1. NASA launches the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission today.
"Mars is a complicated system, just as complicated as the Earth in its own way. You can't hope, with a single spacecraft, to study all aspects and to learn everything there is to know about it. With MAVEN, we're exploring the single biggest unexplored piece of Mars so far."
2. IBM's call center research and optimization services.
"This text-analysis tool takes information from call center agent records, identifies customer concerns, provides early warning capabilities and mines data for trends and patterns."
3. The strange dilemmas posed by emotional support animals for nervous airplane passengers.
"Delta says it allows rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, birds and marmots."
4. On OutKast's southern futurism.
"Rap had seen afro-futurist eccentrics before, but since hard-core hit in ’94, no one but Kool Keith had dressed so flamboyantly... Andre had reached that rarefied level of 'I don't give a fuck' that Kanye West has frantically sought since his first Givenchy kilt. His clothes weren’t a bug-out costume or artistic pose; they felt as creatively surreal as the music. No one on earth or Alpha Centauri could have convincingly pulled them off."
"Just one year ago, those were the compromises Apple was forced to make. They could shrink the year old iPad 2 into the Mini form factor, or go retina and A6X with a thicker and heavier battery. This year, there are no compromises, there is no or."
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