=========================== In Orissa, the fundamentalist Christian missionaries have detected a fertile ground for spreading their poisonous culture. Evangelists must be sensitive to tribals’ Hindu ethos =========================== Exacerbating the tenuous link between sanity and Khandamal is the Orissa government. It admits that Swami Lakshmananand had been complaining of threats

New laws bring threat of up to 200 hours' community service and fines

What the hell is the CRIA? Think of it as Canada's RIAA, well, because it is. Now it is also a target of a preemptive suit from troubled torrent tracker Isohunt.

As Wired's Threat Level reported in May, Isohunt founder Gary Fung was already in hot water with the MPAA, but was defiant as well. "I'm not building a business on the backs of others' works," he told David Kravets. "There are a lot of unprotected works as well."

Evidently, the clash brought out the fight in him. Fung decided to be proactive with the CRIA, who sent him a cease-and-desist in May, demanded he take the site off-line and threated to sue for $20,000 per song. Fung struck back on Friday, filing a petition for Declarative Relief in British Columbia that asserts his company isn't engaging in copyright infringement. It also aims to explain the finer points of torrents, which few outside of the downloading community fully understand.

He's ready for the long haul.

"We intend to take this all the way up to the Canadian Supreme Court," Fung told TorrentFreak, "unless CRIA settles with us out of court in any reasonable way. There are some interesting parties in Canada in our camp I’m not disclosing yet, this is going to make an interesting case and the most important copyright case in Canada currently."

Photo: Isohunt

See also:

• Isohunt Founder at Center of U.S. Torrent-Tracking Legal Battle
• Web App Downloads Torrents onto iPhone, Wii, PS3, More
• RIAA Training Video Leaked onto Torrent Sites (Updated)
• The Only Torrent Search Engine You'll Ever Need (While It Lasts)
• MPAA Secretly Tells Court Why BitTorrent Tracking Sites Violate Copyrights -- UPDATE
• Demonoid Torrent Tracker Site Shut Down by Canadian RIAA

Nirupam Sen told the delegates of the UN General Assembly: India continues to be a victim of international terrorism. No political cause, argument or belief can and should justify acts of terrorism. Terrorism is a "pervasive and insidious" threat to global security. India has sought a concerted action to root out its networks and deter regimes from encouraging and harbouring armed

Yesterday I recorded a series of short interviews that will be aired on the Moody broadcasting network sometime in the next few weeks. We were talking about the imminent release of Is Christianity Good for the World? and in that context the impact of the Christian faith on culture came up. In the course of our discussion, I was pointing out the good that the Christian faith had done for the world in the realm of politics and law, science, the academy and the arts.

But in each of these realms, we are now dealing with representatives of each one, telling us that Christianity actually poses a grave threat to the blessings we currently enjoy in each of those realms. It is astonishing to me that Christians can be cowed by this kind of nonsense. The Christian faith invented our political freedoms. We gave birth to the rise of modern science. The Royal Society at its founding was dominated by Puritans. Artistically? Well, let's just put Bach, Dante, Milton and the builders of the Salisbury cathedral on the field, and then call the game on the slaughter rule. The university is a Christian invention. I mean, give us a break, for pity's sake. Now my reason for bringing all this up is that the same thing goes for free markets.

One of the books I am currently reading is William Cavanaugh's Being Consumed, with a subtitle of "Economics and Christian Desire." I enjoyed his Theopolitical Imagination, and I think this book will be engaging as well. But I already more than half suspect that the same kind of confusion is going on here.

Autonomous "capitalists" whoop and holler about the power and authority of free markets in themselves. This is obviously economic idolatry, and Christians are rightly put off by this. And yet at the same time some Christians are ignorant of the Christian contribution to the rise of our (comparatively) free markets in the first place. Suppose the prodigal son not only bought drinks for everybody at the tavern in that strange land where he had got to. Suppose further that he was telling everybody there lies about how the money he was spending was actually money he had earned all by himself. Some disapproved of his behavior, but for some strange reason they believed him on the question of where he got his money. That is what is going on here.

Concerning the form of government we were given in the Constitution, John Adams once said that our Constitution presupposes a moral and a religious people. It is wholly unfit for any other. This is completely wise and true.

A biblical view of self-government and free markets works this same way.

Now what I am now describing here is not a contribution from me. I did not develop this, or come up with it. I inherited this from my Christian fathers. This is what we have taught for centuries. There are three governmental institutions established by God among men. They are family, church, and state. In order for freedom to exist in any of these institutions, it is absolutely necessary for the men and women making them up to be self-governed. The free market doesn't make them free. The Holy Spirit of God sets them free from their passions and lusts, and then (and only then) freedom becomes possible in family affairs, ecclesiastical affairs, and civil affairs. This means that unless men are bound to God, markets cannot be free. This is because slaves to passion cannot be free in any other significant sense.

While godless "capitalists" might point out various economic truths of interest here and there, their ideology is no savior. Jesus is the only Savior. But the thing that must be insisted on here is that godless capitalists want autonomous markets for the same reason and in the same way that advocates of scientism want to forget their Christian roots, why the lonely bohemian artist wants us all to forget a millennium of Christian art, and why the ACLU wants to protect our republic from the people who came up with it in the first place.

Idolaters say that if you leave capitalism entirely unbound, it will by itself create good and prosperity. That is a lie. But it is also a lie to say that this kind of capitalism is capitalism "as traditionally understood." If someone wanted to say that science "as traditionally understood" stands for Darwinism, say, that "traditional understanding" is leaving out of our discussion a number of very important men and centuries.

So free markets do not create free men, and never have. Rather, free men create free markets. Unless you have men set free from their bondage to sin, economic liberty is not a possibility. Impose a "free market" on a society of sin-slaves, and you will get a plutocracy in about fifteen minutes. Bring the gospel effectively to any nation, and you will see institutions of freedom, a market without state coercion among them, taking deep root over the course of several generations. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Vocalist Jon Howard of the Canadian metallers THREAT SIGNAL has issued the following update: "We've been working really hard for almost a year writing and doing pre-production for the new album.

I'm just getting a little work done on my app and I was wondering what you guys want to backup in 2.0? I mean, I have some general ideas and a few great thoughts that I will definitely add, but not announce yet. Please PM me YES PM ME lol what you would like. While I don't think that anyone in particular seeing this is a threat, I don't want to take chances.

This thread is just a question, iCoders... let's not start anything today. I don't feel like it :/

Please note however that Backups over USB are probably even 4x faster than they were over SSH. This is a supped up, cleaner version of my iPranks Backup, but with many more features. Very exciting!

PRESS/SOCIAL MEDIA RELEASE

- Media releases and feature articles on the Earth's behalf, reporting upon the magnitude of global ecological crises and sufficient responses to achieve global ecological sustainability

September 8, 2008 (embargoed)
By Earth's Newsdesk, a project of Ecological Internet (EI)
CONTACT: Dr. Glen Barry, +1 (920) 776-1075

(Earth) -- A new type of environmental news service launches this week, as "Earth's Newsdesk" will report upon ecological science, policy and advocacy from the Earth's perspective. Ecological Internet will begin regularly providing biocentric media releases and feature articles for publication elsewhere. This continues a long list of firsts from EI and its predecessors, including the web's first blog and environmental search engine.

The free service will build upon Ecological Internet's constant tracking of environmental science, policy and advocacy -- and years of deep green analysis and action -- and will report upon major threats and opportunities facing forests, climate, water and oceans. It will focus upon environmental sustainability and the needs of the biosphere, and her ability to continue maintaining a habitable Earth for all life.

I am continuing all this in the spirit of thinking out loud. It should be obvious -- even though I still have not made up my mind finally -- that I really like Sarah Palin and believe that she might be uniquely positioned (in just a couple months) to really do something about Roe. Here are some of the reasons for thinking that to be a possibility.

I am a Calvinist and believe that God draws straight with crooked lines. I also believe that God is a storyteller who loves to use quirky characters. At the same time, His law remains His law, and His order for the home remains His order for the home -- which incidentally is not the same thing as saying that His order for the home remains what every pious fusser and eisegete thinks it is.

So as we make our way through this complicated novel, we need to master two things. The first is what we are supposed to do -- what role are we to fulfill as a character in the story? The second is how to respond to other characters, especially when they are characters. In responding well and positively to others it is not necessary to maintain that you ought to be doing the same thing. On some issues it is -- Ten Commandments stuff, say. With other decisions, wisdom and discernment is required. You might believe that wisdom would bar a course of action, while this other character obviously does not believe the same. But when that happens, one good exercise is to avoid getting drawn into a detailed argument over the gnats' eyebrows, and step back and consider the big picture. Is something larger going on? In this case, I think that is likely.

John McCain is a man I do not trust, period end. Nothing about this has changed my opinions of his character, philosophy of life, and likely courses of action. I believe that he made this move as a calculated move to shore up his conservative base because that is something that he knew he had to do. He didn't want to do it, and would have picked Lieberman if he thought he could get away with it. But he knew the pro-life deal was a deal-breaker within the party ranks. At the same time, thought he, speculate I, "I should be able to shore up my base in a way they can't complain about, and at the same time, poke them in the eye. There's a pleasant thought. Romney's Mormonism would do it, I suppose . . . I know, I'll pick a woman, one who describes herself as a feminist-for-life. That'll frost their shorts. I'll have their support, which I need, but at the same time, I'll remain my very own maverick-man." So he made his choice, and instead of making faces and trying to thaw out their shorts, every evangelical voter in America jumped up on his or her chair and started waving an article of clothing around his or her head, heliocopter style. And John McCain stood there blinking. And then the crowd started chanting, "John has slain his thousands, Sarah her tens of thousands."

He meant to shore up his base, but he wound up galvanizing his base in a way that was not entirely wise for a man in his position.

Now, to the life issue. Roe is a legal issue, of course, to the extent that all legal travesties are legal issues. And to overturn it, it is certainly necessary to get judges on the Supreme Court who know how to read the Constitution. But in order to do that, it is necessary to deal with the zeitgeist first. Politicians (with certain rare exceptions) are not risk takers. They have their positions, and will articulate them in public (if that is not too risky), but very rarely will you find a solitary voice way out in front. Since Roe, a dithering Congress, and the bloodied Supreme Court, and the rhetorically pro-life but impotent White House have all represented the consensus of the American people well. Our leaders are not aliens -- they come from us, they represent us, we pick them. They will change on this issue when it becomes dangerous for them politically not to change.

An illustration of this principle in action can be readily seen in the domestic oil drilling issue. "Drill, baby, drill," can now be chanted at conventions, and politicians who oppose it can be rocked back on their heels. Twenty years ago that was impossible, but gas is now four dollars a gallon and lots of people have opinions about that. And politicians who feel the heat always see the light.

Now consider Sarah Palin's position -- both her story and her gifts. Her story demolishes, in a way no syllogism could, the central appeals of the pro-aborts. And they love to play the violin with this question -- remember that Obama was asked the question earlier in this election cycle. This is a staple in our campaigns: "What if your daughter . . ." "What if your wife . . ."

Suppose you were a middle-aged woman with a bright political career ahead of you, perhaps even at the national level. You and your husband are surprised by a pregnancy, and then on top of that you discover that your baby is a Down's child. We live in a culture that has been prepared in countless ways to accept the story that "we had to make a tough choice." And we are then astonished when someone, instead of making the "tough choice," makes a tough choice instead -- in the full confidence that it is the right choice. Sarah Palin is a "no exceptions" pro-lifer and apparently she believes that the law of God includes her.

So the question, somewhat bewildered, retreats. "All right. You and your husband wanted to keep your baby. But suppose your political career, and the goals you had worked so hard to achieve, were all threatened because your seventeen-year-old daughter got pregnant. And this will disrupt her life also -- wouldn't the compassionate thing be to . . . oh, never mind." Think of this as a novel. Think of it as a story. What is being foreshadowed? What is coming?

Some conservatives have seen rightly that Sarah Palin is not exactly devoted 24-7 to the domestic arts. She has been doing other things also, like running a state, and so they wonder if that's entirely okay. In her case, this may or may not represent a setting aside of God's calling for a wife and a mother -- we have been discussing that -- but it is a reasonable question for conservatives to wonder about and ask.

Jonah Goldberg at National Review exulted that Sarah Palin was put on earth for two reasons -- to kill caribou and kick butt. And she's "all out of caribou." Allowing for how much fun such exuberant hyperbole is, social conservatives might still wonder if she presents something of a challenge to their ideals of social order. And she might. She might not. Let's talk about that.

But in the meantime, we must not overlook the fact that she presents an absolutely devastating challenge to the feminist narrative for women, and there are no mights involved. Here is a woman who (for the sake of principle) has refused to sacrifice those things which feminists insist (in principle) must be sacrificed so that women can reach their "full potential." As a result of refusing the central dogma of their feminism, she might well become the first woman president. That'll do something to your little leftist narrative. Feminism has never been about advancing the cause of women. This reveals, as few other things could, that it has been about advancing the cause of commie women.

Granting that Sarah Palin does not look like June Cleaver, she looks a lot less like Hillary or Gloria Steinem. And, despite the differences, I can imagine Sarah and June having a very pleasant lunch together. If she tried to take Hillary or Gloria out shopping (for motorcyles, say) and a spot of lunch afterwards, all I can envision is stoney silences and a lot of glaring . . . and not from Sarah, who would be chatting happily. Sarah Palin ruffles the hair of some conservatives, but they can always comb it again. Doug Phillips will be all right in a couple days. In contrast, when it comes to the vampirism of the feminist left, let's just call her Buffy. They won't be all right in a couple of days.

And this is where her gifts come in. Ronald Reagan became a national political player on the strength of one convention speech. The same thing has happened to Sarah Palin, only in a more electrifying way, in my opinion. And in that speech, she demonstrated two things. The first is that she has the ability to have the most awful things said about her, and simply brush them away. She is genial, pleasant, attractive, likeable, smart, and all the rest of it. The more her adversaries froth and bubble like the cauldron in Macbeth, the more her genial good humor, coupled with strength of conviction, make her even more appealing. The Left is desperate and because of their desperation is playing this exactly wrong. But don't tell them -- I like how they are playing it wrong. At the same time, it is all right to tell them because it won't matter -- they are out of control and are beyond listening.

The second thing is that she clearly has the ability to speak over the bobble-heads of the anointed media darlings, and take her business straight to the American people. And this is where the really potent threat to Roe lies. If she speaks on this subject, she does do in a way consistent with the Word of God, and she does so with personal authority. She obviously cannot speak with authority on the subject of how to keep your daughters from becoming pregnant out of wedlock. But she can speak with authority on how difficult circumstances of our own making do not ever justify componding the mess with a murder.

She can say that having made a sinful or foolish choice as a woman is not a foundation for striking at womanhood itself. The establishment feminists have gone one step beyond Lady Macbeth. When she cried out, "Come, you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts! unsex me here," she at least knew what her rebellion was and called it by its right name. In their high impudence, feminists have rebelled against the life-giving nature of woman, and have done so in the name of women. Sarah Palin blows all of that away, and she does not do it by means of a law or a court decision. That, God willing, will follow -- but it cannot come first.

Jim Jordan has pointed out that the task of man was the protect and guard the Garden (Gen. 2:15). The task of woman was to bear, protect and guard the Child (Gen. 3:15). Independent of legislation, we now have someone of the national stage who is capable of addressing American women directly, and inviting them to return to something fundamental. Lady Wisdom says that all who hate her love death (Prov. 8:32-36). Sarah Palin is now in a position to say to the American people that to be a woman of death is to deny being a woman at all, and that repentance means turning around. Before Roe can die in the courts, the Abimelech in the hearts of the people will have to die. And before he can die there, a woman will have to throw a millstone from the top of the tower.

I believe that this may well be what is happening. I may be wrong, but I don't believe so. And if it plays out this way, I will bless the name of the Lord -- the God of Eve, the God of Sarah, Rebekah, and Rachel, the God of Tamar, the God of Deborah and Jael, the God of a nameless woman at the top of a tower, may her descendents be forever blessed, the God of Rahab, the God of Ruth, the God of Bathsheba, and the God of Mary. And I will honor the God who gave us Sarah.

Spanish vineyards fear climate change threat

Spanish vineyards fear climate change threat

A new forest planned to be the largest natural woodland in Britain will act as a haven for oak trees, which are facing a serious threat from diseases.

I’m a huge fan of Brian Cox. He’s often referred to as the ”rockstar of physics,” which is a big complement considering the stereotypical physicist in everyone’s mind. From the get-go you know that Professor Cox is a guy you want in your laboratory, and you can see why from this excellent TED lecture he gave in Monterey, CA, this year. He is a tireless advocate of communicating science to the world and his outreach style is second-to-none. But like many modern scientists who are working on cutting-edge research, they are often at the mercy of public misconception, media hype and personal attacks. So when I hear news that some Large Hadron Collider (LHC) physicists are receiving threats, I lose my faith in humanity…     Almost every speech from the TED conferences from past years up to now is worth watching. My personal favorite:     Ze Frank - What's So Funny About The Internet? (19:08)

The Hartley Greenhouses range are built for the keen leisure gardener, they are specifically designed to meet the lifelong needs of serious enthusiasts with small and medium-sized gardens. Click now to view our greenhouses range today. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it. By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Disease spread to wild bees from commercially bred bees used for pollination in agriculture greenhouses may be playing a role in the mysterious decline in North American bee populations, researchers said on… Last week, the U.S. EPA released a grim, 284-page study that concluded that climate change will cause ”substantial” threats to the health of the American public. And yet, one week prior to the report’s release, the agency ruled that it will not regulate harmful greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. No tags for this post. Related posts No related posts.

Hey guys. im new to this forum, and ive been getting blue screen of deaths for the past few days and im wondering what the heck is making this happen, and how can i fix it.. ill show you the problem report. I have vista home premium with service pack 1 btw.

Problem Event Name: BlueScreen
OS Version: 6.0.6001.2.1.0.768.3
Locale ID: 1033

Files that help describe the problem (some files may no longer be available)
Mini090408-01.dmp
sysdata.xml
Version.txt

View a temporary copy of these files
Warning: If a virus or other security threat caused the problem, opening a copy of the files could harm your computer.

Extra information about the problem
BCCode: 4e
BCP1: 00000099
BCP2: 0005D7F6
BCP3: 00000002
BCP4: 000950A6
OS Version: 6_0_6001
Service Pack: 1_0
Product: 768_1
Server information: f2a661b7-f456-4e38-b0e2-78d75e6269d2

Is it hardware failure? or drivers? how can i tell, its something to do with minidump, version, sysdata. Please respond i built this computer less than a week ago and ive been getting these daily. I looked in device manager i think i have everything updated drivers but, what can i do? system restore or something?? thanks.

British apples and pears are under threat because of a dramatic decline in honeybee numbers, experts have warned.The bee population in Britain has fallen by a third over the past year alone due to bad weather, insecticides and soaring numbers of parasitic mites.

More...

I got an email yesterday from a woman -- I think she's an East Coast real estate agent -- who's just furious at the Associated Press for daring to fact-check some speakers at the Republican convention in St. Paul. "It makes me so mad to see the media pick apart the candidates -- all for their own selfish purpose," she wrote. "I am an independent voter and have not yet decided who will win my vote, and articles like this infuriate me!"

I looked at the story she cited, and as far as I can tell the fact-checking is 100 percent on-target (although she clearly thinks otherwise). Among other things, she's convinced that Barack Obama didn't author any legislation. She says he "just worked with Republicans to have it done" and "Even an everyday citizen could have done that!"

I suppose that it's true an everyday citizen could do it, provided that the everyday citizen managed to get elected to the Senate and, once there, build the support necessary to get a bill through the swampland of committees and subcommittees.

And I don't want to get into a debate over whether a "sponsor" is an "author." Most legislation is drafted and edited by paid staff. Some seems to come straight from lobbyists. But line Gov. Sarah Palin's speechwriters fed her -- "this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform" -- was moose poop.

The AP story makes oblique reference to the Lugar-Obama Cooperative Proliferation Detection, Interdiction Assistance, and Conventional Threat Reduction Act of 2006, which is certainly a major piece of legislation, but my favorite is the Coburn-Obama Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, which mandated the creation of USASpending.gov, an online database that tells you exactly where our money's been going.

Go there and try it out. Just for fun, take a peek at the federally funded spending trend for Alaska.

John McCain signed on as a cosponsor of that bill. As it gained momentum, a total of 43 signed on as cosponsors. One who did not was Alaskan Sen. Ted Stevens, who put a "secret block" on the bill in an attempt to kill it.

But I'm not trying to get into the politics of it. I'm personally more interested in what all this says about how and why people consume media.

Underlying this interaction is an unpleasant truth of human nature. We don't seek information and illumination as much as we seek validation.

Dissonant information -- anything that conflicts with what we think we know, and/or want to believe, is initially rejected. Information that reinforces our world view feels much better.

This phenomenon actually drives a lot of media consumption.

Here's an example: A suburban homeowner may read city crimes stories with special interest, even though they have no real bearing on the homeowner's life. But that homeowner made a decision to locate in the suburbs -- and perhaps endure a daily 50-minute commute. Stories about "inner city" horrors help validate that decision.

This explains why we watch Jon Stewart, cheer, and laugh. And why else would we read sports pages? We already know who won.

You may notice my use of the word "we." I mean that. Journalists are no less entangled with this desire for validation and reinforcement than everybody else.

As evidence, I point to today's Roy Greenslade blog at the Guardian, in which Greenslade is being taken to task by journalist-readers for being a "doom-monger" for daring to speak truth about the inevitable decline of ink-on-paper journalism.

On the Guardian site and at HoldTheFrontPage, print journalists are making it clear they don't like it one bit.

One admonishes Greenslade (who teaches at City University): "Is it not a bit like a First Wold War general to earn your living training young people and sending them out into a a career with an extremely uncertain future and little prospect of earning a decent living?" Another asks: "Why can't we have a cheerleader for newspapers? If we ever need one, it's now."

Rah.

We had a commenter that was really upset about the Large Hadron Collider (or as I like to call it, the biggest refrigerator ever made). I also received a few emails, with the same concerns. Here's what the commenter said and below that, the latest from Science Daily...

This experiment is sick and those that think it a joke are sick. The scientists are terrorists in threatening mass destruction. They have no right to veto my existence, the lives of my children, life on earth in all its wonderous beauty and complexity. They have no right to threaten the people of Earth with mega death. The experiment has to be stopped at all costs. No data or knowledge is worth this kind of risk. Science has reached its limitation. People were quite happy in the past with simple pleasures. No one needs this science or data. we have too much already. Humans need to return to simple and sustainable living and not be threatened by a minority of freaks with over sized brains and no appreciation of Nature and everyday things like mountains, birds, insects, flowers or the sunrise.

And here's a snippet from Science Daily & The Review of the Safety of LHC Collisions. Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics, September 5, 2008.

A new report provides the most comprehensive evidence available to confirm that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)’s switch-on, due on Wednesday next week, poses no threat to mankind. Nature’s own cosmic rays regularly produce more powerful particle collisions than those planned within the LHC, which will enable nature’s laws to be studied in controlled experiments.

The LHC Safety Assessment Group have reviewed and updated a study first completed in 2003, which dispels fears of universe-gobbling black holes and of other possibly dangerous new forms of matter, and confirms that the switch-on will be completely safe.

The report explains that if particle collisions at the LHC had the power to destroy the Earth, we would never have been given the chance to exist, because regular interactions with more energetic cosmic rays would already have destroyed the Earth or other astronomical bodies.

The Safety Assessment Group writes, “Nature has already conducted the equivalent of about a hundred thousand LHC experimental programmes on Earth – and the planet still exists.”

I think the problem is that when you ask a scientist "is there *any* chance things could go wrong" - they will always say well, sure a 0.000000000x chance... it's not zero, but it's also not exactly like pulling the slot machine handle when this machine is fired up either. I do agree with the commenter though, "they have no right to threaten the people of Earth with mega death".

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!

Google garnered headlines all week with its new Chrome browser. Rival Microsoft announced it will release just four patches next Tuesday, but that may not be cause to think the day will be an easy one for those responsible for keeping systems patched. On the virtualization front, HP launched a product-and-services blitz this week, while VMware picked up a Microsoft certification. Otherwise, a warning was issued about new trickery from spammers and in case we all weren't aware of it by now, social-networking sites could be ripe for malware.

1. Continuing coverage: Google's Chrome browser : Google offered up a Labor Day holiday surprise when it inadvertently posted a look at its new Chrome browser at an unofficial company blog. Google then made the news official later in the day and released the browser, which shifts the landscape of that market, in beta on Tuesday. Reviewers found the Chrome browser fast, functional and, following the Google home-page pattern, with a stripped-down look. By week's end, though, the first security problems had surfaced.

2. Upcoming Microsoft patch lineup could be 'massive,' says researcher : A word of warning for next week -- don't assume that because Microsoft is releasing only four patches this month that it will be a snap to deal with them. "It's not going to be an easy month, what with all these different applications and different operating systems affected. Patching will be a lot more involved than you'd think with just four bulletins," said Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Network Security. The job of applying the patches could be "potentially massive," he said.

3. Researchers build malicious Facebook application : A research team built a malicious Facebook program to show the perils of social-networking applications. Their experiment shows how easy it could be for a miscreant to trick a big group of users into downloading an application that seems harmless, but that contains malicious code.

4. Should IT form a union?: Demands on IT workers keep piling up, and they have to labor under the constant threat of having their jobs outsourced. Is it time for IT workers to unionize in order to demand better working conditions? Perhaps, but the idea could also be a tough sell in the "lone gunman" ethos of IT work.

5. Sony recalls 73,000 Vaio laptops due to burn hazard : Sony recalled 73,000 Vaio TZ laptops because a manufacturing defect could cause them to overheat in some circumstances. Wiring near the hinge of the computer models could short circuit, Sony said. One person has suffered a minor burn and Sony has gotten 15 additional reports about computers overheating.

6. Spammers use free Web services to shield links : Spammers are using free Web services to try to make the spam links they send out look more legitimate, according to MessageLabs. Photo-hosting sites and the like are being used by spammers who are taking advantages of various features offered as part of free services, the e-mail security vendor has found.

7. HP launches product blitz for virtualization : Responding to survey findings that show most businesses aren't making the most of what virtualization has to offer, HP introduced several new products aimed at both desktop and server virtualization. Besides the hardware, including a new ProLiant server and desktop thin clients, HP is alos offering virtualization consulting services.

8. VMware's ESX certified for Microsoft support, deployment: Microsoft's Server Virtualization Validation Program has issued its first certification with VMware's ESX hypervisor receiving the honors. The certification means that VMware's product will work with Microsoft's Windows Server and other software. It also means that ESX users will be able to receive tech support from both companies.

9. Internet traffic growth slowing, research firm shows : Remember the alarming reports that the Internet is going to collapse under the weight of its own data, especially as more video goes online? Well ... For the second year in a row international Internet capacity grew at a quicker pace than Internet traffic, according to TeleGeography. International Internet traffic grew 53 percent from the middle of last year to the middle of this year, compared to 61 percent in the prior year. Between 2007 and 2008, average traffic utilization levels on the Internet dropped to 29 percent from 31 percent, with peak utilization decreasing from 44 percent to 43 percent, the market-tracking firm found.

10. Cheaters: Inside the hidden world of IT certification fraud : A group of IT hardware and software vendors have joined with independent certifying agencies, test centers and some others to create the IT Certification Council in an effort to share information to keep certification fraud from occurring. Certification cheating is apparently a dirty little IT secret that the council seeks to bring into the open.