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With Congress on break, SOPA fight continues

(CNN) -- Members of Congress may be on vacation, but that hasn't calmed critics who say an effort to stamp out online piracy would create an unprecedented threat to free speech on the Internet.

Far from fading from memory, the Stop Online Piracy Act (along with a related Senate bill) has become a rallying point for Web freedom advocates in a debate that has pitted Hollywood and other business interests against some of the biggest titans of the technology world.

Interest in the debate spiked again this week when one of the bill's opponents suggested that online heavyweights such as Google, Facebook, Amazon and Twitter had considered a "nuclear option" -- temporarily shutting down their sites in protest -- to raise awareness about the bills, which await lawmakers when they return this month.

When contacted by CNN, none of those companies would confirm that such a drastic move had ever been considered. By Friday, the advocate whose comments had fueled the speculation appeared to back away from claims that a Web blackout was still likely to occur.

"Internet and technology companies will continue to educate policymakers and other stakeholders on the problems with the (legislation)," Markham Erickson, director of Web trade association NetCoalition, said in a statement. "An 'Internet blackout' would obviously be both drastic and unprecedented." More...

01-09-2012 17:27

Could Chrome overtake Internet Explorer in the browser wars?

(CNN) -- A month ago, Google's three-year effort to push its Web browser, Chrome, took a major step when analysts said it had passed Mozilla's Firefox to become the second-most popular tool of its kind on the Internet.

Today, that climb continues and has some tech observers wondering whether Chrome could do the unthinkable and topple perennial leader Internet Explorer from atop the browser rankings.

According to Web analytics firm StatCounter, the most popular version of Google's browser, Chrome 15, edged out Internet Explorer 8 in early December to become the world's most used edition of a browser. (For those keeping score, the totals were 23.6% of worldwide browser usage compared to IE8's 23.5%.)

When all versions are considered, Chrome accounted for more than 27% of all worldwide browser use at the beginning of December, an increase of about 1.5% over the previous month. That's compared to about 37% for Internet Explorer, which dropped 2% from November, according to StatCounter.

Now in third place, Firefox remained mostly steady with about 25% of the browser market. Trailing far behind is Apple's Safari, with about 6%. More...

01-04-2012 21:45

Beijing Imposes New Rules on Social Networking Sites

BEIJING — Officials announced new rules on Friday aimed at controlling the way Chinese Internet users post messages on social networking sites that have posed challenges to the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda machinery.

For many users, the most striking of the new rules requires people using the sites, called microblogs, or weibo in Chinese, to register with their real names and biographical information. They will still be able to post under aliases, according to a report by Xinhua, the state news agency.

Some analysts say the real-name registration could dampen some of the freewheeling conversations that take place online, and that sometimes result in a large number of users criticizing officials and government policy.

The rule on real-name registration had been expected for several months now by industry watchers, and Internet companies in China had already experimented in 2009 with some forms of this. It was the ninth of 17 new microblog regulations issued on Friday by Beijing government officials, who have been charged by central authorities with reining in the way microblogs are used.

The regulations also include a licensing requirement for companies that want to host microblogs and prohibitions on content, including posts aimed at “spreading rumors, disturbing social order or undermining social stability.” But officials have long put pressure on microblog companies to self-censor, and the lists of limits on content are more an articulation of the boundaries already in place. More...

12-19-2011 18:22

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