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Zacharski writes to tell us that the X-Prize Cup Expo was held Sunday in Las Cruces New Mexico in front of about 20,000 people. John Carmack was there with his team from Armadillo Aerospace. From the article: "Armadillo Aerospace got their rocket-powered, vertical takeoff, vertical landing vehicle off the ground. Blasting off into the sky then hovering for a few seconds, the craft began lowering itself to the ground - but tipped over on touchdown. The wet ground due to overnight rain was the cause, although the craft appeared undamaged in the fall. An internal hose was punctured, however, causing subsequent flights to be scrubbed." The expo also ended with quite a bang when Starchaser's Churchill Mk2 rocket engine blew up.

Lord Carmack wrote in to point us to Objective Reality's homepage which claims that it will be releasing an OpenGL based 3D interface for linux. There isn't much there, but it at least looks interesting- although it also looks commercial so I'm skeptical about how much acceptance it will see.

Fwonkas writes "Not sure if this has been posted yet (holiday distractions and stuff), but there's more bad MP3 news. Capitol has forced the Beastie Boys and Billy Idol to remove MP3s that they posted on the web. " They join Public Enemy now with that distinction. The artists see where the future is. How long before the record industry figures it out? Update: 12/27 07:37 by H :A week ago Friday (the 18th) the Wall Street Journal had an interesting article on the Beasties and MP3s. Check it out for more info-although that article was prior to this report. Afraid I can't find an online, non-pay required version. Anyone know where one is? I deleted this article. It was totally a copyright infringment and obviously shouldn't have been posted. Hemos will be slapped with salami until he begs for forgiveness *grin*

This ABCNews Article was sent to us by Matt Michie who also says "The author says Microsoft's monopoly is starting to resemble the big-three American automakers in the 1970's. He says the time is ripe for a quick cheap competitor to makes its presence felt like the Japanese did. Sounds like Linux has a good chance to fill that role."