4chan

Today we find out why Jeff is walking around with his head down all day, and why Justin's new canine glows in the dark. It seems some genetic engineering has turned man's best friend into a flashlight.

Next we pick apart Best Buy's decision to roll out a closet-sized vinyl section in all of its stores, and why we think this might be a step backwards in terms of progress. We're not trying to put record players down; we just think our blue-and-yellow friends are jumping on that bandwagon a little too late and probably for all of the wrong reasons.

We mentioned the App Store's one-billionth app yesterday, but failed to talk about it. Today we'll reveal the useless piece of software and why we'd be happier with that baby-shaking app taking its place.

Then it's off to Firefoxland, where we discuss the highly anticipated version 3.5. We go around the room geeking out by sharing browser fantasies, thus permanently ensuring Wilson and Justin will never date again.

Finally, we dive into the world of 4chan, quite possibly the most influential crew on the Internet. So influential, in fact, that the community has voted its fearless leader to the top of Time Magazine's 100 most influential people list. That's kind of a paradox, isn't it?

All this plus Calls From the Public on today's show!

Some nasty pranksters, likely associated with Web forum 4Chan, have hacked into Apple gossip mainstay MacRumors' live-blog coverage of Tuesday's Macworld keynote. Hosted on a separate domain, MacRumorsLive.com, the site was plagued by offensive messages about Apple CEO Steve Jobs' health and general inanity (i.e. "SEX ME") before finally succumbing to "technical difficulties."

It remains uncertain whether the pranksters actually brought down the site, or whether MacRumors voluntarily took it down to keep things under control.

It's pretty clear, however, that this was the work of 4Chan, which has gained both respect … Read more

A grand jury in Chattanooga, Tenn., investigating who hacked Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's Yahoo e-mail ended its meeting on Tuesday without indicting a Tennessee lawmaker's son.

Speculation on the Internet has centered on 20-year-old David Kernell, a University of Tennessee student.

On the Internet forum 4Chan.org, where the e-mail break-in was first announced, posts attributed to someone named "Rubico" more or less described how the Yahoo account had been compromised using the password recovery feature. The e-mail address used for Rubico has been linked to Kernell.

Kernell's father, Democratic Tennessee state representative … Read more

There are mixed reports on Friday whether or not the son of a Tennessee state representative has been contacted by the FBI or Secret Service in connection with Sarah Palin's hacked Yahoo Mail account.

The father, Democratic Rep. Mike Kernell has told Knoxville News Sentinel and The Tennessean that despite a lot of online chatter, no formal contact has been made.

The person who gained access to Palin's e-mail account did so by guessing details of her life, then changed the e-mail password to "popcorn."

Using the online nickname Rubico, someone posted details of the hack … Read more

Details describing how someone hacked into Sarah Palin's Yahoo Mail account emerged on Thursday, and it appears to have been done with little more than social engineering, the process of acquiring personal information through social manipulation.

Meanwhile, the Knoxville News Sentinel is reporting that a 20-year-old University of Tennessee student has been contacted in connection to the federal investigation of the break-in. Further details are not known.

Since Tuesday, anonymous posters using a forum on the 4Chan.org Web site have been circulating password-protected zip files containing the contents of the now-deleted e-mail account once belonging to the Republican … Read more

Hundreds of Internet users stood outside for hours in the cold on Sunday morning, and they weren't waiting for a shipment of Nintendo Wiis. They were Anonymous, a group of online activists standing outside the New York City Church of Scientology to protest the organization's policies. The protest was one of many conducted across the world at major Scientology centers on that day.

The New York City protest saw between 200 and 300 Anonymous gather outside of the Church of Scientology New York. Other prominent "raids" … Read more