Here's What's Awesome: Controversy!

I hired a bunch of consultants for this week's compendium of awesome links. Their single, unanimous recommendation: Here's What's Awesome needs more controversy. It needs more attitude, more in-your-face, more crash-boom-bang. Seeing as how I flee from controversy the way Star Wars fans flee from the Special Edition DVDs, I'm not convinced this is a good idea. But they talked me into trying a controversial set of links just this once. If it doesn't work, expect three awesome links about fluffy bunnies and lollipops next week!

Only I didn’t say fudge – I said The Word
Naughty kids and hardware-wielding grown-ups, here’s a research study for you: scientists at Keele University in England say swearing actually helps when you hurt yourself! Their theory is that swearing helps activate the body’s fight-or-flight response, which can inhibit pain. “Swearing has been around for centuries and is an almost universal human linguistic phenomenon,” says one of the researchers, though I don’t expect that justification will get you out of detention if your teacher hears you saying one of Those Words. [Live Science]

Does this bug you?
We’ve seen chicken power and tree power in past columns, but in those cases, the electricity actually came from byproducts – chicken manure, for example. The new fly-catching LED clock catches bugs in flypaper, drags them along a conveyor belt into a fuel cell, and powers the clock from its “digestion.” Ok, this "controversy" angle isn’t doing it for me. [Envirogadget]

Gave proof through the night that these flags weren’t still there
DarkRoastedBlend brings us Flags of Forgotten Countries, a unique look at world history through its flags. Some flags tell the tale of a country’s colonial past, either as colonizer or colonized (these tend to be really elaborate); others are from countries that aren’t on the map anymore, like Yugoslavia. A few of them aren’t even for countries: in Tokyo, for example, there’s a flag for every ward in the city. [DarkRoastedBlend]

Now it’s your turn: share an awesome link in the comments. They don’t have to be controversial – in fact, I’m firing those consultants, so share a link to baby animals or something so we can get our karma back in order.

(Photo by Clover_1 via Flickr/Creative Commons)