Hi All, I must begin this weeks blog with a warning, there are fraudsters out there! Australian astronomer Dr. Simon O'Toole has suggested that, due to the gravitational force exerted by Jupiter, the planet Mercury could be pulled out of its solar orbit creating a possible galactic catastrophe. Mercury could be pulled into a collision course with Venus which could in turn collide with the Earth. Dr O’Toole has suggested that there is a 1% chance that this could happen within the next 1 billion years! Although Dr O’Toole advises us not to panic, the prospect of chunks of Venus thousands of miles across hurtling towards our homes and loved ones would seem to leave us with little option, after all a lump of rock probably only ten miles across was enough to kill the dinosaurs and leave a crater in the Yucatan peninsula that can be seen from space. Enter the fraudsters! There have been people going door to door selling a product called Venus-Shield, which claims to be able protect households from the deadly impact of a one thousand mile long chunk of Venus travelling at a 500 miles per second. Although the purchase of this product may initially bring peace of mind, the fine print indicates that the actual protective device, to be activated when necessary, is a wooden stick seven feet long with which the hurtling chunk can be pushed away as it approaches. The experts tell me that the stick is neither long enough nor of sufficient quality for such a task.

The only way to avoid being duped by such charlatans is to keep well informed. The greatest source of information, and misinformation, we have is the internet. Not all information comes from reputablewebsite.com or with reassuring messages such as “As similar to seen on TV”. Fortunately here at the library we have created a “How-to” guide entitled “Internet resource evaluation” ,which can be found at http://www.library.uq.edu.au/ssah/useits/inteval.pdf , to help you. Enjoy your break. Marcos