​And another hundred people just got off of the train? Try another two hundred thousand. An article printed in the Sunday New York Times -- which poses in its headline the daunting question: "How Many People Can Manhattan Hold?" -- explains that the Department of City Planning's Population Division expects that Manhattan will have 220,000 to 290,000 new residents by 2030. Currently Manhattan's population is at 1.6 million, not including the commuters who bring that number up to 3.9 million during the work day.

So, how do we accommodate for our new friends of the future?

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​After compiling our list of the most-read Village Voice stories of 2011, we got to thinking about what the new year will bring. While it's impossible to accurately foresee the coming news cycle, we've used complex algorithms and web-based analytics to predict ten stories that will rock the world this year.

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This is a real CNN report from three days ago. According to the psychics, who know more about Ben Bernanke's plans in the next three months than Ben Bernanke does, everything is going to be just fine.

[@_rosiegray]

Esther Zuckerman

​Today was I Want Media's vaguely titled panel "The Future of Media: 2011," part of the ongoing Internet Week. While most of the discussion was same old, same old (Times digital subscriptions, Gawker redesign, Daily Beast-Newsweek merger), there was a mostly energetic group of panelists, including the New York Times media columnist David Carr, always good for a one-liner, Gawker Editor Remy Stern, Observer Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth Spiers, Huffington Post Big News Editor Saul Hansell, Newsweek/Daily Beast Executive Editor Edward Felsenthal and Facebook Journalist Program Manager Vadim Lavrusik. Not that these panels ever pinpoint what the future of media will be, but they occasionally offer some small bits of wisdom -- serious and not. We have compiled those for you here. (If you are interested in watching the whole thing it should be posted here at some point.)

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​Facebook will be investigated by the European Union's sector on data protection, Bloomberg reports this afternoon, because of new facial recognition technology added to profiles that users have to opt out of through a typically convoluted security settings process. Yes, again. Facebook's latest SkyNet-ish addition recommends friends to tag in pictures based on how people look. "Tags of people on pictures should only happen based on people's prior consent and it can't be activated by default," said an EU representative. Regardless of where this probe goes, let's all turn this shit off right away.

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Esther Zuckerman

​During a question and answer session at Internet Week New York this morning, Senator Chuck Schumer quipped that he was of "the older generation." And even as Schumer looked forward in his keynote speech, which kicked off IWNY at its headquarters in the Metropolitan Pavilion, he made his age hard to forget.

With an AOL backdrop featuring drawings of donuts behind him, Schumer discussed his goal of boosting New York to the forefront of the nation's high tech centers, one day beating Silicon Valley. He announced the creation of a "working group" with the mayor, the governor and New York industry leaders with the aim of making that technology talking point a reality.

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​A new Google project called Business Photos, beginning next week, will allow Google Maps to see inside of buildings and provide a 360-degree view for curious customers. The Street View feature will take users inside the walls of potential dinner spots or date bars if an establishments lets a Google photographer in to document the interior, though there's no telling what kind of computer chips they might secretly plant or which invading alien nations they're providing intel for. If you're a proprietor with no worries about the future or privacy, apply for Business Photos here. Check out the utopian promo video after the jump

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​Livery cabs are often the great savior of the drunken Brooklynite struggling to trek their way home. Like Jay-Z said, New York has its "yellow cab, gypsy cab, dollar cab" (holler back), and there should be no reason not to try them all, right? The thing is, they're not legal to take. New York 1 reports that, "More than 1,100 summonses for illegal hails were issued by the TLC in March alone -- four times as many as were handed out in February." Is this the end of livery cabs as we know them or is there a solution on the horizon?

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New imaging technology has allowed us to see the sun's "angry face."

​For the first time, NASA has been able to image the entire sun from top to bottom, front to back. This is so that we can keep track of "coronal mass ejections" (eruptions of hot deadly sun-stuff) that could be aimed right at Earth. Resisting the urge to make a lot of butt jokes right now.

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via NY Daily News

​Today, Anne Hathaway and James Franco were named the hosts of this year's Academy Awards. The Daily News reports that Bruce Cohen and Don Mischer (the producers of the Oscars) said, "James Franco and Anne Hathaway personify the next generation of Hollywood icons -- fresh, exciting, and multi-talented." They also personify a combined age of 60. Here are 5 pairs that we'd choose over FrancAway.

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