Ben & Jerry’s, which is a unit of consumer product conglomerate Unilever, agreed to remove the “all natural” label after the Center for Science in the Public Interest sent the company a letter last month, pointing out that at least 48 of its products were labeled “all natural” when they contain non-natural ingredients. (After the deal was struck, the CSPI was quick to concede that none of these non-natural ingredients are actually harmful, and plenty of “natural” ingredients are also bad for your health.)

via Ben & Jerry’s finally admits its ice cream isn’t “all natural”.

A typical sampling is an article from the February, 1947 issue of Science Illustrated, titled What I Want Next. It’s composed of reader submissions for inventions they want to see:

OUT, DAMNED SPOT! I would like to see a handy device, small enough to fit in a pocket or purse, that would remove any kind of spot from one’s clothing in a few seconds. This would certainly relieve the embarrassment of spilling gravy or other food on the “best dress” while dining out. With the device I have in mind, it would be possible to retire for a minute to the powder room and return with the dress as fresh and clean as before.

—Harriet Sherman, Atlanta, Ga.

LIGHT LITERATURE. I want next: books printed with luminous ink so I can read at night in barracks, after “lights out.”

—Pvt. Thomas Thornhill, Boca Raton, Fla.

EVERLASTING RIBBON. A typewriter ribbon that won’t wear out! This shouldn’t be so difficult as it sounds. Possibly a durable and effective ribbon could be made of glass, plastic, or steel. It should have a constantly renewable ink supply, which might be rolled on by a small absorbent roller attached to an ink cup at one side of the machine. Such a system would be much cleaner and quicker, and far less exasperating, than the present method of wrestling with a yard of smudgy tape. A few drops of ink would probably have to be added at intervals to the supply in the cup.

— Charles Feger, Chicago, Ill.

I WANT NEXT: Some way of tuning the radio in my car without taking my eye off the road or my hand off the wheel.—R. Strauss, New York, N. Y.

Reader Strauss doesn’t know it, but a steering-column radio control appeared on a few 1942 Chevrolets, will reappear on 1946 models. It turns the set on and off, controls volume, and—when pushed—gives push-button tuning of selected stations.—Ed.

via WHAT I WANT NEXT.

Larry the Cucumber: Sour Apple

Laura Carrot: Watermelon

Madame Blueberry: Blue Raspberry (couldn’t they have done, I dunno, blueberry for this one?)

Pa Grape: Grape (surprised they didn’t go for eggplant here…)

Junior Asparagus: Lemon

Bob the Tomato: Strawberry

“You humans naively assume that ‘physicists’ exist, who discover theories,” said the Universe. “But I did it all. Me. The transitory entity known to you as ‘Stephen Hawking’ is merely an epiphenomenon of the laws of nature, otherwise known as Me, the Universe itself. Mindless physical stuff, the only thing that ever really existed, or ever will exist.”

via Evolution News & Views: Hawking Not Needed to Explain His New Book, Says Universe.

HT: Astute blogger Dan Phillips

To see today’s visit the Google home page. (I’ll update with an archive link after today.)

Usually you can see what the Doodle is celebrating by clicking on the image, but today’s presents some special challenges in that regard. One source speculates that it’s a special logo for either the 12th anniversary of the incorporation of Google, or perhaps celebrating HTML 5.

Now, back to work…

I remember watching this on TV when I was in elementary school:

Curiously, as a software developer, I’ve never been comfortable for reading for long periods of time from a computer screen, particularly when reading for pleasure. But the eInk display is so much more like paper that I’ve already read through an entire novel in the week or so since I got the e-reader.

A lot of people have asked why the Nook, vs. Amazon’s Kindle or other e-readers. (Or, for that matter, why not wait for the Apple iPad? But that is a topic for another day. Short reason? eInk.)

In a nutshell, what drew me to the Nook specifically were those features which distinguish it:

• Native support for PDF and ePub formats – Without any conversion, as the Kindle requires (or at least did initially), you can drag and drop any PDF or ePub (which means pretty much anything from Project Gutenberg – but more on sources of free and cheap books in a later post) directly into your Nook’s storage, which shows up on your PC as just another drive, like an SD card for your camera.
• The “Lending” feature – This feature has gotten some bad press, mainly due to the restrictions (you can only lend a book once per friend, and for a maximum of 14 days with no renewal) as well as the publishers’ reticence to allow it (they can turn it off for any title), but the plain and simple fact is this: B&N are the only big player doing something about making the eBook market friendlier and more like owning a hard copy book. (Now if they’d just figure out a way to do used eBooks that would be something…)
• In-Store features – Speaking of making it more like hard copy books, the in-store features of the Nook (which they really need to actually get around to activating) are pretty intriguing. In a nutshell, while you’re in any B&N and connected to their (free) Wifi, you can read the full text of any book they offer. Which you can do with the hard copies, so why not with your Nook? This is a stroke of genius – browse the stacks from the cafe or while watching your kids in the children’s area.
• The color touchscreen + Google Android OS – The combination of these two opens up wonderful possibilities for future developments….
• Expandable Memory – I’m a hoarder when it comes to books, and no doubt will be when it comes to eBooks as well. The Nook has an SD card slot which you can expand up to 16GB of memory.
• Replaceable Battery – The Kindle’s battery is, I believe, like the iPhone, not replaceable. This means a hefty price down the road to either replace the device or send back for factory battery replacement when it finally dies. With the Nook, on the other hand, you can already purchase a replacement battery should you so desire.

So… what’s wrong with the Nook? Well, a few things, still:

• Different features for B&N eBooks vs. “My Library” - The Nook separates the books you’ve purchased from B&N, from those you loaded yourself (PDF’s, ePubs, 3rd party eBooks, etc.). With B&N content you get coverflow view, searching by author or title, sorting by last read, etc. With your content, you get – none of those. You are limited to a view sorted by title or author (and BTW – the title sort doesn’t handle “a, an, the” properly). I could, in theory, load the hundreds of books I’ve downloaded from Project Gutenberg into my Nook. But that would mean having to scroll through the list to page 20 every time I wanted to read “Tarzan of the Apes.”
• Sluggish – The Nook is not the fastest thing in the world. After using an iPhone for a year+, the touchscreen is not as responsive as it should be. The eInk takes a second to turn pages, but that is actually tolerable.
• “Open” OS, but… – OK, so it uses Google’s Android OS. Give us custom apps!

I’m hopeful that in future updates (there have been 2 already since Nook’s debut), they will continue to enhance the device and address these shortcomings. I understand from previous reviews that the first releases of the Nook system were barely usable with regard to performance, but that newer updates have really gone far in addressing speed issues. as I said, the sluggishness is tolerable, but could still stand improvement. I’m also hopeful that they open it up to more apps, or even 3rd party development (The guys at nookDevs have already started down this path with hacking the Nook. I’ve tried their stuff, and it has possibility, but is not ready for prime time yet.)

In the coming days (weeks?), I’ll be posting more on the Nook and eBooks, including good sources for free and/or cheap content for the Nook, and a review of the classic novel Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Stay tuned…

The very title page of this book will demonstrate, without further explanation from me, the intention of the work I have undertaken.

Gee, can you really tell that much from the title page of a book?

Yes. Yes you can.

The second best part of it was the cost – it will only be $34 after rebate. They’re $80, plus if you have one of those 20% off coupons that BB&B sends to everyone on the planet, your in-store cost is only $64. Then you get a $30 mail-in rebate form. Sweet!

The best part, though?

It sits on my desk at work and every time I look at it I am reminded how much I love my wife and kids, all day long. You can’t put a price tag on that. I recommend something like this for every husband and father out there.

18. Quiet time: This has no relation to �time out.� In fact, it could be just the opposite. All Christians are expected to have �quiet time.� It is at this time that you renew your relationship to God through prayer and Bible study. The longer the better. If you do this first thing in the morning, people will count you blessed.