A few links to start off your day: more ›

The Washington Post is reporting that Google's shiny new attempt at an answer to Facebook, Google+ (in "field trials" right now, probably just to make it sound cooler as it remains "invite only") has already been blocked in China! more ›

If anyone is keeping count, go on and add another tally under "mishaps between Google and China." Google officials announced today that hundreds of Gmail accounts were recently hijacked by hackers, primarily victimizing U.S. government officials, Chinese political activists, officials in other Asian countries, military personnel, journalists and others. more ›

According to tests done by www.greatfirewall.biz, the download speed of Gmail in China has plummeted to an average of 34 kbps. That's 45 times slower than QQ's speed of 1514 kbps. Or if you'd like your fractions another way, Gmail is now operating at 2.2% the speed of QQ. For most of you, this will just be confirming what we've all been experiencing for weeks now. more ›

Gmail has denied any faults within their own system after their services in China have been constantly disrupted for weeks now. We've heard rumors that the strategy is to slow down or even block Gmail every 15 minutes, in order to convince users that it's a problem with Google, not the firewall. Sure, you all say, we aren't dummies, we know what's happening. Okay, but can somebody please tell that to Google's shrinking share in the Chinese market, and somehow convince them, yet again, not to move their business elsewhere? more ›

If any of you haven't been having problems with your internet connection, your VPN, or your Gmail over the past few weeks, then consider yourselves extremely lucky (and send us your VPN info plz.) Since those pesky flower-related non-protests began happening a month ago, inconveniently coinciding with the legislative sessions, things have been haywire all across the interwebz in China. Is this temporary? God we hope so. more ›

So they didn't do this just because of the China problem, but it'll certainly help anyone who thinks they were targeted by hackers here: Google released yesterday a new Gmail feature that notifies you when they detect a suspicious login on your account. Now, if something unusual seems to be going on, it'll alert you with a warning message on the top of your inbox saying "Warning: We believe your account was last accessed from... [location]" By clicking details, you can see last account activity and the most recent access points. Handy! more ›

So after a night without Google, it seems like the block is slowly rolling back and people are finally able to access their gmail around the country once again (though, at this moment, Shanghai users are still reporting problems). But why did it happen? According to the Guardian surmises that it was a "warning shot" over Google's "porn filters" (we quotemark that because it seems like Baidu, which has equally lax porn filters, is "safe"). Chinese netizens think it's to distract attention away from the Green Dam. If that's the truth, one can only wonder who's brain child this could've been: distract from controversy over web blocking by blocking the web? Good going. more ›