Blogging from Virgin America flight 108 high above Arizona.  Have I mentioned how great this is?  I am on my way to an FDA panel meeting to discuss regulation of whole-slide imaging for pathology, and I am really excited about it.  This is it; the culmination of years of hard work and development and study designs and customer advocacy, where the field of digital pathology moves into clinical diagnosis.  A real inflection point!

But meanwhile, it's all happening...

Quick, how big is Antarctica?  Check out this picture of the U.S. superimposed over it... 

Ann Althouse notes we are losing our religion, as U.S. belief in global warming is cooling.  Like nuclear energy, carbon emissions are a political football and most people respond based on opinion rather than fact.  I believe global warming is a problem and is also way overstated as a problem. 

News you can use: how to shoot an anvil 200' into the air.  Do not try this at home, especially if you live in my neighborhood :)  In addition to loving the idea of blasting an anvil into the air, I was struck that the practitioners of this sport look exactly like what you would expect. 

Well it didn't have the hype of the Kindle, but Barnes and Noble have announced the Nook, a Kindle competitor.  It uses a similar E-ink display, but has a color touch screen.  In terms of business model it is similar to Kindle, with a tweak that allows people to "lend books" to their friends.  I think this validates the Kindle more than competes against it. 

BTW I noticed B&N's website is considerably slower than Amazon's; a minor note, but I'm telling you website speed is important.  It is no accident that Google's website is faster than Bing's, for example.

Apple stock hits all time high.  John Gruber goes out on a limb and predicts AAPL's market cap will surpass MSFT's by year-end 2010.  And notes that Apple has enough cash on hand to buy every share of Dell.  It is amazing that everyone gave up on Apple, and they have succeeded by creating new markets for music players and smartphones, instead of by growing within the desktop computer market. 

Picture of the day: the thinker.  The very definition of a silverback. 

ZooBorn of the day: a baby white rhino.  (NB "white" rhino designates a species, not a color.)