In an attempt to help users get a better night’s sleep, a company called WakeMate has introduced a product that will pair with the iPhone and other Bluetooth handsets to detect a user’s sleep patterns and wake them up within a 20 minute window that is said to be the most efficient and healthy for the body. The wrist band is an actigraph and will infer the wearer’s sleep pattern and circadian …

iPhone apps that feature Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama are seemingly blocked in China. Photograph: Ashwini Bhatia/AP Chinese users of the

AP - Most drivers have their own name for those texters in traffic who seem more interested in their cell phones than their cars — jerk and idiot, to name a couple. Come Friday the state of Illinois will have one, too: outlaw.

NewsFactor - AT&T is joining Verizon Wireless in an effort to even out the costs of wireless and landline services. AT&T has requested that the Federal Communications Commission approve replacing legacy circuit-switched or public-switched telephone networks (PSTN) with broadband and IP-based connections.

NewsFactor - A federal appeals court judge on Wednesday essentially pushed the mute button on a class-action lawsuit alleging that Apple’s iPod earbuds are unsafe. Judge David Thompson of the Ninth Circuit Court in San Francisco upheld a ruling by a lower court dismissing a 2006 suit brought by two men who wanted the company to redesign its earbuds and test iPod users’ hearing, in addition to paying damages.

Macworld.com - The US Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit has upheld a lower-court ruling that found that iPods do not pose an undue risk of hearing damage.

AP - Belarus’ authoritarian leader is promising to toughen regulation of the Internet and its users in an apparent effort to exert control over the last fully free medium in the former Soviet state.

PC World - Despite concerns from some privacy groups and U.S. lawmakers about behavioral advertising, most large advertising networks generally comply with a set of privacy and data-handling standards adopted by the Network Advertising Initiative a year ago, the NAI said in a report released Wednesday.

AP - The Christmas Day attack on a jetliner over Detroit, combined with technological improvements to protect people’s sense of modesty, could lead to dramatically wider use of full-body scanners that can see through travelers’ clothing.

A new version of Billings, Marketcircle’s time tracking and invoicing app, is ready to sync with a forthcoming iPhone version.