With all this talk about asteroids slamming into the Earth, it's nice to see that the Earth is fighting back.

"We have met the enemy and he is us": According to this recent unscientific survey of London commuters, two-thirds of those asked would gladly hand over their company computer password to a total stranger. Of course even if they didn't, a malicious hacker would still stand an excellent chance of breaking into their systems since the most commonly used password was "password". (Via Techdirt.)

A lot of stuff goes on behind the scenes when you make an online purchase with your credit card.

Moore's Law marches on through a variety of quiet technical advances on the chip-making front.

Your handy guide to wireless home networking lingo.

Better living through stress and strain: MIT materials scientist Gene Fitzgerald has devised a way to make chips run faster by straining the silicon first.

(Ok, this is getting scary now. Gene Fitzgerald is the third of my college fraternity housemates to move on to do Great Things. Gene is a star professor at MIT and co-founder of his own startup company, AmberWave. One of my former roommates Karl Sims won a MacArthur "genius" grant in 1998 for ground-breaking work in computer graphics. And Brewster Kahle co-founded Alexa, and is also the inventor of the Internet Archive and the Wayback Machine. Maybe I should have drunk more beer with those guys back then!...)

There's been lots of publicity in the mainstream press over a recent EPA report bemoaning the fact that American waterways are becoming more polluted. For some reason, there hasn't been as much publicity about another recent government study showing that fish seem to be adapting to the pollution just fine.

Some websites like to use JavaScript to hijack your registry.

Black holes generate their own unique music.

Classmates.com is a great way for old high school friends to track you down. Unfortunately, it's also becoming an increasingly popular way for stalkers and private investigators to do the same...

A school teacher admitted to phoning in a fake bomb threat so that she could get the day off from work. (Link via ObscureStore.)

Your tax dollars at work: The US Army is developing "indestructible sandwiches" for soldiers to eat on run when on the battlefield. They will be even more convenient than current MRE's (Meals Ready to Eat), and intended for times when MRE preparation is not feasible. (I hate to admit it, but they actually look pretty good...)

Mobile tactical robots: I never knew that just a few miles away from my house, scientists in Littleton, Colorado were developing a robot army. (It's probably not as messy as building an army by crossing orcs and men...)

Panic rooms, California style.

America is often accused of cultural imperialism, but Richard Pells argues that it would be more accurate to describe American mass culture as a mirror of the world's cultures. (Via ALD.)

A pair of excellent articles argue that we should be less worried about global warming and instead more worried about an asteroid striking the Earth.

"Simpsons" episode pisses off Brazilian president, threatens to spark international incident. Although this sounds like it should be an April Fool's story, it isn't. According to this article: "When the Simpsons, America's favourite dysfunctional family, visited Brazil last week they made some offbeat observations. The cartoon characters found that Rio de Janeiro is a city where all men are bisexual, where fearsome monkeys roam the streets, and tourists are kidnapped by taxi drivers and mugged by children... Unfortunately, the Rio tourist board did not see the funny side and is preparing to sue the producers, Fox, for damage to its international image and loss of revenue. The issue threatens to become a diplomatic incident... The Brazilian president, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, has entered the fray claiming that the cartoon 'brought a distorted vision of Brazilian reality'." (Via MetaFilter.)

One good way to build employee loyalty is the hook up your main office with an extensive wireless network that allows them to bring their laptops to the beach while they're working. (To RIA: hint! hint!)

Why is Creationism on the rise in the UK? According to Patrick West, the academic left is as much to blame as the religious right. Given that both camps are suspicious of reason, this is not as surprising as it might seem at first glance. (Via SciTech Daily.)

To increase milk production from cows some farmers are pampering them on waterbeds. (Soft music and candlelight apparently didn't work as well.)