BBC News: social networking sites monitored

Would the government ask Royal Mail to keep track of the recipient of each letter or postcard that I send? More press reports on monitoring of the internet ... thanks to Patrick for spotting this one.

Oldest English words identified?

There's been a flurry of reporting about this research at the University of Reading. Is this bad science, bad journalism or just a bad press release? Here are the links to:

1. University of Reading press release

2. Article in Nature (2007)

3. Language log coverage

4. BBC News coverage and interview on the Today programme

One thing it shows is how difficult it is to explain what we do in the corpus-based study of language. It should not be about whether I like the latest word that has been included in the Oxford English Dictionary, as I've been asked before!!