There is an interesting Xbox plexiglass modification here, which turns an unassuming black plastic cuboid into a horrid display of light and sound.

In a move sure to bedazzle the American public and reinforce the image of political action-hero, President Bush - being the good-willed citizen that he is - visited Baghdad (yes, that Baghdad) for thanksgiving.

It has all the elements of a Tom Clancy novel - except the part where an unidentified group of masked gunmen hijack Air Force One and Jack Ryan sneaks aboard to save the... Oh, wait. Nevermind.

Back to the digital domain, Taiwanese manufacturer of optical drives, Lite-On, is estimated to ship 1 million drives next quarter. Given that their technology ranks among the cheapest, quietest, and most reliable equipment I've come across, I can't say I'm surprised. My $60 Lite-On 40/12/48 CD-R/-RW is serving me rather well, actually. Now, where did I put that 'backup' copy of Neverwinter Nights...

Finally, Umberto Eco has a long and interesting paper about the evolving modes of information storage. He contrasts paper, electronic, and vegetal (organic) -based technologies and examines the way in which authors are influenced by the semiotic system in which they write (and the structure of constraints imposed by the medium of writing). The article makes a few interesting points, such as the idea that digital and print mediums aren't so different as they initially seem:

His structuralist analysis of hypertext systems is also very interesting, if you have the time to absorb it in full, though a little laboured in parts. Note especially his rejection of radical deconstructionist interpretative theories, and adoption of a pseudo-Fishian 'three-dimensional' interpretative framework. In the context of the internet (a collaborative 'work' shaped by a large interpretive community) such a model seems very accurate.

Eco's argument that the electronic medium will (owing to its non-linear mode of information retrieval), replace traditional vegetal reference materials is rather ironic, as his example to contrast the two mediums demonstrates:

While true (after all, I can't remember the last time I've looked up a word in a paper dictionary), these same properties of electronic information access may be used to highlight Eco's own unoriginality (note that this was first discovered by an observant Slashdot reader).

Namely, a quick Google search reveals that Eco's aforementioned article is little more than a repeat of a lecture given by him in 1995, and again in 1996, 1998, and 2000, at various academic conferences. He must be getting rather good at delivering it by now!

Going back a little further (and already onto the second page of search results), we find that the Napolean example itself was earlier used by Bertrand Russell in 1935. Of course, the ease with which this information was all accessed just goes to show how correct Eco actually is!