We cannot help but notice that this week’s Weekend Coffee — the first in a month! — contains fewer silly pictures and more good photographs than usual.

You are therefore particularly encouraged to click on the pretty pictures. As is the norm with pretty pictures, they look better when viewed in larger formats.

	Bruce Schneier has written an excellent essay on terrorism, fear, and why the Washington Monument should be closed.
Something to think about the next time you read that music-industry profits are down: While that may be true for the record labels, the musicians themselves are making more money than ever. In fact, if you buy two songs (in MP3 format) directly from a musician these days, they make more money than they would if you bought an entire album on CD at HMV. In short, new distribution channels are endangering the norms of the industry surrounding the musicians, not the musicians themselves.
	Here is a short story of methane release from melting permafrost.
If you are asked to review your own book, be careful.
	Some of the best bits from the Bloggess come when she interacts with clueless and incompetent marketers. It’s so ridiculous that I think it must be fake. Until I realise that I sometimes get these e-mails too. I just ignore them.
Adding to the list of reasons why my next computer will not be built by Apple: Apple forces a company selling third-party Macbook Air updates to stop producing them. I might not be the sort of person who tends to buy third-party updates for their laptop. But I find it hard to support a company that doesn’t allow it. If I buy something, it’s mine.
	So … Canada has this new copyright legislation, that a lot of people don’t like. So … the guy that wrote it goes on TV to defend it … … and … … he ends up giving a good explanation of why it’s a bad piece of legislation. Why is Canada doing this, again?
If life hands you lemon bars … make lemonade.

Do you want to have sex in space? Too bad — the International Space Station is a sex-free zone. Perhaps they are trying to join Texas.

(Found at FFFFound. Photographer unknown.)

Awkward Family Photos normally features family portraits that have gone awry. Occasionally they deviate from the theme and feature stories about cakes to celebrate a child’s first period. Note to self: do not do this to your own child.

It turns out that Archimedes might not have set invading Roman ships on fire with a giant mirror, but instead he might have used a steam-based cannon. I am not sure if this makes the story better or worse. I think better. Now I find myself imagining Archimedes as a goggle-and-toga wearing Greek steampunk mad scientist/genius.