Chinese province bans adults looking at youngsters’ mobiles
Adults banned from searching children's computers or phones under a new law passed in Chongqing, southwest China It is a ruling that teenagers around the world will regard with a certain amount of envy. Parents in one Chinese city are to be prevented from snooping on their children's online activity and text messages. Adults, including family members, are banned from searching through children's computers or phones under a new regional law passed in Chongqing, southwest China, state media reported today. The regulation outlaws snooping into their emails, text messages, web chats, and browser history. The regulation is designed to protect the rights of children, but is surprising given widespread concern in China about excessive internet use among young people and their access to unsuitable material. Psychologists have sought to have internet addiction listed as a clinical disorder and treatment camps have sprung up across the country. The Chongqing Evening Post described the new regulation, adopted on Friday by officials in Chongqing, as the first of its kind in the country. Other Chinese media said it expanded an existing national rule. But both experts and children doubted whether it would have an impact in practice. Lu Yulin, a professor at the China Youth University of Political Science, told China Daily that children were unlikely to take their parents to court
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Chinese province bans adults looking at youngsters' mobiles
India unveils ‘laptop’ costing $35
Touchscreen computing device aimed at students is expected to be rolled out to higher education institutions from 2011 India has come up with the world's cheapest "laptop", a touchscreen computing device that costs $35 (£23). India's human resource development minister Kapil Sibal this week unveiled the low-cost computing device that is designed for students, saying his department had started talks with global manufacturers to start mass production. "We have reached a (developmental) stage that today; the motherboard, its chip, the processing, connectivity, all of them cumulatively cost around $35, including memory, display, everything," he told a news conference in New Delhi. He said the touchscreen gadget was packed with web browers, PDF reader and video conferencing facilities, but its hardware was created with sufficient flexibility to incorporate new components according to user requirement. Sibal said the Linux-based device was expected to be introduced to higher education institutions from 2011 but the aim was to drop the price further to $20 and ultimately to $10. The device was developed by research teams at India's premier technological institutes, the Indian Institute of Technology and the Indian Institute of Science. India spends about 3% of its annual budget on school education and has improved its literacy rates to over 64% of its population of 1.2 billion. However, studies have shown many students can barely read or write and most state-run schools have inadequate facilities. India Computing guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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India unveils 'laptop' costing $35
Go go gadget plaything | Saptarshi Ray
Once we found fun things to do with computers sold as serious machines. Now gadgets are marketed as nothing but toys As a boy I managed, after much persistence, to persuade my parents to buy me a Sinclair Spectrum 48K+ (the one with the black, concave keys). To do this I had to convince them it was not merely a machine on which to play games but an important tool that would teach me computer programming and aid my schoolwork.
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Go go gadget plaything | Saptarshi Ray
Apple posts highest ever quarterly earnings after success for Mac and iPad
Steve Jobs says tech firm had enjoyed "phenomenal quarter" after revenues rise 88%, with net profit up 78% at $3.25bn Record sales of Mac computers and strong demand for the iPad has helped Apple post its highest ever quarterly earnings. Steve Jobs declared last night that Apple had enjoyed a "phenomenal quarter", after it smashed analyst forecasts. Revenues rose 88% to $15.7bn (£10.2bn) in the three months to 26 June, with net quarterly profit up 78% at $3.25bn.
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Apple posts highest ever quarterly earnings after success for Mac and iPad
Chris Barrie: The satnav is a breath of fresh air | Celebrity squares
Actor Chris Barrie admits to being a luddite, but he finds his satnav to be a true guiding light What's your favourite piece of technology, and how has it improved your life? I have to say that being on the road quite a bit, the satnav is very convenient. I still occasionally use the good old-fashioned map book, but the satnav has been an absolute breath of fresh air. When was the last time you used it, and what for? Yesterday, to take me from West London down to Kent and it got to the point, about 70 miles into my journey, that it was taking me completely the wrong way. But it eventually delivered me to where I needed to be.
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Chris Barrie: The satnav is a breath of fresh air | Celebrity squares
Trying to fix a PC that sometimes refuses to start
Pete Morton has a Mesh PC that does not always start correctly but, if left on, can boot after two or three hours I've got a PC which intermittently refuses to boot, sometimes for several hours. When it's misbehaving, it doesn't show a splashscreen, there's no hard disk activity, and it won't boot from a CD, either. If I leave it powered on, it does seem to boot eventually, after anything up to two or three hours. Memory tests and hard disc tests run clean. The PC is a fairly high spec two-year-old Mesh PC. It has been a dog from 13 months, but Mesh wash their hands of it, because I didn't buy extended warranty. Any idea where I should begin or should I just cut my losses? Pete Morton Intermittent faults are very difficult to diagnose, and I can't think of anything that would cause a PC to hang for a couple of hours before booting. (Anyone?) In this case, I'd guess that the likeliest culprit is either the memory or the hard drive, though you say these check out OK. It might be dust or a stray wire or bit of metal fouling a chip on the motherboard (that last one isn't common turned out to be the cause of my son's PC rebooting at random). It might be the power supply, but again, this seems to work normally once the PC has booted. Although you say Mesh has not been helpful, you could try asking on its support forum, in the section called Mesh Computers Owners Club - Customer Care and Technical Support .
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Trying to fix a PC that sometimes refuses to start
Steve Jobs to launch Apple’s new iPhone – but will it be an anticlimax?
Apple is preparing to reveal its latest iPhone, but many details were leaked after a prototype was left in a bar Apple's chief executive, Steve Jobs, is due to unveil the fourth version of the company's hugely popular iPhone tomorrow – including a screen with up to four times more detail, a camera flash, noise cancellation and longer battery life. The announcement is expected at the company's Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco, which has drawn thousands of programmers keen to write programs – apps – for the device. More than 51m iPhones have been sold since its launch in June 2007, and a number of developers have made thousands of pounds from selling apps through Apple's App Store. But for Jobs the unveiling will be something of an anticlimax – many details about the phone leaked out in mid-April after one of his staff lost a prototype in a bar near the company's headquarters. It was sold to gadget blog Gizmodo, where blogger Jason Chen took it apart and posted a video declaring: "You are looking at Apple's next iPhone." Jobs prefers to keep details of upcoming products under wraps to heighten expectations. But with more details known about the new iPhone than any previous model, some of that effect is likely to be diminished. Yet Apple can revel in having passed Microsoft as the most valuable technology company, based on market capitalisation, and having sold 2m of its iPad tablet computers worldwide since they went on sale in the US on 3 April – including a highly successful UK launch that saw a queue of over a thousand people outside Apple's flagship store in Regent Street, London. Gizmodo's posting about the new iPhone has turned into a criminal investigation after the roommate of Brian Hogan – who walked out of a bar with the iPhone – contacted police, worried that the phone was stolen
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Steve Jobs to launch Apple's new iPhone – but will it be an anticlimax?
HP to cut 9,000 jobs
Computer and services business to spend $1bn over three years to consolidate operations in automated data centres Hewlett-Packard, the computer and services business, is to cut 9,000 jobs while spending $1bn over the next three years to consolidate its operations in automated data centres as it completes its corporate digestion of the services company EDS, which it acquired for $14bn in August 2008. But the company will hire an extra 6,000 staff as it invests in the new data centres and expands global operations, it said in a statement . The move is expected to lead to gross savings of $1bn annually once completed, it said. The shift is part of an ongoing effort to reduce the headcount at the company, which has increasingly focused on services as a path to profit as older parts of the business, such as its PC and printer division, have seen profits remain stagnant . The fastest growth in profits in the past two years has come from its services side. But it has not abandoned the computer side of the business: in May it announced the purchase of Palm, the smartphone maker, for $1.2bn after winning a brief five-way bidding war. It plans to introduce tablet computers running Palm's WebOS software later this year.
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HP to cut 9,000 jobs
Video: Stephen Fry collects his iPad and gives his verdict
Author and broadcaster Stephen Fry was among the crowds waiting to get an iPad from the Apple store on launch day. He gives his verdict on Steve Jobs's latest innovation
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Video: Stephen Fry collects his iPad and gives his verdict
Brett Ratner: ‘The iPhone is a toy’ | Celebrity squares
Film director Brett Ratner believes the BlackBerry is vasty superior to Apple's popular device What's your favourite piece of technology, and how has it improved your life? I have to say there's a new gadget that's called a Dash [Personal Internet Viewer] – it's made by Sony, and it's kind of interesting because it's by your bed … basically it's like a futuristic clock radio. I can have everything from TMX to Twitter to Facebook right next to my bed, so I can wake up to my favourite music video. It's the coolest thing ever. I can see this thing being by my bed for the next 20 years. This has everything right at your fingertips. When was the last time you used it, and what for? Every morning when I wake up – I wake up differently every morning. I'm constantly being visually stimulated. What additional features would you add if you could? It's not a phone, so I would probably add that into it. Do you think it will be obsolete in 10 years' time? All technology will be obsolete in 10 years – it keeps changing and evolving, and makes life exciting. What always frustrates you about technology in general? How fast it's changing – how I buy a new computer from Apple and in six months it's old
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Brett Ratner: 'The iPhone is a toy' | Celebrity squares