NASA's Mars Phoenix Lander, which spent the summer in Mars' northern polar regions performing a variety of science experiments, caused quite a stir when rumors circulated that it had discovered signs of life on the Red Planet

Science/AAAS

NASA eventually held a press conference to dispel the rumors, promising that more details would eventually be revealed when scientists got around to publishing papers that would describe the experiments in detail. That day has finally arrived; today's issue of Science contains four papers that describe various findings from the mission. There's no sign of alien life, but the studies do reveal an active water cycle on Mars—including night-time snowfall.

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From CNet UK:

What is it: 10.1-inch netbook with long battery life.

What we think: Strong design and fantastic battery life make this a great netbook.

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Week in review: A speedier new Firefox
by Michelle Meyers

July 3, 2009 6:00 AM PD

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Windows 7 nears general availability

Jason Mick (Blog) - July 3, 2009 9:45 AM
DailyTech

The year's most highly anticipated software release, Windows 7, is just around the corner.  Microsoft recently announced that the new OS would see general availability (consumer sales) on October 22.  In preparation for that, it recently began its termination of the beta program,encouraging users to install the Release Candidate build which will be available until August.

A bevy of Windows blogs including Neowin.net, GeekSmack.net, and Wzor report that the final "gold" build of Windows 7 will occur on July 10 and the OS will see a release-to-manufacturing on July 13.  Release to manufacturing builds are typically identical to general availability builds for major software releases.  However, if a major bug is encountered, its possible the consumer release could feature something new.  

The main purpose of the RTM build will be to give hardware manufacturers more time to tweak their drivers with a working "final" version of Windows 7.  The release of the build will coincide with the kickoff of Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference (WWPC) set to kick off in New Orleans.   [Comments...]

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Review by Reg Hardware:

Iomega has re-invented its eGo portable hard drives, opting for a 'value-added' theme: when you purchase the 'PS' (Protection Suite) edition of an eGo, you get a bundle of backup and data security software included, plus slimmer, ruggedised hardware and the promise of a three-year warranty.

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A Linux developer has published a new kernel patch that provides a workaround to avoid Microsoft's patents on the FAT filesystem.

By Ryan Paul | Last updated July 1, 2009 7:15 PM CT

The patch, which has undergone extensive legal review by patent lawyers, could make it possible to use FAT on Linux without having to pay licensing fees to Microsoft.

 Microsoft's recent lawsuit against TomTom, alleging infringement of filesystem patents, has left many questions unanswered about the legal implications of distributing open source implementations of Microsoft's FAT filesystem. A new Linux kernel patch that was published last week offers a workaround that might make it possible to continue including FAT in Linux without using methods that are covered by Microsoft's patents.

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Michael Scalisi | Wednesday, July 01, 2009 11:14 AM PDT

  The world has changed since Napster introduced peer-to-peer file sharing in 1999, and the culture that made the practice seem necessary has transformed.

Global Gaming Factory X, a Swedish company, is in the process of purchasing The Pirate Bay (TPB) for $7.74 million. The company intends to continue to allow file sharing, but legally and by making sure content-owners get paid. It's speculated that it may also try to compete with YouTube in the user-uploaded video market. Regardless, what seems clear is that unchecked illegal downloading will come to a halt on TPB.

In the last five years, The Pirate Bay became the go-to site for finding torrents. Its 20 million users have enjoyed nearly unlimited access to copyrighted movies, music, and software.

[PC World...]   [Comments...]

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From Wired:

It’s the most secure distribution version of Windows XP ever produced by Microsoft: More than 600 settings are locked down tight, and critical security patches can be installed in an average of 72 hours instead of 57 days.  The only problem is, you have to join the Air Force to get it.

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The trial version of Microsoft's next operating system has entered its expiration phase.

By Paul McDougall
InformationWeek
July 1, 2009 08:12 AM

Microsoft on Wednesday started the expiration process for the beta version of its Windows 7 operating system.Beginning today, users that are still running the trial version of the company's next OS will see it shut down every two hours.

The interruptions are designed to encourage early adopters to move to Windows 7 Release Candidate, a more polished preview version of Vista's successor.
"If you're still on the Windows 7 Beta you should certainly look at giving the Windows 7 RC at try!" Microsoft's Brandon LeBlanc wrote in a recent blog post....[Comments...]

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   Firefox 3.5 brings the world's second-most popular browser up to speed with current browsing technology and trends, and perhaps nudges it just a bit ahead of the competition. However, it is by no means the leap ahead that its predecessor Firefox 3 was, and it's clear that the competition isn't going away anytime soon.

by Seth Rosenblatt
June 30, 2009 3:49 PM PDT
C/Net News

Available for Windows, Windows Portable, Mac, or Linux, Firefox 3.5 nevertheless represents the best Firefox we've yet seen from Mozilla. This comes as no surprise, and with a testing process that involved four beta builds, three release candidates, and a version change to reflect what Mozilla described as the originally-unintended breadth of the improvements being made, most of the new features are no surprise, either.

Private Browsing, known to IE users as InPrivate, Chrome users as Incognito, and Safari users as, well, Private Browsing, finally comes to a public version of Firefox. It's been available to the 800,000 or so beta testers since December 2008. If you're not familiar with it, users can toggle on or off the browser's history, cookies, and other browsing traces at will via the Tools menu or CTRL+SHFT+P. A new window will open. Among its other uses that serve as fodder for second-rate comedians, it's an excellent tool for avoiding leaving tracks on publicly-used computers and its about time that Firefox finally got it. In fact, Firefox has had it in various stages of development for four years. [Comments...]

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From Computer Weekly:

Technology is being tested that allows heat generated by computers to warm offices and homes.

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 Strange news broke today that Sweden's Global Gaming Factory X AB had purchased The Pirate Bay, the world's largest torrent site.  Among the internet's top 100 most visited properties, The Pirate Bay reportedly fetched a bounty of 60 million Swedish Krona or roughly $7.8 million.  The site will be handed over to its new captain on August 2009.

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Mozilla has officially released Firefox 3.5, the next major version of its popular open source Web browser. Ars takes a close look at the new version and evaluates its enhancements. Support for HTML 5 video and other important emerging Web standards make this one of the most significant Firefox releases ever.

By Ryan Paul | Last updated June 30, 2009 10:20 AM CT

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