WBUR, a Boston public radio station, has daily translations of coverage from the Arabic satellite TV station Al Jazeera.

The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Smalltalk Compiler [via Lambda the Ultimate]

A FBI memo offers details on why the Holy Land Foundation was shut down. [via rc3]

The shuttle got off the ground today. Docking is Friday afternoon. about 3p Eastern.

This is slightly old news, but Gimps has found its 5th Mersenne prime: 2^^13,466,917-1.

The Very Large Telescope at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal location just got better with the addition of the NAOS-CONICA adaptive optics system. [via BBC News (story)]

A famous French conductor, Pierre Boulez, was held for three hours in Switzerland for terrorism links. The link was apparently based on a comment made in the 60s that opera houses should be blown up.