There are a number of sites that have picked up pointers to this article in the News Observer about an Irish lad who created a browser that quadruples web surfing speed over a standard modem link (and plays DVDs). I've yet to find independent corroboration of the claims by the browser's maker, but it sounds like it needs some investigation.

Either way, the kid has made a lot of noise and (if you believe the story) a lot of code. 760K lines in 18 months. That's about 1500 lines of code per day.