Snooping Around Your Skull

Scientists are working on tiny intelligent dust particles that can be inserted to monitor brain functions; the EU is cracking down on Israel by excluding its settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem from future agreements; meanwhile, reporters at several news journals are getting “camera-ready” in order to compete with broadcasters for video views. These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

How Smart Dust Could Spy On Your Brain Intelligent dust particles embedded in the brain could form an entirely new form of brain-machine interface, say engineers.

EU Takes Tougher Stance on Israeli Settlements Future agreements between the European Union and Israel must include the explicit exclusion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank or East Jerusalem, according to a new EU directive described by an Israeli official as an “earthquake”.

At The Wall Street Journal and Elsewhere, Reporters Increasingly Give Face Time Reporters at the Wall Street Journal and have been asked to look camera-ready in an attempt to cash in on the best advertising rates in the digital — those paid for video views.

Treatment of Palestinians is Apartheid by Any Other Name Were it not for the razor wire, giant concrete blocks, steel gates, watchtower and standard-issue surly teenage soldier, it would be impossible to tell at what point the barren uplands of Israel’s eastern Negev give way to the South Hebron Hills of the West Bank.

The Israeli Patriot’s Final Refuge: Boycott With Israel entering into another round of diplomatic inaction, the call for an economic boycott has become a patriotic requirement.