The weekend that was, uh, was, a tiring one. Pop!Tech put a serious drain on the batteries, but I won't let that stop me from serving up some of things you may have missed in the last 72 hours.

ITEM 1: Bottle Smugglers cheating Maine?

- I've always thought of the bottle/can return situation as a bit of a recycling scam, but one that works. Instead of just encouraging people to recycle, give 'em a bit of an incentive like cash. Now, I won't lie, I do stock up on my empties to get a big payday at RSVP, but would you believe some people are hoarding and smuggling their empties to states where they can get a better rate of return? (And yes, there was an episode of "Seinfeld" about this very issue - which that link points out.) While this is a little funny, it may be causing a problem for states and businesses that are losing out on cash from the returns. So here's the question - is this possibly tied to the bad economy? In tough times are people looking for a little extra cash, or are we looking at the beginnings of a serious crime epidemic? How soon until there are search nets and border check points for empty beer bottles?

ITEM 2: Oprah hearts Kindle

- I think we're about to see an Oprah bounce in effect. Last week the empire builder and mogul not only a hand-held device for downloading and reading books, magazines and other material. So far sales and interest in the Kindle has been mixed - it retails for $359 - but with an endorsement (and rebate) from The Oprah it's possible the device will get the same kind of boost that books and other favorites with the "O" seal of approval have seen. If you were looking to buy one for Christmas, you may need to act fast.

ITEM 3: Still more Pop!Tech?

-OK, OK, I know, enough with the Pop!Tech already! I recognize a couple of things here, folks may not entirely get what Pop!Tech is about, and are probably a little tired of hearing about it in the blog. To be honest, sometimes I don't know what Pop!Tech is about and I've been twice. I know it's amazing and mind-bending in the fact that you have farmers, artists, doctors and business leaders all mingling and discussing the world's problems in the same way you and I might casually - and enthusiastically - discuss the last episode of "30 Rock."

I got to meet people working on stopping the spread of counterfeit prescription drugs in India and restoring unusable farm land in Kenya, not to mention chat with author WIRED editor Chris Anderson about The Long Tail (I truly hope I didn't embarrass myself). I also ran into folks like Anestes Fotiades of Portland Food Map, Michael Kosowsky of Hey, What's That, and Bangor Daily News blogger/writer Emily Burnham.

One thing I did not get a chance to write about but struck me as really cool, was the Yahoo! Flickr bike. At first glance it looks like a seriously purple bike, but look closer and you'll see it has a tiny camera mounted on the handle bars and a collection of solar panels on the back. The bikes take pictures as you ride around town and upload them to Flickr along with the bike's location, thanks to a GPS device in the camera. The coolest part? A guy from Yahoo! told me that the camera itself is actually a Nokia N95 cellphone!

How much would you love to see something like this traveling around Portland, cataloging everyday life? Yahoo! is exploring the possibility of getting the bikes in more cities, so we'll have to wait and see. For more on Pop!Tech check out the coverage in the blog and my story from Saturday's paper. You can also check out some out some of my Del.ici.ous links on the right and here's a Pop!Tech Twitter break out.

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