minister Manab Mukherjee said, taking pride in his friend list of 104.'I do have a Facebook account, but frankly speaking I don't have much time to visit the site. I do it for personal reasons. But I think if we can use Facebook as an effective communication tool, then it will be really helpful,' CPI-M state committee member Sujan Chakraborty told IANS.

State committee member and former Lok Sabha member Samik Lahiri said he used his Facebook account primarily to stay in touch with friends, but sometimes people ask questions regarding current issues.Kaustav Chatterjee agreed that Facebook is partially used for political campaigns, but claimed his party had never opposed computers per se.'But it is not true that we were against computers. At that time we had said we are not against computers, but automation should not trigger a layoff,' said Chatterjee, whose profile album has pictures of the slain comrades of the CPI-M.

Analysts say CPI-M leaders joining social networking sites was a welcome development, but it was too late.'It's good they have now realised that computers are not our enemy. If you see the current situation, the CPI-M boasts of the IT sector, which is based on computers. But I don't feel they'll be able to attract the young generation by joining social networking sites,' noted economist Dipankar Dasgupta told IANS.'The younger generation has seen the CPI-M from its birth and the anti-incumbency factor is highest among the group. So the Marxists will not reap dividends by canvassing through sites like Facebook. Actually, it's too late for the CPI-M,' political scientist Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury told IANS.

Apple''s iPhone sales range has outdone BlackBerry

Apple's iPhone range has outdone BlackBerry, as one of the world's biggest mobile phone companies, new figures have suggested.

Apple shipped 14.1 million handsets during the most recent financial quarter, up 91 per cent on the same quarter last year, according to analysts at Strategy Analytics.

Bumper sales of Apple's flagship iPhone 4 has seen the company outperform Research in Motion, the Canadian company that makes the BlackBerry range of smartphone devices, reports the Telegraph.

RIM shipped 12.4 million units during that period, an increase of 46 per cent on the same quarter last year.

The reversal of fortunes has prompted some industry experts to question whether the popularity of the BlackBerry could be on the wane, as other devices match the mobile emailer for efficiency and usability.

A total of 327 million mobile phones were shipped worldwide during the third financial quarter of this year, up from 291 million on the same period last year.

Strategy Analytics said that growth had been less than expected and slightly down on the first six months of the year, but blamed this on component shortages and ongoing economic volatility, which "slightly constrained volumes".

Strategy Analytics said this figure represented just a two per cent annual growth on the same figure last year, but was the ninth consecutive quarter in which the troubled Finnish company had grown volumes above the market average.

Samsung promotes chairman's son Lee As president, shares hit record

The son of Samsung Electronics Co.'s chairman has been promoted to president in a reorganization of top management posts at the conglomerate the giant technology company anchors.

Lee Jae-yong, 42, who is being elevated from executive vice president at Samsung Electronics, would retain his chief operating officer title, Samsung Group said in a statement Friday. Samsung Electronics is a major force in the global electronics industry, where it holds the top spots in memory chips and flat screen televisions and ranks No.

2 in mobile phones behind Finland's Nokia Corp. The company is also the flagship corporation of the Samsung Group conglomerate, which consists of dozens of other businesses including shipbuilding, construction, leisure and finance.

Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee's father founded the Samsung Group in 1938. The move to promote Lee Jae-yong, who also goes by Jay Y. Lee, was widely expected after Lee Kun-hee, 68, said last month that his son was set to move up the ranks.

Investors appeared to welcome the news, sending shares in Samsung Electronics 3.3 percent higher in late morning trading to a record 887,000 won ($775). The announcement came about 30 minutes after trading started Friday.

Samsung Electronics has at least 10 executives with the title of president, according to the group. Lee Jae-yong's promotion, however, has been closely watched given that he is a member of the conglomerate's founding family and widely expected to eventually to succeed his father.

The promotion of Lee and other executives was an "organizational realignment to better prepare for the future in the rapidly changing business environment of the 21st century," the statement said. Lee Jae-yong "is expected to continue to strengthen the competitiveness of Samsung's strategic businesses and to lay the foundation for Samsung's future new growth businesses," the statement said.

Lee Jae-yong, who has previously served as chief customer officer and vice president for strategic planning, graduated from South Korea's elite Seoul National University with a degree in East Asian history and has an MBA from Japan's Keio University. His father is a graduate of Japan's Waseda University.