The transformation of American politics by the Internet is accelerating with the approach of the 2006 Congressional and 2008 White House elections, prompting the rewriting of rules on advertising, fund-raising, mobilizing supporters and even the spreading of negative information.

Update: Micah Sifry found this article wanting. He writes:

I'm putting my money on the real shift, which is the movement of power away from the center and top and to the edges and the bottom. A harder story to report, for sure, and one that the consultants in DC are by definition ill-disposed to understand. But that's the big story, and it's coming.

Internet Injects Sweeping Change Into U.S. Politics

I'm not a musician, but I recently composed and recorded a song. More than that, in a Paul McCartneyesque fit of post-Beatles hubris, I played all the instruments and produced and engineered the entire thing, even though I have no experience producing and engineering anything more complicated than a Bombay martini.

Composing Music Using Apple Computer's GarageBand Software

The News Corp.'s purchase of MySpace is looking like that rarest of rarities in the media world -- a much-ballyhooed acquisition where it turns out that the buyer underpaid.

News Corp. (hearts) MySpace | FORTUNE

In short, here's how it works: Figure out which customers make you the most money, segment them carefully, then realign your stores and empower employees to target those favored shoppers with products and services that will encourage them to spend more and come back often.

Best Buy's giant gamble | FORTUNE

Humans are aware, and we are aware that we're aware. But scientists still don't understand why.

The consciousness puzzle

Are smart people overrated?

This is an old piece ...

gladwell dot com - the talent myth

For now, however, too many Microsoft managers are still measured by their success with yesterday's business model—selling boxes of software. Microsoft is still formulating its response to the rise of online software. As one former Microsoft executive explains: the company's problems are not just technical but organisational. “It has a vision but not a roadmap; it can see the peaks but doesn't know how to cross the foothills to get there.”

Microsoft the dinosaur

As Iran's nuclear program crosses successive thresholds and edges closer to a military capability, the Western capitals are struggling to understand the man at the helm of power in Tehran. Is Iran's president as irrational as his rhetoric would suggest? Is Ahmadinejad driven by a messianic religious fervor that makes him immune to practical considerations? What are the political and ideological determinants of Ahmadinejad's policies? Before contemplating measures to arrest Iran's impetuous impulses, it is important to have a better appreciation of the ideology that animates the new president and the new cohort of hardliners that are leading the Islamic Republic.

The National Interest | Article | A Profile in Defiance

'The Unbinding,' Slate's serialized 'Net novel' being written and posted 'in real time' by Walter Kirn, raises intriguing possibilities for the future of fiction. But is it a future we really want?

Techno thriller

"Going to the march?" he asked me. "What march?" I asked.

He looked at me as if I'd just returned from Paris and mentioned that I didn't notice the Eiffel Tower.

The reason some of us miss major news is because there's just too much news out there. The more information that becomes available, the less informed we are.

I never thought I'd say this, but maybe it's time we all got in touch with our inner fox — at least a little.

Hedgehog nation