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And cue conspiracy theories from The Guardian in 3.....2......1........conspiracy theory!

Somewhat, perhaps, although I don't know if most people will actually use or recognize the terms big data or data analytics.  Nate Silver's Five Thirty Eight blog at the NYT, which you referenced, accounted for something like 20% of the NYT's site traffic on the day before the election, so people are clearly interested in the results.

By default, you should be able to see that.  It sounds like it got turned off somehow.  Go into VIEW>VISUAL AIDS>INVISIBLE ELEMENTS.  When you turn on invisible elements in that menu, you should be able to see the boxes again.  

 

The recent market share of the various browsers indicates that your concerns are shared by many users.  Firefox's share of the browser market has been slipping while Chrome, whose rapid update model Mozilla tried to replicate, has been increasing.

There are quite a few good headphones out there, although not at $10 as you have realized.  My favorite in-ear style are Klipsch Image S5i ear buds.  I use them every day, and I think I spent about $125 on them.  Once you get to the $100 price point you can start to find much better products.