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One of the goals for WordPress version 3.2 is "Distraction Free Writing", or an upgrade to the current "Fullscreen mode" that can be toggled within the Visual Editor. The upgrade is still very much in development, but there's enough in place that we thought a quick peek wouldn't hurt.

I wrote about how NBC has handled Keith Olbermann's departure from his show on MSNBC. Writing that story put me in mind of one of the hoary chestnuts of public relations strategy, which is to let sleeping dogs lie for some situations. Veteran PR folks are fond of refering to a minor flap as a "one-day story," meaning that you read about it in the newspaper today, but it disappears tomorrow. Unfortunately, the Internet has forever ended the technique of letting the storm blow over.

The increasing use of text-messaging by teens - and increasingly often, by younger children - has given some people cause for concern. They argue that the abbreviations used in texting are detrimental to literacy development. Spelling, grammar, phrasing - these are all somehow poised to suffer, critics of texting contend, because of the use of shortened words and sentences. Soon, they predict, students' essays will be filled with LOLs and L8Rs. But a new study from Coventry University finds no evidence that having access to mobile phones harms children's literacy skills. In fact, the research suggests that texting abbreviations or "textisms" may actually aid reading, writing, and spelling skills.

Mindtouch Executive Vice President of Sales Mark Fidelman, writing for Cloudave, identifies Apple Senior Vice President of Worldwide Product Marketing Phillip W. Schiller as the top social Chief Marketing Officer of the Fortune 100.

The assumption that human beings are inherently selfish-interested in the greater good only when it serves their own interests-has long-influenced capitalism's most prominent thinkers (Adam Smith, Alan Greenspan, Gordon Gekko) and served as a litmus test for modern America's so-called political realists. Employees are best motivated with bags of carrots and a big stick. Without law there is no order, and without the threat of punishment there is no law. We're all out for number one. Greed is good. Dogs eat dogs. Just turn on the news anytime of the day or night. The anecdotal evidence is overwhelming. A compelling counter-narrative is emerging, however. In the latest issue of Harvard Business Review, Yochai Benkler points to "recent research in evolutionary biology, psychology, sociology, political science, and experimental economics [that suggests] people behave far less selfishly than most assume." "Evolutionary biologists and psychologists have even found neural and, possibly, genetic evidence of a human predisposition to cooperate," he writes.

It is quite easy to end up writing about the problems with parliament and the failings of politicians. Our assumption tends to be that the problems with politics today lie solely in Westminster. But these memes show that mendacity is found outside SW1 as well as in it. If we must hold our politicians in revulsion - rather than recognising that they're no more (or less) flawed than the rest of us - then we should at least also hold those who create these totally inaccurate graphics in even lower esteem.

ONE HAS LATELY heard much of the hashtag. That is, the Twitter symbol #, used to categorize a tweet. Charlie Sheen's first tweet, for example, was famously: "Winning ..! Choose your Vice... #winning #chooseyourvice." #Winning has gone on to live in irony across the Twitterverse, in mockery of the eternally less-than-winning Sheen. But even President Obama recently urged students to tweet their senators about raising the interest rates on federally subsidized student loans with the hashtag "#DontDoubleMyRate." The new thing, however, is using the word "hashtag" in conversation. Especially if you are under a certain age, you may be catching people saying things like, "I ran into that guy I met-hashtag happy!" or, in response to someone complaining, "My flashlight app isn't working," perhaps you have heard the retort, "Hashtag First World problems!" A college student not long ago reported a favorite witticism to be appending observations with: "Hashtag did that just happen?

In March of 1961, nine years after the publication of Charlotte's Web, author E. B. White received a letter from a young fan named Cathy Durham who wanted to know when, if ever, his next children's book would see the light of day. His reply ultimately prompted another letter explaining information overload as it applied to a popular writer of kids books a half-century ago.