Internet Computer Network

MySpace continued its evolution from teen hangout to entertainment destination, announcing Wednesday that it would acquire ILike, one of the premier music recommendation services -- and the most popular music application on rival social network Facebook. The deal, estimated to be worth about $19 million, signals MySpace's intention to dominate the online social music scene, building on the gathering momentum behind MySpace Music, a nearly year-old joint venture with the major music labels whose number of visitors has increased nearly 200% since its launch in September.

When Jiang Dabao lost his right hand to a molding machine three years ago, his factory boss said he wasn't eligible for workers' compensation. Unemployable, Jiang whiled away his days in the Internet bars that thrive here in China's manufacturing heartland. Eventually he tapped into an online forum on QQ, a popular social networking service, where he found a workers advocacy group that helped him win a $30,000 settlement. "Before I got hurt, I had no idea how to use a computer or even the Internet," said Jiang, who identified himself by his childhood nickname for fear of official reprisal.

As newspapers across the country struggle with declining readership and advertising revenue, News Corp. executives have been meeting in recent weeks with publishers about forming a consortium that would charge for news distributed online and on portable devices -- and potentially stem the rising tide of red ink. Chief Digital Officer Jonathan Miller has positioned News Corp. as a logical leader in the effort to start collecting fees from online readers because of its success with the Wall Street Journal Online, which boasts more than 1 million paying subscribers.

In the United States, video of a wedding party boogieing down the aisle was about to become a summer sensation on YouTube, viewed more than 20 million times. At the same time in China, the latest Internet obsession began with an anonymous post on a computer gaming forum: "Jia Junpeng, your mom is calling you to come home and eat." Was it a vexed parent hunting down her Internet-addicted child in cyberspace? A cheeky gamer poking fun at one of his buddies? Or simply an idler with a sense of humor?

In an effort to quell its critics, Google Inc. on Thursday said it would open up its vast digital books archive to rival retailers who can access the books and sell them online. The announcement, made during a congressional hearing before the House Judiciary Committee on Google's book-scanning project, involves digital copies of millions of so-called orphan books, works that are still under copyright but whose rights holders can't be tracked down. Since 2004, the Mountain View, Calif.

Since it's so fashionable these days to question whether government can do anything right -- whether it's regulating banks, bolstering the economy or overseeing healthcare -- it's worth noting that we're about to celebrate the 40th anniversary of one of the most important federal initiatives of our time. The event was the launch of the Internet, which we date from Oct. 29, 1969, when a refrigerator-sized special-purpose computer in Leonard Kleinrock's engineering lab at UCLA transmitted its first message to a twin machine in Menlo Park, Calif.

New rules proposed by the nation's chief communications regulator to ensure unfettered access to the Internet would level the online playing field as more people surf the Web on mobile devices, but the plan has wireless carriers in an uproar. Monday's proposal by Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski would ensure that consumers would be able to get whatever content they want on the Internet and to use any service they want. But the telecommunications and the cable companies that control both land-line and wireless access to the Internet argue that some customers who download large amounts of data, such as a continuous flow of movies, can jam their networks.

It sounds almost silly to say it, but the Internet is going global. Of course, it's already global. But the underlying technology that makes the Internet run was developed by the Department of Defense 40 years ago, and the federal government continued to have an outsized voice in how the Internet was run. Eleven years ago, as the Internet took off, the U.S. turned over some of its governance to an obscure nonprofit group, the Internet Corp....

I've felt a bit quaint the last couple of days, toting a pen, a notepad and my old journalism notions around here at the Googleplex. I'd once thought that a journalist's (and journalism's) work ended when a story cleared the copy desk. But a two-day blizzard of power-point presentations in the heart of the Silicon Valley pounded home a notion that the media and their foot soldiers need to do much, much more to thrive in the midst of an information revolution. We're talking about media letting the audience increasingly into the middle of the conversation.

An ultraviolet light that its sellers promise will "destroy swine flu virus." A dietary supplement claiming to be "more effective than the swine flu shot." Pills, hand sanitizers and air filters galore. Through daily Internet searches, the Food and Drug Administration found hundreds of suspect items advertised as swine flu deterrents and cures, and over the last six months warned 80 Internet purveyors to stop peddling unproved or illegal treatments. The FDA has issued an advisory, telling consumers to use "extreme care" when purchasing online products claiming to diagnose, treat or prevent the H1N1 virus.