New Scientist (via slashdot) is carrying this story about a new development in black hole research. It seems that Stephen Hawking has (or at least is thought to have) finally worked out a way around the quantum information paradox that his own earlier research about evaporating black holes revealed. Ironically, this will cause him to lose a bet he made with another physicist in the mid 90s, which will apparently cost him an encyclopedia.

Look, it's taken me twenty years of reading popular scientific books to even begin to understand what these guys are talking about. I ain't gonna summarize it all here.