I became aware of Bruce Lee when I was in junior high, which is probably when a lot of boys realize that karate is really cool. My best friend, my cousin, and I would buy and devour martial arts magazines featuring articles on Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris. I have a lot of fond memories of hanging out with my friends and watching Bruce Lee movies.

Every day we learn something new about how this planet works. It’s a good thing those discoveries lead to new technological breakthroughs.

Speaking of water, in climate change news new research into the rapid melting of Antarctic’s Pine Island Glacier is casting doubt on global warming as a cause. Apparently the melt-off has been in the works for a long time and would be happening now with or without global warming. This research does nothing to disprove global warming, but it does remove a piece of “evidence” from the table.

I’m sure you’ve heard about the vast mineral wealth found in Afghanistan? The article says that they could become the “Saudi Arabia of lithium.” If managed properly, these mineral resources could replace opium as the main source of income for many Afghanis. Of course, getting access to these resources will mean major infrastructure improvements, such as railroads, roads, and reliable electricity. With this much wealth at stake, I think you can forget Afghanistan being abandoned. Even if we completely turned out backs on the country, the Chinese would immediately step in. Batteries play a huge role in our “green” future, which means our insatiable appetite for oil will be replaced for an insatiable appetite for minerals like lithium. The big question is, what will it take to keep the Taliban from sabotaging efforts to improve the infrastructure of their own country? Because they control the roads, they have already stopped an effort to revitalize a hydro-electric plant and return reliable electricity to the southern part of the country.

Want to argue the politics of our place in Afghanistan? I don’t. If you want to chew on politics, I was recently reminded of this old article in which the author suggests we abandon the old two-dimensional left-right political spectrum in favor of a more sophisticated model for political axis. It’s as good as any. Or, you could check out some of the others mentioned on Wikipedia. They have the benefit of prettier graphics.

This sounds like a major medical breakthrough, to me. Researchers have found an agent that appears to stop metastasis in cancer cells. Basically, it keeps them from growing. So far the tests have only been conducted in mice, so we don’t know if there are any side effects that would make this a deal-killer.

You know I’m a fan of Michael Yon. This beautiful photo series was reprinted (with permission) on an Air Force site.

Ever wonder what’s so wrong with arrest quotas? This article, if true, about NY city’s practices should be pretty disturbing. Here’s a money quote.

One officer with the unit acknowledged the political pressure to juke the stats. “The mayor’s looking for it, the police commissioner’s looking for it…every commanding officer wants to show it,” he said. “So there’s motivation not to classify reports for the seven major crimes.”

Sometime when you’re at home and have a few minutes to play with something really cool, visit Sounds of Hamburg. This Flash site lets you compose music by cleverly using the random motions of pedestrians in public webcams. It’s a fun, cool, site. Obviously you’ll need sound to enjoy this site.

I’m sorry for the long silence. Spare time has been at a premium, and I’ve been spending what little time I’ve had working on ETU. Quick update on that– it’s coming along well. We’re working on refining chapter 10 at the moment and we just have 3 more chapters to go.

Although it’s nothing you’re likely to notice, I used cpanel to block a repeat spammer’s IP address for the first time. I see from my Bad Behavior logs that it has been blocking harvestors and bots, but–more distressingly–attempts at SQL injection. I’m very thankful that the plugin is stopping them…but I can’t help but wonder about the ones it hasn’t. If you can read this post from a feed (such as at Livejournal, Facebook, your RSS reader, etc.) but are denied access to flametoad.com, please let me know!

Now for the linkdump:

• Buried Tales of Pinebox, Texas was recently voted Best Anthology in the Preditors & Editors Readers’ Choice awards. We also had a pretty nice review at Bitten by Books recently. We’ve submitted it for the Origins award, so keep your fingers crossed that we get on the ballot.
• I’m signed up for the Google Buzz, so if you’re interested in connecting, here’s my public profile. I do share items of interest from my Google Reader feed, so that should be good for a laugh.
• “Offline Lending” Costing Publishers Billions
• Viagara might be useful for pregnant women in promoting healthy fetal development. (I just painted a giant target on this post for spam-bots, haven’t I?)
• It costs a business roughly $204 per card in fines and restitution when they are hacked and your card numbers are stolen. Often when this type of thing happens, the number of cards affected are in tens of thousands if not millions. It’s enough to put a mom and pop store out of business and cripple a multi-million dollar operation.
• There are some seriously neat technology improvements on the horizon for e-book readers. They’re going to make these first generation e-ink books look like… well, first generation iPods.
• Shopping for a new digital camera? Lifehacker recommends staying under the 7 megapixel range, for good reason.
• Finally, some problems can’t be talked out.

Joint Forces Command is holding a video contest “Why Afghanistan Matters“.

[The contest] serves as an opportunity for those serving – or who have served – in Afghanistan, to explain why the work they are doing in Afghanistan is of such importance. The intent is to provide a “boots on the ground” perspective of the military mission in Afghanistan from the point of view of those most closely involved.

The ethanol we started adding to our gasoline a few years ago is destroying engines. Now the government is looking at upping the ratio from 10% to 15%. Why do I not trust these people with my health care?

How about a bird’s eye view?

Did you hear about tadpoles raining from the sky in Japan?

Or, here’s some interesting trivia. On-demand books published now exceed the number of traditionally published books. Even large houses are seeing the value of keeping their back catalogs alive through on-demand printing. It’s a brave new world for the printed word.

The Sky is Falling.

Have you heard of botnets? They are collectives of PCs that have been infected by malware, that turns them into slaves for criminal organizations. In many instances the PC owners don’t even realize that their computer has been turned into a zombie. Modern botnets are constantly updating and next to impossible to stamp out. Yet, recently researchers hijacked control of a botnet away from its criminal owners, and the results are both fascinating and frightening. This is definitely worth a read.