Procrastination man - Part 2

... and how subtle they can be. This is a screenshot from an article about the hack into Sarah Palin's personal email account:
Under normal circumstances, I'd frown at such subjectivity on the journalist's part (especially as it concludes the news item by reminding that McCain's running mate was violating the law by using her personal email for official reasons), but that particular sentence is just as good as pure gold.
It also says much about the state campaigning is in - when a hack, and not the actual manifesto, makes the headlines. Remember the passport files breach, earlier in the primary season?
Anyway, it is really enjoyable to find such wit, and lack of self-consciousness in articles, that downplay an issue that is not that important!

Nuff said. (from snotr)

In the UK at least, the great experiment of the Large Hadron Collider in the CERN gets a more than decent media coverage. Radio 4 is giving it a full day's worth of programmes, BBC News has had it on its front page for quite a while now. While the website has more than half decent content, including a guide to the collider, the radio feature doesn't work quite that well. We did hear champagne corks popping when the beam was switched on, though, and the excitment was palpable.
Some liken the LHC to a modern cathedral for science - and, true enough, it cost billions, overshooting its original budget fourfold. Despite its scientific interest (God particle, a few seconds after the Big Bang snapshots, source of energy maybe), the LHC is indeed first and foremost, in the eye of the media, a massive feat of engineering. To a lesser extent, the Millau bridge got full-on media cover when it was finished... to boast French craftmanship. And it is good news, in the rather gloomy context of economic half-arsed crisis which doesn't want to say its name, that we (as we can appropriate the project, surely - it's taxpayer's money :-p) can still make dreams come true.
What makes this project different from previous giant leaps is that it does not serve a particular culture's ego. The American moon landing was full of cold war politics, the Millau bridge (not that it can be likened in any way to both giant feats) purely French, the LHC is international. And such cooperation, especially considering the massive funds that came into play, can only be applauded...
...despite some comments on the Beeb's Have Your Say. I have copied those two, which made me crack up a little, and put them up here (as they would be rather hard to find in the flooding mass of comments on this feature).

Also, I am a bit miffed that I didn't grasp the chance to use this great chat-up line (from xkcd) last night:

Even though the mother-show itself, Doctor Who, is undergoing a sort of gap year, both spin-offs have some heavy actuality of their own.
Torchwood, the "grown-ups' Doctor Who", will have its soundtrack finally released on the 22nd of September.

Behind this awesome CD (look out for Owen's theme!), already available for download here, are the combined talents of Ben Foster and Murray Gold, who have already worked on Doctor Who. Silva Screen Records have already released two soundtracks for Doctor Who, which are pretty much awesome - buy them here and here.
But Torchwood's activity does not stop there. Admittedly, we still have to wait for the half-arsed (but probably worth it) series three, comprising only five episodes making up one story, and which will be broadcast over the course of one week, probably over the Christmas break. But this wednesday, on BBC Radio 4's Big Bang Day, a 45-minute special audio episode of Torchwood, featuring Martha Jones as well as the usual cast, will be broadcast. Tune in at 2.15pm (British Time). Here's the trailer:

To listen to Radio 4 on the Internet (which should also work from the European mainland), follow this link, and if you've missed it, there's always listen again. If the Earth is not blown up by then, that is.
The other Doctor Who spin-off, The Sarah Jane Adventures, is also gearing up for its second series, which will start broadcasting on the 29th of September. A trailer has been made for it:

So yeah, we will only get a few Doctor Who specials this year, and we have to wait until Christmas for the next one, but there's still lots of stuff to get excited about!