Internet giant Google Inc. has agreed to pay the US government US$500 million for allowing online Canadian pharmacies to advertise to US-based consumers through its AdWords program, according to a press statement released by the United States Department of Justice on Wednesday.
Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, has resigned as CEO from the computer and technology firm. Jobs will be replaced by Apples Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook.
Libyan rebels have offered a 2 million dinar (US$1.7 million) bounty on the head of Muammar el-Qaddafi, with his whereabouts remaining unknown despite Libyan rebels claims that 95 percent of Libya was under their control.
In a public move designed to entice members of el-Qaddafi’s inner circle, the chairman of the National Transitional Council (NTC) Mustafa Abdel Jalil, announced that any individual from within the colonel’s camp would be granted amnesty or pardon if he/she killed or captured the former Libyan leader.
Facebook has confirmed that it will remove its Places check-in feed from its mobile apps and interface, just a year after it was unveiled, with only 6% of Facebook users trying out the service. Many industry observers had then feared that Facebook’s social location service posed a serious threat to other providers, such as Foursquare and Gowalla, because of its sheer number of users.
Some of France’s richest people, including L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt and the head of oil giant Total, have signed a petition to pay more tax following U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett’s call to raise taxes on the super-rich, urging the French government to do more to help solve the country’s financial problems.
The fighting in Tripoli may have yet to be ended, and Muammar el-Qaddafi may have yet to been caught, but the scramble for Libya’s oil wealth has already begun to heat up among numerous international players.
On Monday, Italian oil company Eni became the first company to announce its intentions to return to Libya in order to restart oil production, after months of inactivity due to the escalating conflict.
The oil markets celebration over Libya was short lived. A day after news headlines were abuzzed over the apparent victory of the people of Tripoli, the future of Libya looks uncertain. With no clear plan ahead, Libya is left without a government, constitution and leaders.
Automated Speech Recognition (ASR) technology is increasingly becoming a more prevalent part of today’s society. Presently, the technology is most evident in our mobile phones or our personal laptop computers where by operations and tasks can be handled by merely our voices.
However, as most of us can attest to, the technology can sometimes be irreliable or inaccurate. Take a look at how far ASR has progressed in the last two decades and find out how new changes could improve the accuracy and efficiency of the technology:
Germany has signaled that it will not support plans to create euro zone-wide government bonds. German Vice-Chancellor Philipp Roesler was quoted as saying that “euro bonds are the wrong signal to weaker economies”.
The United States will keep in place its freeze on US$37 billion in Libyan assets until they are absolutely certain that Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and his supporters can no longer access the funds, said a White House official on Monday.
The freeze had begun in February this year, when the Obama administration decided to impose unilateral sanctions against the Libyan leader and his family, including shutting off access to Libyan government assets.
