Last week, the US House of Representatives passed a "compromise" version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that gives the President additional authority to conduct surveillance on American citizens while providing immunity to telecommunications companies that have cooperated with previous Bush administration warrantless surveillance efforts. The bill goes to the Senate for a vote this week. Sen.

Graycie at Today's Homework and Ms. Cornelius of A Shrewdness of Apes wrote this week about "stalker moms," a K-12 variant of the college-age student's "helicopter parent." In a comment, Ms. C mentions she keeps an online gradebook, which prompts e-mails such as "Deer Teechur: Pweshus told me he gave you that assignment. Please change the zero in the gradebook immediately." I got three of those last week. In the same thread, roller coaster teacher reported, "My team opted for online grades 3 years ago, and that got old fast, so we opted out. Some team teachers got so fed up, they won't even keep a web page for assignments anymore." Even teachers who are technophiles often feel overwhelmed by all the technological choices, which too soon become reponsibilities, then burdens. Take, for example, Jane Nicholls, who studies the effects of Web 2.0 tools on oral literacies. In a post simply titled Troubled," she explains why she needs to "reboot."