Apple has announced the worst kept secret in town - the 3G iPhone. It is much thinner, faster and is cheaper than the first-gen iPhone. The 8GB will now cost US$199 (with a two-year contract), with GPS that will work on the AT&T’s 3G cellular network. A 16GB will be $299.

If you want to compare the prices, the previous model’s 8GB version cost $399.

The battery is supposed to support 300 hours of standby time, 5 to 6 hours of Web browsing, 7 hours of video and 24 hours of audio, but the talk time is cut in half from 10 hours to 5 hours.

Apple’s Website also lists the release date for this new product - it will be released in 25 countries on July 11, including Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Japan, Italy and the US.

There are other countries on that list too, however their schedule has not been announced.

Full Keynote announcements will be on a post - posted later in the afternoon.

Amazon.com is counting the effects, if there were any, after its site experienced problems in North America for more than two hours because of ’system issues’.

Before 10am California time on a Saturday, the website was shut down and giving an error code to anyone visiting it, according to Keynote Systems - a company who measures the performance of websites.

However, Amazon’s services it provides to other companies were not affected, nor its international sites.

Amazon is one of the web giants, and it attracts massive amounts of money and traffic, with forecasters expecting the company will bring in more than US$19 million in revenue this year.

Intel, the world’s largest microchip maker, had announced on Friday that it had received a civil subpoena from the Federal Trade Commission, which has been examining informally its pricing and sales rebates for more than a year.

This investigation follows the assault by regulators in Europe and Asia, and the subpoena sees Intel forced to comply with the investigation, while it wasn’t forced to comply before the subpoena was issued.

All three investigations are looking at the same issue: the practises it used to computer makes that have prevented AMD expanding its sales.

The South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission fined Intel for US$25 million after finding that it had violated antitrust laws in South Korea. In 2005, Japan found that Intel had violated antitrust laws, and Intel agreed to change its practises.

AMD is also pursuing a private antitrust lawsuit, which was filed in Delaware in 2005, but the trial date has been pushed back to 2010.

As well, it is understood that many PC makers received subpoenas last week.

TECHGEEK is planning a brand new design to be launched, but we also want some of your input as well. So tell us what we need to change, what we need to remove and what do we need to add to the design.

We have also heard from our editors that they don’t like the red colouring… so we plan to change the colouring to a new colour. We are not going to tell you though, since it’s a secret and we don’t want anyone to know.

As well, if you want a fluid design; someone send me an HTML code for a fluid design and we will use it. You can post it as a comment or send it directly to me at terencehuynh@reawaken.info.

So, have your say NOW!!!!

Terence Huynh
Editor in Chief

OK, so we didn’t put much content up on The Journal, TECHGEEK or GamesArena (looking at all my other editors). Mainly, we have been suffering the effects of the Exams finishing and etc.

But look on the bright side, we have some great content on The Journal in the past few days, since we announced that we will be covering the lead up to the US Presidential race there…

Clinton looked at her final moments of her campaign by saying goodbye to her staff and did a final rally, supporting her former rival - Barack Obama.

Meanwhile, we had some TV news - including that the Queen’s Birthday AFL match won’t be live in Melbourne, and Temptation was rested.

And finishing off the week, a video - a remix created by someone who remixed an episode from South Park which was about web phenomenons, which became a web phenomenon itself.

So there you go. Enjoy!

South Australia will follow New South Wales and Victoria in the cashless smartcard ticketing for its public transport with $29 million over three years to kick start the system.

The system will include its 812 buses, 99 trains and 15 trams; with the new system to be implemented in 2009/10 but to be operational until 2013. As well, it has been working on the specifications for the project for about a year, and it should be finalised in another three months, when the tender process.

However, the South Australian goverment will choose its supplier with caution, after seeing their state-wide counterparts battling their ticketing systems; with the NSW cancelling their Tcard project after giving a fourth extension to have the ITSL to implement the system.

Victoria’s myki is also suffering, with another funding increase and won’t surface until 2012.

Softbank, the third-biggest mobile operator in Japan, has announced that it will be selling the iPhone, after agreeing with Apple to sell them by the end of the year.

Spokesperson Fumihiro Ito has said that they do not have any other information, but it is also unknown if it is an exclusive contract or not.

The new deal is a huge coup to the group, afer trying to lure subscribers to its bigger rivals NTT DoCoMo and KDDI with low prices and aggressive marketing.

NTT DoCoMo has also been seen as another candidate to the iPhone contract, but its spokesperson declined to comment.

Microsoft has finally announced a second beta version of its next version of its internet browser, Internet Explorer 8.

IE Beta 2 will target ordinary web users, and will come out will all the features that will be there when the full, completed version is out - though some may contain bugs.

It has also pledged to deliver more updates to versions of Internet Explorer, after the Firefox browser (owned by Mozilla) has been slowly chipping away Microsoft’s share. Mozilla is also testing out a new version of its Firefox browser, Firefox 3.

While Microsoft has the backing of its Windows XP/Vista to support its browser, Mozilla has gain some market share after being affiliated with Google - who provided around 85 percent of revenue to the Mozilla Foundation, according to filings published last October.

No release date has been set for Internet Explorer 8. Its predecessor, Internet Explorer 8, was released in October 2006.

Telstra has revealed that more of its support contact centre operation will be going to the Philippines.

Telstra has said that there will be no staff lost during the new movie, but they will provide support as Australian workers will be training to deal with a new billing system being installed.

As well, Australian credit management staff will also commence additional trading in managing peak call volumes - as they are expecting an increase when the new system is introduced.

The online arm of PBL Media is now in turmoil, according to the Australian, after the shock departure of its chief executive, Tony Faure.

This comes after many high profile members exits from the portal, a joint venture between Microsoft and PBL, with its commercial director Jason Scott and marketing director Tony Thomas leaving the comapny.

The chairman of ninemsn has said that Faure made a significant contribution to the company.

In a statement, he has said that he was "not the right person to take the business to the next level." He will leave on the end of August to ensure a smooth transition for his successor.