Some fresh links to good stuff:

• A Brief Rant on the Future of Interaction Design – The currently popular Pictures Under Glass technology is an interaction paradigm of permanent numbness. It denies our hands what they do best: touching things, sensing their tactile response. Claiming that Pictures Under Glass is the future of interaction is like claiming that black-and-white is the future of photography. It’s obviously a transitional technology. And the sooner we transition, the better.
• Gilad Shalit and the Rising Price of an Israeli Life – One soldier swapped for over 1,000 prisoners, most of them convicted terrorists. How and why did Israel end up in a place where they would agree to this deal?
• In ‘Game of Thrones,’ a Language to Make the World Feel Real | NY Times – Hollywood is driving demand for constructed languages, complete with grammatical rules, a written alphabet (hieroglyphics are acceptable) and enough vocabulary for basic conversations. (Estonian grammar gets mentioned in passing.)