So it looks like Humboldt squid don't kill divers after all. At least, they haven't done so yet.

Now that the latest battle in the invertebrate wars seems to have died down a bit (victors inconclusive, of course), I can post a list of cool things about cephalopods that have put them in the news lately, without it necessarily having to serve as ammunition. (<---WOW, that was the most awkward sentence ever, but guess who DOES NOT CARE, because she has been locked in a basement for a week writing her dissertation! HI!)

1. They used to rule the world. As I'm sure Dr. Fuchs discussed in his lecture:

So, I was going to blog about the new baby giant octopus (complete with webcam!) at the Smithsonian. But, it's not really a squid.

Then I was going to talk about sperm whales collectively hunting squid, and point out that the BBC made a geographic error. (The study was conducted in the Gulf of California, on the Pacific side, not in the Gulf of Mexico, which is on the Atlantic side.) But that's really about mammals, which is just not what I do here.

What to look for in the next decade, as far as squid are concerned? Certainly new species will be discovered and described. Fisheries will probably spring up for species that have never been fished before. These will boom, and probably bust.

But the real question on everyone's mind: will we have a giant squid in an aquarium by 2020?

I don't know about you but, personally, I can't get enough of giant squids: great Routemaster-sized carnivores with bone-snapping beaks, eyes the size of dinner plates and churning tentacles.