Los Angeles  - A law firm has released details of what was supposed to be a confidential 65-million-dollar payoff by Facebook to plaintiffs who claimed the social networking site was based on their ideas.

The payment was made by Facebook last year to smaller rival ConnectU, which had accused Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, a fellow Harvard University graduate, of stealing their ideas to create his site. The ConnectU founders claimed to have hired Zuckerberg while all were students at Harvard University to create a college dating site.

Taipei  - Taiwan on Wednesday lent its support to the proposed merger of Japan's top producer of computer chips - Elpida Memory Inc - with three Taiwan firms, but said details are still being discussed.

Economics Minister Yin Chi-ming made the statement to the Central News Agency (CNA) after Japanese press reported that Elpida and the three Taiwan chip makers would clink the deal Wednesday.

Washington, Feb 11: Hate waiting for your bus? Take heart, for two University of Washington students have developed a new tool that can allow you to keep a track of the vehicle using a cell phone, iPhone or computer.

OneBusAway, created by Brian Ferris, a UW doctoral student in computer science and Kari Watkins, a UW doctoral student in civil and environmental engineering since a year, already helps bus riders in Seattle to keep tabs on their buses.

OneBusAway has processed 20,000 automated phone calls since June, and the Web site gets an average of 1,000 hits a day.

People have found out about the tool on blogs, from stickers posted at a few UW campus bus stops, from a mention in a Seattle magazine and by word-of-mouth.

London, Feb 9 : It's the CEOs who are responsible for any data that has leaked because of unprotected networks in offices, say technology experts.

In order to prevent the network from viruses and hacker attacks, most companies insist their computers are "locked down" so that employees can''t run unauthorised software or CD and DVD content.

But the same rule doesn't apply to the senior leaders of a company.

"But woe betide the lowly IT director that would inconvenience the CEO with such restrictions," New Scientist magazine quoted Glenn Zimmerman, a technology expert with the Pentagon''s cyberspace task force, as saying.

Washington, Feb 7: A brewing company in the US is adapting a new system that will make its own high-quality ethanol fuel from discarded beer yeast.

According to a report in Live Science, the company, known as the Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., in Chico, California, has developed the new system, in collaboration with E-Fuel Corporation.

The company will start testing the system in the second quarter of this year, and hopes to move to full-scale ethanol production in third quarter.

"This has the potential to be a great thing for the environment and further our commitment to be becoming more energy independent," said Ken Grossman, founder and president, Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.

Washington - Windows 7 - with its commendable performance improvements - may be on the horizon. But for now, most of us have to live with Windows Vista, which can make even the fastest computer seem slow.

But you don't have to put up with Vista's sluggishness without a fight. In fact, most of what ails Vista when it comes to performance can be remedied by adjusting some settings and eliminating some features.

And the good news: The whole process need not take more than half an hour. Afterwards, you'll be rewarded a computer that feels a lot faster.

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