Brian Gongol
Why, oh why, do people still think gold is the "gold standard"?
It's a pretty-looking metal with little or no practical use. It's mined out of the ground in unpredictable volumes and then hoarded by people who think the apocalypse is near. But here's the dirty little secret they don't seem to realize: If the economy were somehow to collapse and currencies' values to be destroyed overnight, who in that post-apocalyptic scenario is going to know how to tell real gold from the fake stuff? It's not as though anybody (in any serious numbers) can tell the difference between real gold and fool's gold, which in turn renders the real stuff less valuable. Instead of hoarding gold, people who think the world's in dire distress should invest a similar amount of money (and time) in learning skills that they could use for barter. Today's gold fever is just another stupid fad driven by hype.
Redistricting sails through Iowa Legislature
And the governor plans to sign it. It's actually pretty remarkable how smoothly the entire process worked. Now, if only we could expand the number of members of Congress tenfold, then we wouldn't have such dramatic redistricting events to worry about in the first place.
Google is still making good profits, but people are starting to see the end to the bubble
Not a lot of publicly-traded companies manage to survive the kind of breakneck expansion through which Google has passed over the last few years, and as a giant company now, it has a huge target all over its back. The Google boom will end sooner than most people realize.
An artificial pancreas is underway
It's being tested in small groups in Britain. Tremendous news -- if it works -- for diabetics.
The best news contest of the year
The Washington Post invites people to create dioramas using Peeps, and many of them focus on the news. Hilarious.
Crooks use programs distributed in the Android market to steal data from Skype accounts
