New users to Facebook (and probably some existing users, but not all of them yet) are getting a new search experience in Facebook starting Monday. The new interface for search makes it possible to see all public results from Facebook users (the Everyone filter), or just results from your friends. Or, as before, only Events, Groups, or Applications.

The Everyone filter is the key new feature. It lets Facebook users monitor the entire network for news and updates on big topics, the same way Twitter was consumed for information coming from Iran after the recent election. Read the full story

The distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks that knocked out Twitter for hours and affected other sites like Facebook, Google’s Blogger, and LiveJournal on Thursday continued all day Friday and may persist throughout the weekend.

In its latest update, posted to a discussion forum of its third-party developers at 11 p.m. U.S. Eastern Time on Friday, Twitter reports it’s still fighting the attacks. Read the full story

This seems a little fishy given the importance August 7th, 2008 has for Georgian/Russian history….

Web attack ‘aimed at one blogger’

A “massively co-ordinated” attack on websites including Google, Facebook and Twitter was directed at one individual, it has been confirmed.
Facebook told BBC News that the strike was aimed at a pro-Georgian blogger known as Cyxymu.

The attack caused a blackout of Twitter for around two hours, while Facebook said its service had been “degraded”.

Google said it had defended its sites and was now working with the other companies to investigate the attack.

“[The] attack appears to be directed at an individual who has a presence on a number of sites, rather than the sites themselves,” a Facebook spokesman told BBC News.

“Specifically, the person is an activist blogger and a botnet was directed to request his pages at such a rate that it impacted service for other users.”

Botnets are networks of computers under the control of hackers.

The machines were used to mount a so-called denial-of-service (DOS) attack on Thursday.

The BBC reported that the blogger was “pro-Georgian”

Today is an important day in Georgia’s history…..

Georgia marks anniversary of war

Ceremonies are under way in Georgia to mark one year since the war between Russia and Georgia over the South Ossetia region.

Midnight bonfires were lit in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, and other towns. A minute’s silence was held and church bells rung to remember the dead.

A march and candlelight ceremony in South Ossetia are also planned.

Russia’s president said the decision to go to war “was probably the hardest thing, but eventually we did it right”.

Some 30,000 people remain displaced because of the conflict, according to Amnesty International.

Among the day of events in Georgia, several hundred people formed the Georgian flag in the grounds of Gori’s medieval fortress, at a ceremony attended by President Mikheil Saakashvili.

The town was hit by Russian airstrikes and then occupied by Russian forces last year.

The Georgian national anthem was played as the flag was formed.

Mr Saakashvili also visited a war cemetery in Tbilisi to lay a wreath, and is due to address the nation later on Friday.

Speaking to the BBC during the day of events, Mr Saakashvili also said it had been a hard decision to mobilise troops a year ago, but that if he had not acted then “we would have had much worse atrocities than had been committed”.

He said that now, diplomacy was the only way to “expel Russians” and shift the balance of power in the region.

In an interview to be broadcast later on Russian TV, his Russian counterpart spoke of the decisions he made on 7 August, 2008.