Technology, Mongolia | featured news

A Chinese space capsule with three astronauts aboard returned to Earth on Friday from a 13-day mission to an orbiting module that is a prototype for a future permanent station. The crew of the Shenzhou 9 parachuted to a landing on the grasslands of the country's sprawling Inner Mongolia region at about 10 a.m. (0200 GMT). China declared the mission to the Tiangong 1 module a major stride ahead for the country's ambitious space program.

Anyone worried about an erosion of America's global status might consider this modest fact: Facebook is the dominant social network in Mongolia. Along with its pervasive social media, the United States leads in myriad other ways - from the allure of its movies and music to the reach of its military. It's tough to match a nation that deploys troops to Australia and central Africa, propels Beyonce to global stardom, and produced the Twitter-style technologies that abetted the Arab Spring.