politically motivated censorship

From Mrs. Clinton's speech at Newseum in Washington, D.C. January, 2010:

We are also supporting the development of new tools that enable citizens to exercise their right of free expression by circumventing politically motivated censorship. We are working globally to make sure that those tools get to the people who need them, in local languages, and with the training they need to access the internet safely. The United States has been assisting in these efforts for some time. Both the American people and nations that censor the internet should understand that our government is proud to help promote internet freedom. 
 
I wonder what Julian Assange thought about it...

Retardation of science

I recently discovered a remarkable science fiction story by a distinguished theoretical physicist Leó Szilárd called The Mark Gable Foundation. It was written in 1948 (published in 1961). A scientist who woke up in the 21st century after 90 years of cold-sleep is asked by a billionaire how to slow down scientific progress. The answer given by the scientist is this:

I think that shouldn't be very difficult... You could set up a foundation with the annual endowment of thirty million dollars. Research workers in need of funds could apply for grants, if they could make out a convincing case. Have ten committees, each composed of twelve scientists, appointed to pass on these applications. Take the most active scientists out of the laboratory and make them members of these committees. And the very best men in the field should be appointed as chairmen at salaries of fifty thousand dollars each. Also have about twenty prizes of one hundred thousand dollars each for the best scientific papers of the year... 
 
How would that retard the progress of science?

it should be obvious... First of all the best scientists would be removed from their laboratories and kept busy on committees passing on applications for funds. Secondly, the scientific workers in need of funds would concentrate on problems which were considered promising and were pretty certain to lead to publishable results. For a few years there might be a great increase in scientific output; but by going after the obvious, pretty soon science would dry out. Science would become something like a parlor game. Some things would be considered interesting, others not. There would be fashions. Those who followed the fashion would get grants. Those who wouldn't would not, and pretty soon they would learn to follow the fashion too...
 
The National Science Foundation of USA was created in 1950, although National Institutes of Health and U.S. Atomic Energy Commission existed before. Today the NSF is the only U.S. federal agency with a mandate to support all the non-medical fields of research...

Trillium

Perhaps one of the most recognizable labels of modern times is Nike's swoosh (yes even in France). Curiously enough it cost the company only about $35 for the wholeproject. For comparison here's the new symbol of Ontario:

 which is a redesign of the old one:

The upgrade took place in 2006 and cost the tax payers $219,000. This monumental graphics project was carried out by Bensimon Byrne, which proudly calls itself "the most efficient agency in Canada".

Asian carp

Forget about the Gulf oil spill. The real looming environmental disaster is the Asian Carphttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_carp in the Great Lake: