The $150 Laptop

It's not coming to a store near you. But millions will be shipped next year to schoolchildren in developing countries, including Brazil, Pakistan, Nigeria, Thailand and Libya. The computer, known as the XO, is the brainchild of the One Laptop per Child foundation, a spin-off of MIT Media Lab. OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte outlines the program in this Q&A. It's Linux-based, and you won't find standard office software on it. "[C]hildren are being trained to use Word, Excel and PowerPoint...I consider that criminal, because children should be making things, communicating, exploring, sharing, not running office automation tools." Read more about the specs here or take a video tour here.

Jon Stewart, unscripted

On October 8, 2006, Jon Stewart stepped out from behind his desk on "The Daily Show" and spoke with David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker. In this audio clip of the conversation, Stewart talks about: the similarities between politics and show business; Fox News; and the perception that his show is a news source. (Stewart's interview starts at 12:05.) A few transcribed quotes are below.

On Washington vs. Hollywood: "We traffic in government and Hollywood, for the most part. And the similarities between the two cultures are so stunning that it's hard to imagine they are ever at odds with each other...They always used to say that politics is show business for ugly people, but I believe that show business is politics for the powerless."

Stewart on the "rudderless protoplasm" of news today: "In the media atmosphere, you either bring clarity or noise. And for the most part, the people that have overtaken the business have the biggest noisemakers...I think Fox knows what they're doing and CNN doesn't...They don't know why they exist...There's no editorial point of view...Fox News is actively pursuing something. They are actively pursuing what they feel is an editorial slant in the other media that they need to correct. So they believe that they are a corrective...a salve to whatever they thought is festering in the media culture. They're wrong...We are reactive in the same way, except we just think that what's wrong is that most of it is theater and very little is authentic. So, the reason that you have to be reactive is government and corporations work non-stop, incessantly, 24 hours a day to create noise. And if you're just reporting...what you're reporting is the smoke from the machine."

On his show as a news source: "People put up our show as a news show because they feel underserved by news shows. It says nothing about our show's news ability...We're not journalists. We have one guy with a TiVO...We're cranky people, like, that would sit in a bar and yell at the TV. Only somebody gave us a show. But the reason people keep presenting us in that manner is because they feel sad about what they're being served with."

In a related story, Ben Karlin, the executive producer and former head writer for Stewart's show, is stepping down. (No punchline to follow. But here's an NPR interview with Karlin from April 2006.)

Happy fifth birthday, iPod!

On October 22, 2001 Apple introduced a pocket-sized, portable device that held 1,000 songs. In the original press release, Steve Jobs said, “With iPod, listening to music will never be the same again.” What might have seemed like marketing hyperbole at the time has proven itself quite true. However, the beginning was bumpy. Apple's rip, mix, burn philosophy drew the ire of the music industry. So, to create a marketplace for legitimate digital downloads, Apple began to talk to record labels. (Some news organizations even mistakenly reported that Apple was buying Vivendi Universal's music division.) What the Cupertino-based company came up with was the iTunes Music Store. A revolution for both the computer and music industries. Over 60 million iPods have been sold over the past 5 years, and the latest incarnation is a matchbook-sized iPod shuffle. But what's next?

Big Yellow Taxi

What if you hopped in a cab and ended up a contestant on a quiz show? That's the premise of the Discovery Channel's show, "Cash Cab." In the clip above, a contestant/passenger gets some help from a pedestrian. Volkswagen does their own version in a Rabbit (minus the cash) in the Gypsy Cab Project. But for those of us who have to pay for our cab rides in New York, fares have just doubled when stuck in traffic. Good news is that there are 11 different hybrid vehicles in the city's fleet, including a Lexus RX.

Underdog Chefs

British food can be peculiar, insular, of questionable nutritional value and, at times, a disgrace. Bubble and squeak. Aspic. Marmite. The bacon butty. So why is it that Britain produces so many chefs who find an international following? Do they have more obstacles to overcome when they start out and therefore try harder? Do they purposely look for a platform outside their homeland because they know their countrymen's tastes? Below are a few of them who've created a wider appeal.

Jamie Oliver cooks with a conscience. His restaurant Fifteen employs young people whom other places wouldn't even think of hiring. Now, he's crusading for better school lunches, as seen in the promo above. And not everyone is happy about it. Gordon Ramsay's eponymous restaurant in London has three stars from Michelin and a price tag to match. And his eagerly anticipated new eatery across the Atlantic opens at the London NYC Hotel next month. On TV he dishes out some tough love to hapless chefs and restauranteurs on "Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares." Nigella Lawson remains the queen of comfort food that's still far more sophisticated than anything Paula Deen would whip up. While Tom Parker-Bowles isn't quite a household name yet, his mother Camilla is. The stepson of the future king of England cooks and has assembled recipes from around the world in his new book.

Reinventing the wheel. Or the rocking chair.

Stumbled onto the 100% Design show in London, and a few pieces really jumped out as smart, inventive and entertaining. The picture is of a rocker called Ku-Dir-Ka by Lithuanian designer Paulius Vitkauskas. The floor model was bright green, but it's also available in black and red according to its manufacturer, Contraforma. Designer Anthony Dickens takes a whole new look at time with clocks that scroll in a linear fashion while others rotate like a carousel. Andrew Lang has created something that looks like a flower pot screwed to the wall. Instead, you lock your bike to it. No need for big bike racks. A design group called Asobi from Slovenia crushes all sense of scale with their XXL suggestion for public seating, the Isle Lounge. Dead Good brings cool Britannia to a mirror. The London office of ad agency Wieden & Kennedy even got in on the act, sponsoring a design contest for a new product that reprepresents them . It's very democratic. Vote here.

Five years later

A tribute in light, through 2008 at least. A renewed effort to build a physical memorial. What if that morning had never happened? Rounding out a neighborhood by building up. And Santiago Calatrava's designs for the new transit hub.

Everybody's crazy

Jody Rosen of Slate.com has a great piece on the large number of covers out there for the Gnarls Barkley track "Crazy." It seems to be the lingua franca on this summer's music circuit for groups like the Raconteurs, Of Montreal and the Kooks. Even better, Rosen unearths the Ennio Morricone track that's the basis for the song's main riff.

Six years of every day

Photographer Noah Kalina has been taking one picture of himself every day for the past six years. And he's strung all the photos together into a video. Music by Carly Comando. Listen on her My Space here. Two more similar projects (by different photographers) are here and here. And what would a trend be without a spoof?