From the outside, there is nothing unusual about the stylish new gray and orange row houses in the Kranichstein District, with wreaths on the doors and Christmas lights twinkling through a freezing drizzle. But these houses are part of a revolution in building design: There are no drafts, no cold tile floors, no snuggling under blankets until the furnace kicks in. There is, in fact, no furnace.

The Energy Challenge - No Furnaces but Heat Aplenty in Innovative ‘Passive Houses’ - Series - NYTimes.com

TEXT messaging is a wonderful business to be in: about 2.5 trillion messages will have been sent from cellphones worldwide this year. The public assumes that the wireless carriers’ costs are far higher than they actually are, and profit margins are concealed by a heavy curtain.

Digital Domain - What Carriers Aren’t Eager to Tell You About Texting - NYTimes.com

In a stunning turn of events, the US music industry has ceased its long-time litigation strategy of suing individual P2P file-swappers. Instead, with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo acting as a broker, the RIAA has signed voluntary "graduated response" agreements with major Internet service providers. Those currently on the receiving end of an RIAA lawsuit, though, will have to see it through to the (very) bitter end.

No more lawsuits: ISPs to work with RIAA, cut off P2P users

The White House said on Thursday that an “orderly” bankruptcy was one option being considered to try to rescue General Motors and Chrysler, which are seeking billions of dollars to avoid a shutdown.

Bush Weighs ‘Orderly’ Bankruptcy for Carmakers - NYTimes.com

Maybe your old truck isn't responsible for destroying the planet after all.

New climate change scenarios quantify the idea that oil is only a small component of the total global warming problem — the real problem is coal.

If the world replaced all of its oil usage with carbon-neutral energy sources, ecologist Kenneth Caldeira of Stanford University calculated that it would only buy us about 10 years before coal emissions warmed the planet to what many scientists consider dangerous levels.

Oil Is Not the Climate Change Culprit — It's All About Coal | Wired Science from Wired.com

David Foster Wallace, whose prodigiously observant, exuberantly plotted, grammatically and etymologically challenging, philosophically probing and culturally hyper-contemporary novels, stories and essays made him an heir to modern virtuosos like Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo, an experimental contemporary of William T. Vollmann, Mark Leyner and Nicholson Baker and a clear influence on younger tour-de-force stylists like Dave Eggers and Jonathan Safran Foer, died on [Sep, 2008] at his home in Claremont, Calif. He was 46.

I don't know how I missed this. I guess this pushes Infinite Jest up the list...

David Foster Wallace, Influential Writer, Dies at 46 - Obituary (Obit) - NYTimes.com

According to people who were present, Logsdon, a space historian, told a group of about 50 people he had just learned that President John F. Kennedy’s transition team had completely ignored NASA.

Griffin responded, in a loud voice, “I wish the Obama team would come and talk to me.”

Alan Ladwig, a transition team member who was at the party with Garver, shouted out: “Well, we’re here now, Mike.”

Soon after, Garver and Griffin engaged in what witnesses said was an animated conversation. Some overheard parts of it.

“Mike, I don’t understand what the problem is. We are just trying to look under the hood,” Garver said.

“If you are looking under the hood, then you are calling me a liar,” Griffin replied. “Because it means you don’t trust what I say is under the hood.

Orlando Sentinel - NASA has become a transition problem for Obama

These bailouts are an awful idea -- the worst of K St. capitalism (== kapitalism) inviting an insanely bad future for the industries affected. If there's one thing worse than Detroit managed by the managers who have been driving the American auto industry into the ground for the past three decades, it is Detroit managed by politicians.

rant: the mistake in bailouts (Lessig Blog)

On December 31, 2008 a "leap second" will be added to the world's clocks at 23 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). This corresponds to 6:59:59 pm Eastern Standard Time, when the extra second will be inserted at the U.S. Naval Observatory's Master Clock Facility in Washington, DC. This marks the 24th leap second to be added to UTC, a uniform time-scale kept by atomic clocks around the world, since 1972.

Will your software do the right thing?

Leap Second will be added to clocks on Dec. 31, 2008 | SpaceRef - Your Space Reference

Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich of Illinois was arrested by federal authorities on Tuesday morning on corruption charges, including an allegation that he conspired to effectively sell President-elect Barack Obama’s seat in the United States Senate to the highest bidder.

!!!

Illinois Governor in Corruption Scandal - NYTimes.com