Just back from a Science & Technology Facilities Council event in Westminster to observe, via video-link, the first beam going round the Large Hadron Collider.

As you by now surely know, this milestone was passed successfully, and very quickly. By quickly, I mean in under an hour. When the LHC is going full steam, there will be 40m collisions of particles every second, so an hour may seem a long time - but remember this was the very first time the beam made it fully round the circuit, and its progress was relatively painstaking.

Going through about eight stages, the particles were periodically stopped at strategic points to make sure the beam was not oscillating. Where it was, corrections were made by refocussing the beam, and it was allowed to continue. Although they had so much invested in its success, everyone involved was stunned that the LHC - the world's largest machine, mind you - was working so perfectly, so quickly.

I'll be bunging up a photo gallery shortly, with pictures of and quotes from some of the key UK scientists who were present at today's event. Suffice to say, everyone was happy. Deliriously so.

Now let's hope the beam going in the opposite direction - also to be tested today, with luck - goes as well.

Today wasn't a day for new science, as such. But what it did demonstrate was the remarkable engineering that went into the LHC, and the fact that the whole damn thing works. Well done, mankind and science.

UPDATE: That photo gallery is now up, and here's a roundup of our LHC coverage up til now.

A fascinating story here from the Desktop Linux website, which appears to suggest that Lenovo has stopped offering its ThinkPad, IdeaPad, ThinkCentre and IdeaCentre lines with preinstalled Linux rather than Windows. At least, it initially suggests that, but subsequently carries a denial from Lenovo's PR chief, Ray Gorman.

"Lenovo is not abandoning its commitment to choice of operating system, and actually is increasing the role of the Linux operating system in Lenovo's product portfolio, Gorman is quoted as saying. "We will continue to certify Novell and Red Hat Linux on our ThinkPad notebooks and ThinkCentre desktops. Additionally, we will be offering Linux on our Think servers, an area we are seeing a greater demand for Linux."

Jolly good! So how come a visit to Lenovo's UK website offers no Linux options whatsoever?

People should avoid using Google's Chrome browser due to privacy fears and its beta status, Germany's equivalent of the Information Commissioner has warned.

According to Saturday's edition of the Berliner Zeitung, a spokesperson for the country's Federal Bureau for Information Technology Security said it was "problematic" that Google had used its market strength to launch a beta version of the product to the general public.

The spokesperson is also quoted as saying it would be risky for users to invest so much data with a single company, as Google also provides popular email and search applications.

Sniff sniff. Do we smell antitrust?

At the time of writing, trading on the London Stock Exchange is not happening, and hasn't been possible since before 9 o'clock this morning (trading began smoothly at 8, as usual, but something unspecified happened afterwards to force the LSE to shut down customer access to its trading platform).

A spokesperson for the LSE told us a moment ago that they are "putting the processes in place for firms to reconnect".

"After issues were identified, we closed off customer connections to bring connectivity back in a controlled way," the spokesperson said, while confirming that all trading had ceased, and was yet to recommence.

More soon, no doubt - it'll be interesting to know what went wrong, and how much money this is costing on a day when the markets are generally rallying around the world.

I'm back now from my Alpine sojourn, one particular episode of which is a story I think I'll be retelling for years. It's certainly one of the most surreal encounters I've ever had.

I was on a commuter boat in Geneva when I started chatting with a Brazilian chap who my companion - also Brazilian - and I had seen on the same boat an hour or so before. I made the mistake of mentioning I was a technology journalist, which obviously piqued his interest. He suggested we go for a drink at a bar next to his apartment.

My companion and I ordered some wine while he went to drop off his shopping. He then returned with a thick file and a laptop. The file contained his portfolio for one of his careers, as a professional George Clooney lookalike. He then launched what he meant to be an hour-long presentation about a mobile-banking-slash-social-networking scheme that would be going live in a few months' time.

The system is based on referrals, which earn the referrers money that is, until the launch, virtual. As I recall, it also involved investing some real money up-front. It quickly became apparent that this scheme exhibited some potential risks similar to those you might find in a pyramid scheme. Although, hey, it allegedly has just about every major vendor - from hotel chains to laptop makers - signed up. So I may be wrong. Time will tell.

Annoyingly, every question I asked was rebuffed with a call to let him first finish the presentation. And there were many questions. Are those vendors really signed up? Why do you have to be referred to join the scheme? What are these "virtual credits" that the user amasses by getting others to join? Couldn't the scheme be used for money laundering?

Already irked at being forced to switch from holiday mode to journalist mode, I called time on the conversation after being told I shouldn't be so skeptical, as journalists are supposed to have open minds. I replied that journalists also have fairly active bullshit detectors. Things went downhill from there.

Afterwards, my companion - who urged me to point out in this post that not all Brazilians are like that - told me I could have ended the conversation more politely. I'm not sure that would have been possible. But, if any of you can think of a polite way in which one can extricate oneself from a lengthy and dubious sales pitch from a Brazilian professional George Clooney lookalike in Geneva, please do let me know.