Chinese firm to invest billions in solar battery plant
Chinese car and battery maker BYD–which is 10 percent owned by U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway–will invest $3.3 billion over five years to build China’s largest solar battery plant, a report said Saturday.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10440127-54.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
China’s BYD to bring electric cars to U.S. in 2010
Initially, it will make the $40,000 car available to “government agencies, utilities and maybe some celebrities” in a specific region, Wang told the Journal during a factory tour of the BYD’s lithium ion battery factory. BYD plans to offer a few hundred of one of its most advanced cars in the U.S., the five-seat e6, which takes seven to nine hours to fully charge and has a 250-mile range.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10315928-54.html?tag=mncol;txt
Italy trying to clamp down on Internet videos
The government decree, which affects sites such as Google’s YouTube, would also require sites that regularly upload videos to obtain a license to operate in Italy, the Associated Press reported Friday. Companies and organizations, including Google, telecommunications providers, and press watchdog groups, are seeking changes in the proposed decree. They assert that it would hurt freedom of expression and be extremely difficult to enforce and monitor.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10440129-93.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Leaf-like sea slug feeds on light
U.S. researchers have found that the sea slug Elysia chlorotica can photosynthesize, using energy from light to convert carbon dioxide into sugars. “If you shine light on these slugs, they fix carbon dioxide and make oxygen just like a plant,” Sidney Pierce of the University of South Florida told CBC Radio’s Quirks & Quarks.
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/01/22/tech-biology-solar-sea-slug.html?ref=rss
How Google’s Nexus One censors cuss words
Every time they said something naughty into the phone, the naughty word came out as “####”–and not just “f—.” It even censored the “S” part of BS. And what I am about to tell you may lead you to utter some naughty words. Please, go ahead. I have heard them all, in several different languages. And I respect the vehemence of the vernacular.
Judge: Nvidia infringed on three Rambus patent
Rambus first filed patent claims against Nvidia in July 2008. In November of that year, it asked the ITC for an injunction on the import and sale of anything using Nvidia’s memory controllers. Nvidia was cleared of infringement by the ITC judge on two other Rambus patents under examination, however. The litigation involves memory controllers–which handle communications between memory chips and other silicon–related to graphics processors.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10439960-260.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
YouTube starts renting movies online in U.S.
Google Inc.’s YouTube is joining the likes of Apple, Amazon.com and Netflix with a new online movie rental service in the United States.The announcement marks YouTube’s first major push into delivering paid video and movies, rather than supplying videos that can be viewed free in exchange for watching advertisements.
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/01/22/tech-youtube-charging.html?ref=rss
State Dept. presses China ambassador on Google
The U.S. government is continuing confidential talks with China in response to the Google-hacking incident, with a State Department official meeting the Chinese ambassador in Washington, D.C. Thursday night, but it has not yet filed a formal protest.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10439959-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Storage predictions for 2011
Dedupe everywhere – Data deduplication (dedupe)–squeezing data objects down to a fraction of their original size–surfaced in 2003. Four years later, dedupe went mainstream as a process embedded within backup.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-21546_3-10439711-10253464.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Google search gets answer highlights and events
Between the two improvements, the highlighting one is the most interesting. It now highlights what Google calls “answers” within page summaries. These are matches to a user’s query, so if a user looks up something like a math problem, or a semantic question such as, “what is the capital of Haiti?” the answer would be made bold right on the page.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-27076_3-10439712-248.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Solar-driven Stirling engines get to work
Solar plant developer Tessera Solar installed 60 solar collectors, called the SunCatcher from Stirling Energy Systems, in Peoria, Ariz. Each dish is rated at 25 kilowatts and the entire facility will have a capacity of 1.5-megawatts of generation. The Stirling Energy Systems technology also captures heat by using a mirrored parabolic dish that moves to track the sun. But instead of heating a liquid to make steam for a turbine, the heat is directed at a hydrogen gas-filled piston, which drives a Stirling engine to make electricity.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10439709-54.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Judge lowers Jammie Thomas’ piracy penalty
Last June, a federal jury in Minnesota found Jammie Thomas-Rasset liable for willful copyright infringement and ordered her to pay nearly $2 million. Michael Davis, chief judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota, chopped the amount to $54,000, or $2,250 per song.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-10439636-261.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Sony Ericsson to launch its first Android phone
The company announced Thursday that it will launch its first Android smartphone in April in Japan. Sold through the large Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo, the Xperia X10–or SO-O1B as it will be known in Japan–will sport a 4-inch WVGA touchscreen and 8.1-megapixel camera. It will include both entertainment and social networking features.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10439544-1.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Apple eyes gadgets with built-in solar panels
Company employees have applied for a patent relating to powering electronic devices using integrated solar cells, the Patently Apple site has uncovered. Called Power Management Circuitry and Solar Cells, the application dates back to August 2008 and was officially published Thursday.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10439525-54.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Astronaut sends first live tweets from space
NASA astronaut T.J. Creamer, on board the International Space Station, made social-media history Friday morning when he became the first person to send a Twitter message from space. Creamer, under his Twitter username @Astro_TJ, tweeted, “Hello Twitterverse! We r now LIVE tweeting from the International Space Station–the 1st live tweet from Space! 
More soon, send your ?s.”
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10439573-36.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20