"The Software Freedom Law Center has announced that it has filed comments with the US Librarian of Congress, asking for an exemption to the DMCA, so that users can legally control their own devices. Specifically, SFLC 'asks that the Librarian of Congress exempt from 17 U.S.C. § 1201(a)(1)'s prohibition on the circumvention of access control technologies, for the period 2012-2015, computer programs that enable the installation and execution of lawfully obtained software on a personal computing device, where circumvention is performed by or at the request of the device's owner'. That's legalese for 'When you buy a device, you ought to be able to control what goes on it and be allowed to run legal software of your choosing on your own device'."

There are a lot of browsers these days, some being bloated with features, others serving the bare minimum of web browsing tasks. Marco Peerboom began developing his minimalist web browser xxxterm for OpenBSD in 2010. Within a year the browser became popular enough in the OpenBSD community to find its ways to major Linux repositories. And here's why.

Valid Windows NTFS folder names, rogue antivirus products, dual-boot Windows 7/Windows XP systems - find out how much you really know about everyone's favorite whipping post OS by taking the Windows IQ Test.

"A bill recently introduced in Congress would greatly expand the exemption to the Fair Labor Standards Act for IT employees, ending overtime benefits for many more types of workers, including network, database and security specialists." The Democrat senator of North-Carolina has introduced an even worse version of the bill, which specifically exempts database and network specialists and security professionals from overtime benefits. Say, isn't some company building a huge data centre in North-Carolina? I'm sure it's all a coincidence.

A new report from StatCounter says Chrome's popularity now edges out Firefox. It says Chrome has a 25.69% share of the global browser market while Firefox claims 25.23%. Microsoft's Internet Explorer is still #1 with a 40.63% share. If true, Google has pulled off quite a feat with a browser they only introduced in late 2008. StatCounter claims to measure browser use rather than just downloads.

So, this has been causing a bit of a major dungstorm - and rightly so. As it turns out, many carriers are installing a piece of non-removable privacy-invading spyware on their smartphones called CarrierIQ. It doesn't matter whether you have a webOS, Android, BlackBerry or iOS device - carriers install it on all of them. Luckily though, it would appear it really depends on your carrier - smartphones in The Netherlands, for instance, are not infested with CarrierIQ. Update: As John Gruber rightfully points out, ever so verbosely, the headline here isn't particularly well-chosen. The article makes all this clear, but the headline doesn't. It's my birthday today, so my head wasn't totally in it - my apologies! Update II: Just got a statement from an HP spokesperson: "HP does not install nor authorize its partners to embed Carrier IQ on its webOS devices."