The White House took a major leap into the Web 2.0 world, launching pages on social networks My Space and Facebook and sending its first 'tweets' on hot micro-blogging service Twitter.
Content from President Barack Obama's website whitehouse.gov is being fed in real time to White House profile pages on My Space and Facebook and members of the communities can sign up as Facebook 'fans' or My Space 'friends'.
The White House had more than 60,000 fans on Facebook and more than 8,000 friends on My Space within a few hours of the pages going online while more than 14,500 people had signed up as 'followers' of the White House Twitter stream.
"Technology has profoundly impacted how - and where - we all consume information and communicate with one another," the White House said in a blog post titled 'WhiteHouse 2.0'. (AFP)
Caught new flu at brief meeting
One of the two people in Britain to have contracted the new deadly flu strain without having recently visited Mexico said yesterday he believed he caught the virus during a brief meeting with a work colleague.
Barry Greatorex, 42, is one of 13 people in Britain to have tested positive for the new strain of Influenza A (H1N1).
He said he caught the disease last week during a half-hour meeting with a colleague who had recently returned from Mexico but had herself so far tested negative.
"She had a cough then and that's seemingly where I got it," he told Sky News. "I wasn't there too long but it was obviously enough." (Reuters)
Amy Winehouse hospitalised
Grammy-winning British singer Amy Winehouse was taken to hospital during her prolonged holiday in St Lucia after fainting, her spokesman said yesterday.
The 25-year-old Back to Black and Rehab songstress was kept in for a night for observation after tests showed she was dehydrated.
Her British-based publicist Chris Goodman said: "She fainted at home (in St Lucia) and they took her in for observation, mainly to do with her medication to check everything was OK. They told her that she was dehydrated and needed to drink more water."
Winehouse had been "running around" with a group of children before she passed out, he said.
The singer has had a well-publicised struggle with drugs, but has appeared to have been in improved health in recent months after turning her back on the London party scene and holing up on the Caribbean island. Her spokesman confirmed that Winehouse has obtained an injunction banning paparazzi taking photographs outside her London home. (AFP)
Briton dies trying to stop dog fight
A British man died after he tried to break up a fight between two dogs and they turned on him instead, police said yesterday.
The death occurred as the man tried to stop two large Alsatian dogs fighting in the back yard of the house he shared with the animals' owner in Blackpool, northern England.
The dogs' owner came out of the house to intervene and dragged his pets away, the spokesman added.
"But during the course of the attack and shortly afterwards the 21-year-old male, we believe, may have fallen over several times and possibly banged his head on those occasions," a police officer said. (Reuters)
Iran to review US reporter sentence
Iran said yesterday it would review the eight-year prison sentence handed down to Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi after she was convicted of spying for the US.
Visiting Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone said his government was following the case of Saberi, whose mother is Japanese, with "concern".
Saberi, who according to her father is on hunger strike, was jailed on April 18 for eight years after she was found guilty of espionage. Her lawyer has appealed the verdict.
"There has been a review request for her and this review will be implemented based on justice and human and Islamic kindness," Foreign Minister Manoucher Mottaki said in a joint press conference with Nakasone.
Iranian judiciary officials have said Saberi is in good health and that she is not on a hunger strike. Her father Reza Saberi has described her condition as "frail and weak". (Reuters)