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"It seems like just yesterday that we were reviewing 2011 and now, with July creeping up on us, we're about to reach the halfway point of the year. To mark that milestone, we're publishing a series of reviews looking back at a range of topics from the past six months, including our most read stories.\r\n\r\nSo, we've taken the pulse on what news items caught your attention most this year; without further ado, here are the top five posts from the first half of 2012:\r\n\r\n1.\u00A0Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian won\u2019t invest in Facebook due to its CISPA support\u00A0[Published: May 7 2012]\r\n\r\nBring together two of the Internet's biggest topics and the attention is obvious, especially when it concerns one of the men behind the 'front page of the Internet'.\r\n\r\nFollowing the ongoing issues around Web copyright and ownership issues, which raged in the US in late 2011 through\u00A0SOPA and PIPA, CISPA\u00A0(Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act) rose from the ashes to concern Web users across the US and the rest of the world.\r\n\r\nAt the same time, Facebook's IPO was moving closer to being (little did we know how that would go), and the Menlo Park-based firm moved to support for the bill, that would give the US government new powers to secure their networks, turned Ohanian away from investing in the firm.\r\n\r\nCISPA was seen by many as being too vague, with critics claiming authorities could use the powers to carry out a range of shady activity, such as spying. But, equally of interest, Ohanian's decision sprouted a series of doubters who casted their 'less positive' opinions about the IPO.\r\n\r\n2.\u00A0A Round Up of ALL of Google\u2019s April Fools Jokes. Fair play, they really make an effort\u2026\u00A0[Published: April 1 2012]\r\n\r\nGoogle is often criticised for a number of things (hello Google+) but one area where the company continues to excel without dispute is the practical joke department. April Fools Day 2012 was vintage stuff, and we're glad to know that our summary post went down well.\r\n\r\nThe pure scale of Google's 2012 efforts was incredible, and the Mountain View-based company really made its numbers count...to the point that we struggled to keep with the japes it got up to.\r\n\r\nMost notably, it 'launched' Google Maps in 8-bit for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), which isn't going to make up for Apple's recent move away from the mapping system.\r\n\r\nMy personal favourite was our number 9:\r\nYou can now have all of YouTube delivered straight to your door (or as a gift to for friends and family) with The YouTube Collection. Delivered in convenient giant packages, organised and divided into categories, you can now get all of your favorite YouTube videos offline on DVD.\r\nWe found 16 (yes sixteen!) in total, and there may have been more. Check out the original post for an overview, you might even find some you missed or forgot about.\r\n\r\n3:\u00A0Google Drive detailed: 5 GB for free, launching next week for Mac, Windows, Android and iOS\u00A0[Published: April 16, 2012]\r\n\r\nAt Google I/O the company announced that Google Drive has seen 10 million sign-ups. While that figure doesn't sound colossal, given Google's massive reach, the anticipation for the service was palpable when we broke details of the launch of the Dropbox rival back in April.\r\n\r\nThanks an email from a Google partner, we were able to reveal that the service would launch the following week (as it did) and with 5GB of basic storage for free (as it did). The screenshot we were given was spot on too:\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nGoogle just launched its iOS app so, if you're one of the 10 million signed up, or were waiting for mobile support, now is the time to get more interested.\r\n\r\n4.\u00A0US Police Can Copy Your iPhone\u2019s Contents In Under Two Minutes\u00A0[Published: April 20 2011]\r\n\r\nHere's an interesting one, this post was actually published in 2011 but its popularity hasn't waned despite its relative age in the fresh-faced tech blogging space.\r\n\r\nThe issue of security is never out-dated, and this is a fascinating one - particularly as the device in question has been in use since 2008:\r\nIt has emerged that Michigan State Police have been using a high-tech mobile forensics device that can extract information from over 3,000 models of mobile phone, potentially grabbing all media content from your iPhone in under two minutes.\r\nThe real talking point around this issue is the concern that these searches could be carried out without the ascertainment of probable cause, and a warrant, meaning that they could violate the fourth\u00A0amendment.\r\n\r\n5.\u00A0Amazing video: Technology brings Tupac back to life at Coachella\u00A0[Published: April 16 2012]\r\n\r\nWe love publishing short, cool snippets from across the Web via our Shareables channel, and this video of the incredible Tupac hologram from Coachella, is one of my favourite to date and really sums up what Shareables is about.\r\n\r\nThe technology that brought the deceased rapper 'back to life' for the gig is called\u00A0Musion Eyeliner, and it's\u00A0a modern version of an old illusion trick called\u00A0Pepper's Ghost.\r\n\r\nYou can find more details about the tech in the original post, here's the video:\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nImage via Shutterstock /\u00A0Khamidulin Sergey"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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