Google Inc. is in delicate negotiations with the Chinese government to keep its research center in China, an advertising sales team that generates most of the company’s revenue in the country and a fledgling mobile phone business.

Both sides are torn by conflicting objectives.

Google says it’s no longer willing to acquiesce to the Chinese government’s demands for censored search results, yet it still wants access to the country’s engineering talent and steadily growing online advertising and mobile phone markets.

Chinese leaders are determined to control the flow of information, but realize they need rich and innovative companies such as Google to achieve their goal of establishing the country as a technology leader. Even some Chinese media that rarely deviate from the party line have warned that Google’s departure could slow technology development and hurt China’s economy.

Analysts are split on how the current impasse will be resolved, with some resigned to Google having to pull completely out of China for the foreseeable future while others envision a face-saving compromise that preserves a toehold in the country for the company.

Robert Broadfoot, managing director of Political and Economic Risk Consultancy in Hong Kong, is among the camp that expects Communist leaders to bend their rules to keep Google in the country.

“They’re hardly going to close the door on the innovator. They are very interested in what (Google is) innovating, because they may want it for themselves,” said Broadfoot, who has advised companies on China since the 1970s.

Google said Jan. 12 it might close its China-based search engine, Google.cn, because it no longer intends to censor the results as it has for the past four years. And, the company, warned, the decision could lead the company to pull out of the country completely.

The threat stemmed from computer hacking attacks on Google’s computer code and efforts to break into the e-mail accounts of human rights activists. Google said the intrusions originated from within China, but stopped short of linking them directly to the country’s government.

Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt told analysts last week that the company planned to make changes in China in “a reasonably short time” while raising hope for a compromise.

“We made a strong decision that we wish to remain in China,” Schmidt said. “We like the business opportunities there. We’d like to do that on somewhat different terms than we have.”

The dispute with China prompted Google to postpone the planned release last week of its latest mobile phones for the country, a market with more than 700 million accounts. But the company says it still hopes to sell the phones in China.

Even if Google.cn is shut down, Google wants to keep its Beijing development center and sales offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, according to a person familiar with its thinking. But that won’t happen if management believes its decision to stop censoring search results will jeopardize employees in China, according to this person, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the negotiations.

Google will not say how many employees it has in China, but industry analysts estimate its work force at 700. The company, based in Mountain View, California, employs about 20,000 people worldwide.

The Chinese sales force is important to Google because most of the company’s revenue in China comes from online ads sold on Google’s U.S. Web site, Google.com. The company also runs an ad network that places marketing messages on other China-based Web sites besides its own.

Analysts say keeping Chinese advertisers happy would be more difficult if Google closes its sales office in the country and tries to connect with the customers from abroad. Alienated advertisers would be more likely to defect to alternatives still based in China, such as Baidu Inc. and Alibaba Group, which is part owned by Yahoo Inc.

Google trails Baidu with about 35 percent of China’s search market to its local rival’s 60 percent.

If Google does close Google.cn, it could go back to trying to reach Chinese Internet users with the Chinese-language portion of Google.com. That was Google’s strategy before 2006, when it opened its censored search engine to better reach the Chinese population. Google opted for a China-based search engine because the Chinese government used its Internet filters to restrict access to the U.S. site.

Beijing encourages Internet use for education and business but tries to block material it deems subversive or pornographic and was filtering access to Google’s U.S. site.

In a sign of hardening Chinese attitudes, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology on Monday denied government involvement in Internet attacks and defended its online surveillance as lawful. The Communist Party newspaper People’s Daily accused the U.S. government of controlling the Internet at home while urging other countries to build an “Internet freedom utopia,” which it called “only an illusion of freedom.”

There’s still a chance that Chinese leaders may be more conciliatory behind closed doors. Google has been more circumspect publicly since confronting China in a blunt posting on the company’s Web site.

In recent years, companies have learned better how to deal with Beijing and to channel complaints about market barriers and regulations through trade groups. That helps to conceal their identity and shield them from retaliation.

Last year, manufacturers that opposed Beijing’s order to include its “Green Dam” Web-filtering software with personal computers worked through trade groups and refused to talk about it publicly. The government withdrew its order in June in a rare last-minute reversal, though schools are required to use the filter.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which resists efforts to form labor unions in its stores elsewhere, faced an organizing campaign by China’s state-sanctioned labor group in 2006. The company ultimately agreed to cooperate in forming unions at its dozens of China outlets.

The Google dispute could heighten disputes within the Communist Party over how to balance security and economic development, Broadfoot said. He said the search giant’s future in China might be decided by the outcome of that struggle.

“Those two factions have to conduct a very difficult dance that they really don’t want the outsiders to watch,” he said. “The most important lesson out of this is it helps us understand the kind of economic player China wants to be.” – AP

This downloadable e-book is designed to help you jump-start your blog by giving you 31 tasks that will turn your blog into the powerhouse you’ve always dreamed of. The great thing about Darren’s e-book is that you can do it at your own pace and in your own way. Set a goal of reading a chapter a day and take notes. I usually dog ear and highlight the important pieces and come back to them later.

The workbook uses a great approach to teaching and is designed so that you come away from the challenge having not only learned how to build a dynamic blog but you’ll have actually done something with the knowledge.

Guaranteed 31 Days to Build a Better Blog is for virtually bloggers at different stages of their blogging which includes:

• Those who have just started a blog but who don’t know what to do next
• Those who have had a blog for a while but it’s stalled in its growth
• Bloggers with bloggers block and lacking inspiration

I was actually in a Borders bookstore the other day and saw a published version on the shelf and couldn’t help but pick it up. I first started thumbing through the chapters but soon realized I was reading it word for word. The book was addicting and I learned some things which I apply to my blogging today.

The cost of this e-book is only $19.95 and there’s even a money back guarantee.  Darren is one of the best known bloggers in the world. All of his works are top notch and his latest offering is no exception. If you want a better blog, you can have it in the next 31 days. Buy it today and you’ll be able to start reading it in minutes. Trust me, it pays for itself!

But hey, don’t you know that you can now download it here for FREE.

I know little about the new system because I am still kinda new with Windows 7 but I hope my solution below on how to how to disable the system restore in windows 7 can be of help to you.

Solution

But this time, Windows 7 gives me advise that it did not detected any anti-virus software I installed on my computer (yet AVIRA detects very fast every time a virus is present). What do you think is the reason? When I was still working as technical support in a certain IT company we always do the troubleshooting and solve problems for clients and this is what we always do first and must be aware of, it’s the compatibility issue.

As of now, this are the Anti-virus software companies suggested by Windows 7 Compatibility Center.

* Quick Heal
* PC Tools
* BullGuard
* K7
* CA
* Webroot
* Zone Alarm
* Gdata
* Sunbelt Software
* Kaspersky Lab
* Panda
* Symantec
* ESET
* BitDefender
* AhnLab
* F-Secure
* Microsoft Security Essentials
* Rising
* McAfee
* Trend Micro
* AVG
* Avast!

Google Public DNS is a free, global Domain Name System (DNS) resolution service, that you can use as an alternative to your current DNS provider.

To try it out, configure your network settings to use the IP addresses 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 as your DNS servers.

If you don’t know this is done, check out these instructions if you are running on Windows, Mac or Linux.

We have some pretty serious DNS problems with our ISPs here in the Philippines so having Google Public DNS (and OpenDNS) is always a good thing.

Friendster, which predates Facebook and MySpace in the social networking space was founded in 2002. But it quickly lost ground to other social networking sites in the United States. Friendster is now mostly used in Asia where more than half of its registered 100 million users are from.

Friendster will be sold to an Asian listed firm for more than $100 million in a deal set to be announced by the end of the month, said a source who declined to be identified as the information was not yet public.

TechCrunch, an industry blog, said in July it valued Friendster at $210 million, a fraction of Facebook’s estimated $10 billion valuation.

Friendster chief executive Richard Kimber told Reuters that Morgan Stanley had been hired to handle the deal.

“We have a shortlist at this point that we are negotiating with,” Kimber said.

Friendster, like Facebook, has been struggling to find an effective monetisation strategy. The firm rebranded its main website on Friday targeting a younger audience and said it will shift its revenue focus from advertising to micro-transaction.

Headquartered in California, Friendster had turned down a $30 million buyout offer from Google Inc six years ago, according to newspaper reports.

Tencent Holdings, China’s largest Internet firm by market value at $35 billion, was among the short-listed bidders, while Facebook also showed interest but was turned down due to competition and intellectual property issues, the source said.

Friendster holds five U.S. patents related to social networking according to the United States Patents and Trademarks Office.

(Reporting by Melanie Lee; Editing by Jacqueline Wong) – [via]

Just a quick reminder to all of you that tomorrow, October 22nd, will be launch day for the new Microsoft Windows 7 OS. Windows 7 is certainly a great upgrade for many people out there – especially if you’ve been using Windows Vista for some time. Windows 7 takes the best features of Windows Vista; improves upon them; adds a few new usability improvements; and optimizes the entire platform for a wide variety of hardware.

Starting tonight at midnight, you should be able to configure your new computer system with a Windows 7 edition. Many new netbooks will begin to offer Windows 7 Starter Edition in favor of Windows XP Home Edition that is currently found on many netbook systems.

Our recommendation? If you have the appropriate system resources, go ahead and upgrade to Windows 7. It’s fast, stable, and a joy to use. Plus once you’re used to the usability enhancements, it’ll be hard to go back to an earlier version.

Looks like an era is coming to an end, as Microsoft is now shifting its focus away from supporting old-timer Windows XP on a service pack level, and looking at the hot new chick in town, the sexy Windows 7. According to Softpedia, SP3 was the last service pack for the 32-bit version of Windows XP (x86); SP2 was the last major update for the 64-bit version (x64). Microsoft officially announced the end of the road for the 32-bit version some time ago, but there was hope that the company would puke up another service pack for x64 XP before the OS headed out to the pasture.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case. If fact, Microsoft confirmed its legal separation from Windows XP on a whole, admitting that it’s fallen out of love and will never return again, even in the case of x64 XP. “We have received inquiries from our customers and partners on whether or not there will be a need for a Service Pack 3 for Windows Server 2003,” said Crissy House, the Windows Server Operations manager. “Microsoft will not have a SP3 release for Windows Server 2003.”

In the past, Microsoft has delivered service packs for the 64-bit version of Windows XP and major updates to Server 2003 at the same time, hence the assumption that the same cut-off date applied to x64. While the comment from House refers to Windows Server 2003, a spokesman for Microsoft told Softpedia that the divorce also applies to any version of Windows XP.

Thanks for the memories, you were a good OS.

So, you’ve turned on your computer, clicked on Mozilla Firefox, and then….you waited. “Why,” you say, “Is firefox slower now?”

Well, we’re here to fix that problem! Whether it’s just because you want to make Firefox faster than it already is (which is wickedly fast anyway), or because you want to fix your declining speed, you’ve come to the right place.

Please note that if you do not have firefox as your default browser, I advise you to get it immediately. It is faster and more efficient than every browser out there. It is obtainable at mozilla.org/firefox.

Windows actually reserves 20% of your bandwidth for purposes I will never know. I’ll show you in a few easy steps, how to reclaim it.

Step 1:

Click “Start“, and go on “Run“, and type in “gpedit.msc“. You should see this:

Step 2: You should see a thing called ‘Group Policy’ open.

Step 3: Double-Click on “Computer Configuration”.

Step 4: Double-Click on “Administrative Templates”

Step 5: Double-Click on “Network”

Step 6: Double-Click on “QOS Packet Scheduler”

Step 7: Double-Click on “Limit Reservable Bandwidth”

Step 8: Check the box that says ‘Enabled’ and change Bandwidth Limit (%) to 0.

You got 20% increase on your bandwidth speed! Easy, was it not?

The catch — well, promo period is only until October 31, 2009. The Globe Broadband Tattoo prepaid kit still comes with free 5 hours of mobile 3G worth Php100. Kits are available at Globe Stores and authorized dealers nationwide.

Note: SmartBro Prepaid kit also costs Php995 now.