Sen. Al Franken has been quick to use time in the Senate to define himself as an outspoken advocate of independent programming and media. During Elena Kagan’s confirmation hearings he used his time to ask her for her thoughts on major media mergers such as the proposed one between Comcast and NBC Universal [Franken is not a fan].

This past Saturday Franken used his closing spot at the Netroots Nation conference to advocate for Net Neutrality. In his rousing remarks Franken told that crowd that Net Neutrality was “the First Amendment issue of our time.”

President Obama delivered the commencement address at Hampton University in Virginia yesterday, and in a weirdly out-of-touch moment for a President who fought to keep his Blackberry, told the crowd of graduates that “with iPods and iPads and XBoxes and PlayStations…information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment.”

Kids today!

You’re coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombards us with all kinds of content and exposes us to all kinds of arguments, some of which don’t always rank all that high on the truth meter,” Obama said at Hampton University, Virginia.

“With iPods and iPads and Xboxes and PlayStations, — none of which I know how to work — information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation,” Obama said.

Read on...

Stephen Hawking: “If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans…

We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.”

In what I have to imagine will be one of the better headlines you are going to read today, scientist Stephen Hawking offers some sage advice on how to deal with an alien encounter.

The ash from a large volcanic explosion in Iceland has caused the closure of airports in Britain from 12 noon U.K. time (7 a.m. ET) to at least 6pm tonight (U.K. time).

Additionally, there are currently no flights allowed in British airspace, meaning flying to and from Europe today is going to be a nightmare. It is the largest disruption in air travel since September 11, 2001. This from the New York Times:

Last night Stephen Colbert interviewed Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, which the other week published video of the US military killing 12 individuals in Iraq, two of whom were later revealed to be staff members of the Reuters.

After a sort of jokey opening in which he had his face pixelated and voice altered, Colbert got down to business:

Not even the White House can ignore the power of the Google. TechPresident picked up on this subtle use of phrasing by the White House blog to optimize the SEO of their posts … in this instance, how to cause them show up higher on Google search results.

Which was something the White House was extra interested in last week when the Internet was afire with health care reform:

This is a sad way to start the day. TMZ has reported (CBS followed up) that ’80s teen star Corey Haim was found dead in his home this morning from an apparent drug overdose.

From TMZ:

Have you been feeling slightly more in the dark these last few days? Literally. This is crazy but apparently the 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile Saturday was so strong it knocked the Earth a few degrees off its axis and shortened our days. Not a joke.

Oy. Suffice it to say this is only one of those things that can only happen in print. Canada’s national newspaper the Globe and Mail reportedly ran this unfortunate ad just four days after Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili was killed in a practice run accident.