Charon, moon of Pluto...

Charon, moon of Pluto ... as we've never seen it before.  This is a synthetic photo, false colored using data and images collected by the New Horizons explorer.  Heretofore Charon has been no more than a few pixels on a Hubble telescope photo – now we're seeing real detail.  Awesome job, New Horizons team!  Via APOD, of course.  Full resolution version here.  More information here...

Here's a technology to watch...

Here's a technology to watch...  Optical rectennas.  “Huh?”, you say?  These are devices built with nano-materials that convert light directly to electricity, and they work in a way that's different from the silicon photovoltaic cells that make up all solar panels built today.  The optical rectennas have one advantage that gives them huge potential: the teensy rectennas can be “tuned” for various wavelengths (colors) of light – so they can convert (theoretically, anyway) all light to electricity.  Today's solar cells can't come close to that.  This means that solar cells built with optical rectennas have the potential to be much more efficient than today's solar cells.  They also have the potential to be easier and cheaper to build, because the materials involved are not crystalline.

It's very early days for this technology, but it's one I'm going to watch closely...

U.S. labor force participation rate: 62.4%...

U.S. labor force participation rate: 62.4%.  That's the lowest since the middle of the Carter recession in 1977.  Remember that? 

If that statistic doesn't appall you, let me say it another way: for every three adults in the U.S., only two of them are working.

Helluva recovery here, Barry...

Of buggies and books...

Of buggies and books...  This article reads almost exactly like similar articles published in the early 1900s (especially the paean to craftsmanship), except that instead of books vs. ebooks, it was horse buggies vs. automobiles.

I predict the end of the books vs. ebooks story will be analogous to the end of the buggies vs. automobiles story :)