It's Official: Barefoot IS Best
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is now official, barefoot is best. Well almost... if we do a bit of liberal interpretation 
. To quote Vivobarefoot's article (I've changed the link to point directly to the paper)...
Health Check on BBC World Service Investigates Barefoot Running
Monday night's episode of Health Check (listen here) on the BBC World Service covers the topic of barefoot running with the reporter taking a quick spin barefoot round a track (and surprises herself) and then follows up with an interview with Daniel Lieberman in which he briefly covers what he discusses in his recent paper. What is quite impressive is just how much coverage barefoot running gets in one programme: over 11 minutes of a 28 minute programme. Impressive.
My Thoughts on The Lieberman Paper
I've finally managed to get my hands on The Lieberman "letter": Foot strike patterns and collision forces in habitually barefoot versus shod runners reported in January's edition of Nature and I've read through it, the accompanying Harvard site and a lot of the reviews other people have made, and here are my observations.
First and foremost, I believe this paper has been over-hyped and misinterpreted (possibly deliberately as it makes "good news") in a big way. I think the main reason for this is it's the first major research paper in years that actually involves comparisons between barefoot and shod runners. There have been other recent studies that have documented the merits of different foot strikes (fore/mid/heel), but none have made the comparison between barefoot and shod runners. There's also the added attention barefoot running is currently enjoying thanks to Christopher McDougall's book: Born to Run (my review).
I've Not Missed the Lieberman Paper
Just a quick note to say, no, I've not been sleeping under a rock (sleep, what's that?). Yes, I've heard about the Lieberman Paper and seen/heard the BBC news article