August 5, 2005 (Friday)
- An Israeli archaeologist working in East Jerusalem reports that she has discovered a palace dating from the 10th century BC, which may have belonged to King David. (NY Times), (International Herald Tribune), (Washington Times), (Houston Chronicle), (Taipei Times)
- Wikimania has started. Audio streams are available on Meta. Reuters has reported that new restrictions on editing Wikipedia and other rules, such as removing the ability to edit articles with "stable contents", are being considered, allegedly to protect against vandalism. (Reuters) The report is based on an interview with Jimmy Wales conducted by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.(SZ)
- Three Irishmen accused of training Colombian FARC rebels have returned to Ireland. (RTÉ)
- Conflict in Afghanistan: Al-Arabiya television broadcasts video footage shot by al-Qaeda which appears to show the downing of a US Chinook helicopter in Afghanistan. (BBC)
- Yahoo! has introduced a test version of a new search service Yahoo! Audio Search that it claims can comb through 50 million music, voice and other audio files. (Yahoo! Audio)
- An earthquake in Papua, Indonesia, reached 6.0 on the Richter scale. There are no reports of casualties.(Channel News Asia)
- Newmont Minahasa Raya, a local subsidiary of U.S. mining giant Newmont Mining, and its executive Richard Ness, go on trial in North Sulawesi accused of polluting a Buyat Bay near its mine in Indonesia. (Channel News Asia) (Forbes) (Bloomberg)
- The People's Republic of China formally charges Hong Kong reporter Ching Cheong, journalist for The Straits Times, of spying. (China Post) (Channel News Asia)
- Typhoon Matsa hits Taiwan (Channel News Asia)
- Russian Priz class mini-submarine AS-28 and its 7 crewmembers are stuck underwater off the Pacific coast (Reuters) (BBC)