The Internet Archive, a project to create a digital library of the web for posterity, successfully fought a secret government Patriot Act order for records about one of its patrons and won the right to make the order public, civil liberties groups announced Wednesday morning.

On November 26, 2007, the FBI served a controversial National Security Letter (.pdf) on the Internet Archive's founder Brewster Kahle, asking for records about one of the library's registered users, asking for the user's name, address and activity on the site.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Internet Archive's lawyers, fought the NSL, challenging its constitutionality in a December 14 complaint (.pdf) to a federal court in San Francisco. The FBI agreed on April 21 to withdraw the letter and unseal the court case, making some of the documents available to the public.

The Patriot Act greatly expanded the reach of NSLs, which are subpoenas for documents such as billing records and telephone records that the FBI can issue in terrorism investigations without a judge's approval. Nearly all NSLs come with gag orders forbidding the recipient from ever speaking of the subpoena, except to a lawyer.

Brewster Kahle called the gag order "horrendous," saying he couldn't talk about the case with his board members, wife or staff, but said that his stand was part of a time-honored tradition of librarians protecting the rights of their patrons.

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Stephen Colbert, whose U.S. presidential campaign was cut short, came out a winner on Tuesday when he walked away with a Webby award as the Internet's "Person of the Year."

Other special achievement winners in the 12th annual Webby awards, known as the "Oscars of the Internet," included Black Eyed Peas' frontman and songwriters will.i.am, recognized as "Artist of the Year," and French filmmaker Michel Gondry, who took home honors as "Video Person of the Year."

The Webby awards, which honor excellence on the Internet, are presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a 550-person judging academy. Winners will be honored at ceremonies on June 9th and 10th in New York, and, as always, will be limited to just a five-word acceptance speech.

Colbert won the highest honor for "the innovative way he has used the Internet to interact with fans of The Colbert Report."

Among other Web achievements, a campaign by Colbert's fans made his show's official website the top Google search result under "Greatest Living American" and his "One Million Strong for Stephen T. Colbert" Facebook group attracted more than 78 members per minute in its first week.

Last year Colbert, who plays a pugnacious, egomaniacal talk show host on Comedy Central, cut short a playful run for the presidency after his requests to be on the South Carolina Democratic and Republic primary ballots was rejected.

NASA is badass. Let's admit it. Who else would be so forward thinking as to team with m2mi to build small satellites to make internet bandwidth available in space? This way, the Venusian social networking site we've all wanted to hook up with will be ready to receive us before too long.

Also, if you end up going to space, and you need to buy that collector's Star Wars Darth Vader action figure replica helmet from eBay, you don't have to ask the astronauts to land the space shuttle special for you. You can just buy it from space. Now, the shipping, we're not sure how that will work, but NASA can't solve all your problems, you know.

Comcast Corp. said Tuesday it has increased upload and download speeds for business customers of its high-speed Internet service.

The Philadelphia cable, phone, Internet and media company said it is now offering its business Internet customers download speeds of up to 16 megabits per second and upload speeds of up to two megabits per second.

Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA,CMCSK) offered the boost on the heels of its launch of its Business Class Bundle, a combination video, phone and data offering aimed at business customers.

The company said it will continue to increase download and upload speeds as it rolls out a new data-transmission technology.

When I was a boy, I wanted a shortwave radio. I was fascinated by the idea of listening to radio programs from around the world. I didn't get one until I was an adult, by which time the reason I had wanted one was diminished: In recent years, most of the national radio services around the world have stopped or cut back on their shortwave broadcasting, opting instead to broadcast via the Web. Britain's BBC is a prime example. Some years ago its World Service stopped broadcasting directly into North America via shortwave.

Meanwhile, although radio broadcasters have embraced modern times, with some 10,000 around the world now streaming their programs online, radio makers haven't caught the hint. Why don't more radios feature an Internet connection? The appeal is obvious, if only because tuning in to a broadcast on a computer isn't as easy as flipping on a radio on the nightstand or in your kitchen.

This is why I was excited to try the Aluratek Internet Radio Alarm Clock. Priced at $199, the Aluratek is a basic clock radio that can pick up both traditional FM signals as well as Internet broadcasts via an Ethernet cable or your Wi-Fi wireless router.

Balky on Passwords
When I connected the radio to my router via Ethernet, the setup was easy. I didn't have to configure anything on my computer. But setup via Wi-Fi could have been better. My router is an Apple (AAPL) Airport Extreme, and I use both WPA2 passwords and MAC-address filtering to prevent others from hijacking my network. Try as I might, I couldn't get the router and the radio to work with a password required. I'd type it in with the remote control, and still it wouldn't connect. Finally I turned off the password requirement on my router, and the radio connected. I had this same problem once when I tried another model of Internet radio, the Roku Soundbridge Radio. Wi-Fi radios don't seem to like passwords very much.

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LOL, BRB, and OMG are just some of the things teens say in their conversations to their friends on the Internet, in their blogs or in text messages. And a new study released from the Pew Internet and American Life Project shows that 64% of teens are starting to use this electronic language in their writing assignments at school. "It has become more pervasive. More and more kids write at school like they right at home," said Stacy Fabrega, an English teacher at Leon High School.

Students say the Internet lingo has become like a second language. "I've done it before a couple, a lot of times. I'll be writing a paper and you use the letter "u" or something instead of the word. Or you know b/c for because or you know w/o for without just shortening it because you get lazy and don't want to type the whole thing," said Patrick Dix, a Junior at Leon High School. "If it, it helps a lot because it's real quick and easy so I tend to use it like OMG or like some other ones LOL for laughing out loud," said Philippe Schmitt, a Sophomore at Leon High School.

 
The study says 85% of teens use some type of electronic communication on occasion. This includes text messaging,
e-mails, instant messaging, and social network sites like myspace. As more and more young people are exposed to the abbreviated language, some think this issue will only get worse. And some teachers say when students mix this writing with formal writing it can become a real problem. "I don't know if they are spelling it incorrectly because they don't know or because it's just their style of writing. So we do address that," said Fabrega.

The study was based on 700 teens in the U.S. ages 12 to 17.

China has proclaimed itself the world's largest Internet market, with 221 million Internet users, state media reported Thursday.

The Ministry of Information Industry (MII) cited statistics from the China Internet Network Information Centre (CNNIC), a quasi-government organization that reports to the MII. China reached the magic mark at the end of February, English-language newspaper China Daily reported. In March, Beijing-based telecommunications consultancy and research firm BDA China reported that China had overtaken the U.S. in total Internet users.

With its large population, China made reaching the world's top mark look easy. China currently has only 16 percent Internet penetration -- below the world average of 19.1 percent, and well below the approximately 50 percent penetration in the U.S.

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Is that Miley Cyrus flashing some skin?

Less-than-wholesome photos of a girl bearing a close resemblance to the 15-year-old superstar are making the rounds on the Internet.

One photo shows the Cyrus look-alike tugging at her white tank top to reveal a green bra. In another shot, she flaunts her bare midriff while draped over a young male, who rests his hand on her hip. Another shot shows her cuddling up to the same guy.

This isn't the first time risque photos of someone resembling Cyrus have circulated online. In recent months, shots have surfaced of a girl posing in her underwear and bikini.

Cyrus, star of the TV show "Hannah Montana" and role model for countless young girls, is one of the biggest and most G-rated acts in the country. Cyrus' "Best of Both Worlds" tour sold out arenas, and her successful 3-D concert film collected $31.3 million in its opening weekend in February.

The upcoming "Hannah Montana" movie will be filmed in Tennessee and Los Angeles, beginning early next month. The movie is scheduled for release May 1, 2009.

The actress-singer's publicists Jill Fritzo and Meghan Prophet didn't return messages from The Associated Press seeking comment. An assistant to Cyrus' manager, Jason Morey, referred the AP to Prophet.

Software company Microsoft said Monday it is suing a company run by a Dutch mother because it had started using a Microsoft domain title in computer programmes aimed at curbing children's use of the Internet.

"Microsoft has filed suit against Unicaresoft Corporation for violation of intellectual property rights in using our MSN brand," said a spokesman for Microsoft's Netherlands interests.

Unicaresoft Corporation is headed up by 46 year-old Carola Eppink, a mother keen to restrict her children's use of the Internet.

"We filed suit to prevent the use of MSN in the name of the product and in the domain names on the Internet," the Microsoft spokesman said.

Unicaresoft Corporation began earlier this month marketing its software programme enabling parents to limit the time their children spend surfing and in chatrooms.

The programme also helps parents to check out Internet sites which their children have been visiting or to filter out groups of words received in email reception boxes.

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Major Internet stocks rose Friday, with Google shares soaring after the Web search leader reported better-than-expected first-quarter earnings.

Google shares rose $96.69, or 21.1 percent, to $546.23 in afternoon trading. In the past year, the stock has traded between $412.11 and $747.24.

Late Thursday, Google reported its profit climbed 30 percent in the first quarter to $4.84 per share, handily beating analyst estimates and soothing investors' fears that Google would be hurt by broader economic weakness.

Jefferies & Co. analyst Youssef Squali upgraded the stock to "Buy" from "Hold" in a client note, citing "impressive improvements in monetization, no signs of weakness from the economic downturn and upside potential from display, video and mobile over time."

The analyst said that although the company's total paid clicks grew 20 percent year over year, growth has slowed in the last year. However, he noted Google's management maintains this is due to quality improvements the company has been making, not economic issues.

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