Fireworks factory explosion

Lessig is becoming an icon (err, I didn't intend to mean "avatar," but it was so appropriate I thought I'd leave the pun alone). I'd still really like to try out Second Life, but it's one of those things where my close RL friends would need to be playing for me to interact with, or it would take away the time I have to interact with them (mostly via IM right now due to a 7000-mile gap). I'm pretty sure it's free to play it and use as a virtual-world chat program, but you have to pay for anything good (the good news being, if you buy the virtual land from them and set up shop, well, some people are making a living playing this--well, then, I had a friend making more money than I make monthly playing the ladders in Diablo 2 and getting cool rare stuff--it was nowhere near his normal income, and he was giving it all to his wife for pocket money).

Appropriately, good SF is generally more available online and through other technological means than other genres. And congrats on the nomination, Mr. Doctorow.

Also from BoingBoing, finally--fashion I can understand.

I agree with this in principle, but in practice, it's more likely that a man will do certain things if you're all clean-shaven, and after I shave once, I have to keep doing it, or go through maddening itching for weeks while it grows back. Easier to just take a razor to it than pay a damned fortune in salon Brazilian waxes (OK I'd like to do that just once, but can't justify the expense, nor letting the hair grow out enough for the wax to grab).

Google News is out of Beta, but what's the point in personalizing Google News home when you can do the same thing with a personalized Google homepage and add custom content, games, RSS feeds, etc.?

I think this is good news. Wonder how expensive it'll run.

The West Wing will end after this year. Aside from their reasons, I don't think it'd be the same show once there's a new president--and if Vinick were to win, most of the White House staff would be changed as well.

Conservatives take Parliament. From the BBC header--"Canada has swung to the right in a general election after 12 years of Liberal rule increasingly overshadowed by allegations of corruption." No shit? What government in power for over a decade isn't overshadowed by allegations of corruption?