March 15, 2010 marks the 25 years of the .COM domain names. On March 15, 1985, Symbolics Inc. registered the first .com Internet domain name symbolics.com. Symbolics Inc. is then a Cambridge, Massachusetts based maker of computer systems and software based on research done at MIT. They signed up the first .com with Network Solutions. The Symbolics.com Web site still exists, but was purchased in 2009 by XF.com, an Internet domain investment firm. Read full story »

The Open Source Data Center Initiative is a new industry group announced recently, to apply open-source principles to the design and construction of data centers and to act as a repository and test bed for mechanical and engineering advances in data-center design. Read full story »

A South Korean couple left their baby daughter to starve to death at home while playing an Internet game which simulated child-rearing. The couple were arrested five months after they reported the death of their three-month-old baby. Read full story »

In an effort to offer improved access to the Internet, Google plans to create fast, cheap and ubiquitous fiber-to-the-home Internet broadband networks with one-gigabit-per-second (1Gbps) speed. The broadband connections will be as much as 100 times faster than most cable and DSL services. Google hopes to offer the service to at least 50,000 people and as many as 500,000. It will announce which communities will get the service later this year. Google said it will sell access to customers directly “at a competitive price” and team with telecommunications companies that want to package services with its fiber network. Read full story »

The Internet was nominated by the Italian version of Wired magazine, which cited its use as a tool to advance “dialogue, debate and consensus through communication” and to promote democracy. Organizers said signatories to its petition backing the nomination include 2003 peace laureate and exiled Iranian activist Shirin Ebadi, which would make it a legitimate entry. Read full story »