Originally posted by Zero One

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Originally posted by FieryIce

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I wouldn't know seeing as we don't have the forced theme going on this year. What happened?

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Don't poke the bear.

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Originally posted by Rick

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I know I totally enjoyed the day, and I hope everyone else did too. :3

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In the U.S., waiting for high-speed fiber internet to come to your neighborhood is a bit like waiting for a file to download over dial-up. It’s gonna take a while.

But in China, the government will soon require all new homes constructed where public fiber-optic telecom networks are available to be equipped for access to those networks, according to China Daily.

Residents will be required to have equal access to services from available telecom companies. The new policy from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology will go into effect April 1, 2013.

The Chinese government wants to connect 40 million families to fiber networks by 2015 — according to the Economic Information Daily Journal, as cited by China Daily — and fiber connections grew by 10 million families in 2012.

The cost of deploying fiber networks is driven in large part by the “last mile” phase — the process of actually connecting homes and businesses to the fiber network. China’s policy puts the onus on builders to deal with the last mile.

The project drives home the point made previously by Mark Ansboury, founder and president upstart U.S. broadband provider Gigabit Squared: In other countries, broadband is driven by government investment and regulation, while in the U.S. it’s driven by the needs of investors at entrenched companies. Such a heavy-handed policy is unlikely to fly in the U.S., and many builders would likely want to provide fiber connections as a selling point. But the contrast between the two countries is telling.

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Originally posted by Gabu

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China: New homes required to have fiber optic Internet
China: Censors Internet anyway

We see China trollin', we hatin'...

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Concerns about the susceptibility of the Java programming language to cyberattacks culminated Thursday night, with a warning posted on the Department of Homeland Security’s Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-Cert) calling on the public to disable Java on their personal computers.

The call came in response to the discovery of a new vulernability that lets an attacker execute code on a PC running Java. The vulnerability is reportedly already being used in “exploit kits” which are pre-packaged, for-sale tool kits that can be used to commit online crimes such as stealing someone’s identity.

“We are currently unaware of a practical solution to this problem,” the posting said.

Security experts have been advising people to disable Java for some time, since it is so commonly targeted by cyber criminals. Last fall, Apple won praise for a Mac update that removed a Java plugin from all Mac-compatible web browsers. “I think that the way they’ve handled Java in the browser was their biggest win in 2012,” Charlie Miller, a former NSA employee turned noted Apple hacker, told Ars Technica.

Turning off Java can be done in a few simple steps, depending on which browsers you use.

Mac owners who use Google Chrome can go to Chrome://plugins and verify that the Java plugin is disabled. If you use Safari, you can choose Safari>Preferences, click security and uncheck the box that says “enable Java.” If you use Firefox, you can choose Tools>Add-ons, search “My add-ons” and disable any Java plugin.

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Originally posted by Rena

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Canadian internet service: now worse than Chinese internet service.

Originally posted by FieryIce

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the government will soon require all new homes constructed where public fiber-optic telecom networks are available to be equipped for access to those networks, according to China Daily.

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But how many stories have we heard of ISPs telling people their service is not available in that area, when their neighbours have it?

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