I think the reason they used it is that it starts with "B" as does "Baidu" and thus it adds a bit of Dr. Seuss like whimsy to the headline. Boffin has a very p

I think the reason they used it is that it starts with "B" as does "Baidu" and thus it adds a bit of Dr. Seuss like whimsy to the headline. Boffin has a very positive connotation in British English. It's connotation is an eccentric, extremely smart, almost wizardly scientist. Think "Doc" in Back to the Future. "Boffin continued, in this immediate postwar period, to carry its wartime connotations: a modern-day wizard who labours in secret to create incomprehensible devices of great power."[1] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boffin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boffin