Recommended from Around the Web (Week Ending November 8, 2014)

Is Wasting Time on the Internet Actually Good for You? Read This and Find Out.
On the importance of doing nothing much online.
—Will Knight, news and analysis editor

The War of the Words
On the no-holds-barred fight between book publishers and Amazon.
—Will Knight

FT Interview with Google Co-Founder and CEO Larry Page
Nuclear fusion, defeating aging, and how to spend a $62 billion (and growing) cash pile – things on the mind of Google CEO and cofounder Larry Page, interviewed here by the Financial Times.
—Tom Simonite, San Francisco bureau chief

Partial Lobotomy Cures Man’s Arachnophobia
Unexpected perk of enduring a lobotomy?
—J. Juniper Friedman, associate Web producer

Man and Uber Man
“If we can get you a car in five minutes, we can get you anything in five minutes.” Vanity Fair profiles the outsize ambitions of Uber founder Travis Kalanick.
—Tom Simonite, San Francisco bureau chief

What Is the Carbon Limit? That Depends Who You Ask
Tackling the question of how much carbon we can safely emit.
—Kevin Bullis, senior editor, materials

2015 Tesla Model S P85D First Test
What it’s like to drive Tesla’s “insane” new Model S with two motors.
—Kevin Bullis

The Pierre Omidyar Insurgency
A profile of the secretive, eccentric eBay founder and his quest to promote government transparency, but on his own terms.
—Nanette Byrnes, senior editor, Business Reports

Why Sand Is Disappearing
Man-made erosion, rising sea levels, and storms have led to a sand mining boom.
—Nanette Byrnes

Brain Training May Help Calm the Storms of Schizophrenia
“Schizophrenia is a disease in which the stream of consciousness has swollen into a tsunami.” The story’s illustration and this quote are good metaphors for this devastating and poorly understood brain disorder.
—Kyanna Sutton, senior Web producer