Every Wednesday here at eWEEK's Emerging Technology we'll provide links and insights into the latest news that's breaking anywhere about new technologies and products.

Here are the emerging technology stories for the week of May 7th.

Sun Tries to Outshine Silverlight, Flash; Targets Mobile - You could make a good argument that Java was the original Rich Internet Application environment but it has since been replaced by Flash and other new technologies. Among many announcements at this week's JavaOne show is JavaFX, which aims to get Java back among the top players in RIAs.

Doing the Tom Cruise with your computer - The founder of Oblong Industries gives a talk about work on building hand gesture computer interfaces, somewhat similar to the one show in the Tom Cruise film Minority Report. All I can say is that if the person next to me on a plane starts waving their hands around at their laptop, I'm going to ask for another seat.

Web Alarms, Mobile Alerts Aim to Make You Safer - In the wake of the Virginia Tech tragedy, security companies and experts look at better ways to send notifications and alerts.

The Future of Web technologies - We'll be keeping on eye out on news from this years World Wide Web Conference. In past years this conference has seen the launch of everything from XML to web services.