Tech & Science

The number of mobile phone users in Moldova increased by 47.3 % in the first quarter of 2008 against the last year and exceeded 2.88 million. This information was published by the Moldovan National Electronic and Information Technology Regulator (ANRCETI). At the beginning of this year, the number of mobile phone users was of 1.88 million. The penetration rate of such services per one hundred inhabitants increased by 19.7 percentage points and approached 61%. The first million of mobile telephony users was registered in September 2005. A yea

Author Robert Asprin died Thursday in his New Orleans, Louisiana home at the age of 61. Asprin, known for his science fiction and fantasy novels including the MythAdventures series, and Thieves World series of shared world anthologies which he created and edited with his then-wife, Lynn Abbey, was also known by his The Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc. (SCA) nickname of "Yang the Nauseating". Asprin had been scheduled to appear as a keynote guest at the Multiple Alternative Realities Convention (MARCON) in Columbus, Ohio, over the weekend

NASA's Phoenix spacecraft has landed safely on Mars, following a ten-month flight. Landing occurred yesterday evening at around 23:38 GMT (20:38 EDT), with confirmation being received by flight controllers around fifteen minutes later at 23:53, the communications delay due to the time taken for light and radio signals to travel from Mars back to Earth. Phoenix was launched atop a Delta II rocket last August. It is the first Mars Scout spacecraft to be sent to explore Mars. It will search for water and complex molecules at the North Pole of Ma

United States airframer Boeing has announced that development of a replacement for their 737 narrowbody airliner, begun two years ago, has been pushed back several years, Boeing saying that further advancement of technology is required. Spokeswoman Sandy Angers said that that the team formed to look at the development had been merged into the parent product development team and would cease looking at specific designs. Boeing say airlines demand performance improvements of 15-20% are required if a new airliner is to be commercially viable. "We

A New York Judge ruled to continue an injunction against Premise Media, which effectively prevents Premise, the producers of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, from further distribution. Expelled is a film about intelligent design and creationism starring Ben Stein, and is currently playing at 200 U.S. theaters. Since its April 18 debut it has received criticism from the scientific community, which considers both pseudoscience, and film critics. The case Lennon v Premise Media was filed by Yoko Ono, Julian Lennon, Sean Lennon, and EMI Blackwo

Today, the King Harald V of Norway awarded the Abel Prize which, along with the Fields Medal is one of the two most important mathematical prizes, to John G. Thompson and Jacques Tits. They received the award for their "outstanding achievements in algebra and especially for their shaping of modern group theory". The Norwegian Academy of Science announced the names of the prize winners at the beginning of April. The prize, which includes a €750,000 award to the winner, has been awarded every year since 2003 and it is named after the Norwegian

A major security hole was discovered in the pseudo-random number generator (PRNG) of the Debian version of OpenSSL. OpenSSL is one of the most used cryptographic software, that allows the creation of secure network connections with the protocols called SSL and TLS. It is included in many popular computer programs, like the Mozilla Firefox web browser and the Apache web server. Debian is one of the most used GNU/Linux distributions, on which are based other distributions, like Ubuntu and Knoppix. The problem affects all the Debian-based distribu

Wikinews has learned that the Wikimedia Foundation has decided not to participate in a panel discussion that is to take place at Santa Clara University in California. The discussion, which is titled 'The World that Wikipedia Made,' was to be based on the online encyclopedia Wikipedia and ethics involved in the editing of the website. It is the ninth such meeting in a series on technology, ethics, and law and is taking place today. In an e-mail to Wikinews, Miriam Schulman the communications director for the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics a

At 20:22:54 GMT yesterday evening, a Russian Soyuz-U carrier rocket lifted off from Launch Complex 1/5 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, and successfully placed a Progress spacecraft into low Earth orbit. The spacecraft, designated Progress M-64 and 29P, is flying to resupply the International Space Station (ISS). Following a series of manoeuvres, it is expected to dock with the Space Station's Zarya module at 21:36 GMT tomorrow evening. Progress spacecraft are launched every few months to deliver new supplies to the astronauts and cos

Hewlett-Packard (HP), a global technology leader with major businesses operations in computer hardware, software, printing and services announced today that they will acquire Electronic Data Systems (EDS) for US$13.9 billion in an all cash deal. The Wall Street Journal has reported that the deal has been in various stages of development since October 2007 when the CEO of EDS, Ron Rittenmeyer, approached HP CEO Mark Hurd with a proposition to join forces. This acquisition models a strong pattern of robust mergers and acquisitions activity sinc

At the Pavilion of Taiwan Automotive Research Consortium during the AutoTronics Taipei 2008, in Taipei Time, the Next Consortium of Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) unveiled a brand-new environmental-concept vehicle named "RoboScooter". It was jointly designed by the Creativity Lab of ITRI, SYM Motors, and the Media Lab of Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This announcement was approved by industrial, governmental, and academical executives, but not just in Taiwan. The ability for R&D to manufacture the electronic vehicles

The 28th-annual COMPUTEX Taipei show, the second largest IT show in the world, is the largest one since they held their first show in 1982 since expanding to TWTC Nangang. Not only were vast ICT products showcased from upper, mid, and lower-stream vertical and horizontal OEMs, OBMs, and world-class stellar companies like Intel, AMD, ASUS, Foxconn, Acer, BenQ, and Kingston, but also featured products related to green technology. Companies from Korea will be hosting the biggest international pavilion to catch the buyers' eyes. The Taipei Comput