Beloved developer id Software has announced that its annual celebration of debauchery and first-person shooting known as QuakeCon will take place at the Hilton Anatole Hotel in Dallas, Texas from July 31 to August 3.

Nothing satisfies the geek's need for electrolytes, caffeine, B-12 and a wicked sugar high all at once like a can of neon green goo. Learn to determine which energy drinks are most worthy of your buzz -- and which ones to avoid -- in Wired's How-To Wiki.

Submit your best transportation photo for a chance to be included in a photo gallery of the winners on Wired.com.

Go Mavs? Teehee. Net neutrality back to the Senate Our election remains undecided 31 MPG by 2015 Green companies really green? Brain hacking As for the the videogame news

Here's a neat trick: drip food coloring into a pan of milk, then add some dish-soap to set off a psychedelic, animated chemical reaction that'll have 'em agog with delight! Link (via Neatorama)...

These diamonds in the rough got lost in the shuffle for our macro photo contest, so we're bringing them back from the dead for your enjoyment.

People who bought music from the MSN music store have been royally hosed by Microsoft: as of today, if you buy a new computer, or refresh your hard-drive, you have to kiss all your music goodbye. Microsoft has shut down its DRM "license server" and left people who bought music -- instead of downloading it from a P2P site -- out in the cold. All those years the music industry spent insisting that the only way they'd sell music is with crippling DRM attached managed to totally discredit the idea of buying music at all: MSN Entertainment and Video Services general manager Rob Bennett sent out an e-mail this afternoon to customers, advising them to make any and all authorizations or deauthorizations before August 31. "As of August 31, 2008, we will no longer be able to support the retrieval of license keys for the songs you purchased from MSN Music or the authorization of additional computers," reads the e-mail seen by Ars. "You will need to obtain a license key for each of your songs downloaded from MSN Music on any new computer, and you must do so before August 31, 2008. If you attempt to transfer your songs to additional computers after August 31, 2008, those songs will not successfully play." This doesn't just apply to the five different computers that PlaysForSure allows users to authorize, it also applies to operating systems on the same machine (users need to reauthorize a machine after they upgrade from Windows XP to Windows Vista, for example). Once September rolls around, users are committed to whatever five machines they may have authorized—along with whatever OS they are running. Link...

Oscar sez, "Amnesty International waterboarding ad, where they actually filmed someone really getting waterboarded. The ad will play in movie theaters starting on May 12th. This is part of their 'Unsubscribe Me' campaign. They had released another video a couple of months ago of a guy getting put into a stress position." Amnesty's 90-second film, called Stuff of Life, opens in slow motion with stylish shots of crystal-clear water and an upbeat soundtrack in the style of a typical mineral-water TV ad. However, after lulling viewers the ad transforms into an interrogation room where a man is strapped to a table being subjected to waterboarding. Waterboarding involves first tying detainees to a board face-up and tilted backwards, then pouring water over the face and into breathing passages to simulate drowning. "For a few seconds our film-makers did this for real, they poured water up the nose and into the mouth of someone who was pinned down with his head tilted back," said Sara McNeice, campaign manager at Amnesty International UK. "Even for those few seconds it is horrifying to watch. The reality, in a secret prison with no one to stop it, is much, much worse." Link (Thanks, Oscar!) See also: Amnesty's Unsubscribe Me video reenacts CIA stress-position torture...

A Danish company called Agroplast has figured out how to turn pig-piss into plastic and into a cigarette "flavor enhancer": Transforming farm waste into plastic precursors is potentially attractive over other bioplastic ideas because the feedstock effectively has no value. In fact, it has negative value because animal waste must be disposed, which costs money. Some other bioplastic companies make their resins out of corn starch. Tøttrup claims that the process could, conceivably, result in plastics that cost a third less than conventional plastics made from fossil fuels. That's a big conceivably. Traditionally, bioplastics made of vegetable matter have cost more than fossil fuel plastics. Evaluation of the pricing will have to wait until large volumes of this stuff are made. Agroplast is going into a pilot study now, Tøttrup said. Link (via Gizmodo) (Image: URINE: a Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike photo from Salvez's Flickr stream)...

Need a seemingly endless flurry of instant updates on strangers' mostly mundane activities? You're in luck. Commentary by Lore Sjöberg.

Trip hop stalwarts Portishead return with their first full-length in more than ten years. Also, Beauty & the Geek pairs nerds with bombshells, and the butt-shaking sounds of Santogold.

We challenged our readers to give us their best macro photos and vote on which ones they liked best. Here are the results.

Free broadband at local library

One of the best songs ever combined with one of the most whimsical roadside advertising gimmicks equals a video of pure joy. Created by Lex10, who says: I drive a 12 year old Pontiac convertible to my place of work, so I get quite the panoramic view. I was waiting for the light to change across from a storage complex, when I noticed how the end of Cream's "Glad" matched so beautifully with the tube man on top of the storage complex's roof as he waved his pneumatic arms and whipped his pneumatic head back in an unbridled expression of glee and air-filled pride. Link...

Thierry Henry is a French football player. Renowned for his pace, goal scoring record and ability to create assists, he plays as a striker for the France national team and FC Barcelona. He was spotted by AS Monaco in 1990 and signed instantly, making his professional debut in 1994. Good form led to an international call-up in 1998, after which he signed for the Italian defending champions Juventus. He had a disappointing season playing on the wing, before joining Arsenal for £10.5 million in 1999. It was at Arsenal that Henry made his name as a world-class footballer. Despite initially struggling in the Premiership, he emerged as Arsenal's top goal-scorer for almost every season. Henry spent his final two seasons with Arsenal as club captain, leading them to the UEFA Champions League final in 2006. In June 2007, after eight years with Arsenal, he transferred to FC Barcelona for a fee of £16.1 million. Henry has enjoyed similar success with the French national squad, having won the 1998 FIFA World Cup and Euro 2000. In October 2007, he surpassed Michel Platini's record becoming the country's top goal-scorer of all time. Given his accomplishments, he is regarded today by many as one of the best footballers in the world. (more...)

What did I realize during a few days and nights walking the Strip and trawling the casinos? I realized that cruise ships are waaaaay better than Sin City -- and here's why.

Holland America celebrates a big birthday, NCL rescues a puppy (and adds some fees), Majestic still tries to save the "Delta Queen," and more news from the seven seas.