Off topic: The September 30, 2009 Christian Science Monitor has published my latest health care OpEd, "Health care in Massachusetts: a warning for America".

It's also mirrored here at Yahoo! Opinion.

Who owns my garbage?

"Weird, Rare Clouds and the Physics Behind Them"

"Man Goes Into Business Delivering Costco To Overpriced NYC Neighborhoods". (Via MR.)

"20 Incredible LEGO Artworks".

(Via RB, who pointed out this real-life Bilbo Baggins house.)

Schneier on unauthentication.

"The Myth of Crowdsourcing". Here's an excerpt:

The notion of crowds creating solutions appeals to our desire to believe that working together we can do anything, but in terms of innovation it is just ridiculous.

There is no crowd in crowdsourcing. There are only virtuosos, usually uniquely talented, highly trained people who have worked for decades in a field. Frequently, these innovators have been funded through failure after failure. From their fervent brains spring new ideas. The crowd has nothing to do with it. The crowd solves nothing, creates nothing.

What really happens in crowdsourcing as it is practiced in wide variety of contexts, from Wikipedia to open source to scientific research, is that a problem is broadcast to a large number of people with varying forms of expertise. Then individuals motivated by obsession, competition, money or all three apply their individual talent to creating a solution.

There is a legitimate sense of "the power of crowds" in which multiple eyes on a project can catch subtle mistakes that might slip past one observer or in which aggregate actions of individuals acting in a free market can set prices better than a single central planner.

But for creative innovation, it still ultimately comes down to the individual mind.

(Via David Jilk.)

Future MilTech:

In the last century, each war has left pretty clear signs about which new weapons and gear will be common in future ones.

...What are we seeing now? Lots more personal electronics for infantry, armed battlefield robots, the beginning of the battlefield Internet, and a lot more sensors. There are already portable electronic devices that can see through walls. There's more pattern recognition software that can examine digital video and make decisions on what is dangerous, and what is not. In the lab, there is a "crowd scanner" that examines how flushed (excited, as in blood rushing to different parts of their faces) people are, and who might be feeling guilty, or ready to attack. The last decade has seen the first large scale use of combat robots (if you don't count naval mines, which were first introduced in the late 19th century.)

Now you know what kind of weapons will be common, reliable and most effective in a decade or two.

In the right hands, these could be tremendous technological advances. (In the wrong hands, that's a different story...)

Spot the difference between Arial and Helvetica. (Via BBspot.)

Total Recall: "Microsoft researcher converts his brain into 'e-memory'"

Big Egg.

Here's how it happens.

"The coming tablet wars"

"Where will synthetic biology lead us?" (Via Cosmic Log.)

"10 Dirty Little Restaurant Secrets". (Via Jon Henke.)

Dvorak keyboard fans take their fight to smartphones.

"Woman gets pregnant -- while pregnant". (Via Instapundit.)

"A Stick Figure Guide to the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)". (Via Schneier.)

Spider silk. (Via Howard Roerig.)

"Rusty Soviet Doomsday System Still Turned On". Related Wired article.

Rice paddy art. And more. (Via RB.)