Google changes how it deals with redirects

The obvious place to start this week would have been how bullish I am on Facebook’s chances in search; but since Rebecca Stewart beat me to it – and most of what I want to add is conjecture – let’s go with something more immediate:
Google seemingly has completely changed how it deals with redirects.
30x redirects supposedly pass PageRank
Backing up a previous claim by frequently unreliable webmaster trends analyst John Mueller, generally reliable trends analyst Gary Illye