Facebook tests $1 fee to send messages to non friends

Facebook says that it is testing a service that will charge users $1 to send a message to a non-friend user.  This will make sure that the message does not end up in the recipient's "other" folder.  Facebook says that doing this will greatly reduce the number of spammers.

China prepares to grow vegetables on Mars.

China is planning to grow vegetables on Mars, it has been announced.That's despite the country's expanding and ambitious - but young - space agency not having a permanent space station in orbit around the Earth - let alone the Moon or Mars. State media reported that successful tests have been completed in a Beijing lab to grow four kinds of veg in an "ecological life support system". China apparently has a 300 cubic meter cabin in which its scientists are growing food, and producing water and air, which could be used during space missions to the Moon or even Mars. The experiments are reminiscent of similar projects being undertaken by Nasa and private companies, with a view to establishing permanent human settlements on other worlds.

Syria Disconnects from the internet

Yesterday, Syria was disconnected from the internet.  Nobody really knows how, but a Syrian "official" says that the outages were caused by "technical problems".  Technical problems being President Bashar al-Assad fearing that the citizens who post what  happens everyday to social networking sites.  This situation is very similar to what Moammar Ghaddafi did in Libya.

Android Devices' World Domination Plans Are Near Completion

As of now, 72% of the smartphone market are android phones.  3 out of 4 smartphones in the world run on Google's Android Operating System.  The increase from last year was 20%.  A large portion of this percentage was contributed by Samsung, which cold more than 55 million smartphones.  Meanwhile, Apple sold 23.5 million phones during the same period.  Apple's operating system market share dropped from 15% down to 13.9%.  Android World Domination Status: nearly complete.

Google vs Battery life

Google claims that the new update for Google chrome can lengthen the battery life of your computer.  If you watch a lot of video, you don't waster battery life doing so.  Batteries tested with the new chrome update lasted 25% longer than other batteries using other web browsers.  The updated browser also includes a Skype-like real-time chat.

Ubisoft sues Black Eyed Peas for $1million

October 16th, game publisher Ubisoft filed a lawsuit against BEP Music LLC, a company which owns the  The Black Eyed Peas trademark, for neglecting to recognize the publisher's planned iOS version of The Black Eyed Peas Experience.  In the contract, the band agreed to approve, or disapprove of the iOS game within 10 business days of the request.  Ubisoft claims to have spent $233,000 in developing the iOS game, and combined with their loss of profits, results in a loss of one million dollars.

Samsung working on a Galaxy s3 mini. Watch out, Apple might sue.

Samsung reveals a new smaller version of their flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S3.  The new smaller version will have only a 4 inch screen, as apposed to being 4.8 inches.  It will still be slightly larger than the iPhone 5, but have 800x400 display, where apple's iPhone 5 has 1,136x640 display.  The Galaxy S3 mini will NOT have 4g LTE networking, which is a major downgrade.  No detail have been released about pricing, but is rumored to be much cheaper than the regular Galaxy S3.
  it is plastic, has rounded corners, a 4" screen, and a home button.
watch out Samsung, Apple might sue.