Launching a Christmas tree
Make has a video where a guy decided to load up his Christmas tree with a bunch of rocket motors, instead of just throwing it out. I’m voting awesome.
Evolution of the Earth in 60 Seconds
This a neat little representation of the evolution of the earth done in sixty seconds. It’s takes a little bit at first to get an idea of what’s going on but once you realize that there is a counter in the lower left, and the voice is speaking the events happening at that time, it makes a lot more sense.
Kepler’s off to a good start
Seems that the mission has already found 5 new exoplanets. That’s a pretty good start. I’m sure that there is going to be any number more in the coming months.
Critical Thinking
Phil Plait again has found some good content from around the Internet. This time it’s a video from a YouTube user whom apparently does a good number of pieces on critical thinking. I think that I’m becoming a large fan of injecting science and education into popular culture.
QualiaSoup video: Critical Thinking | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine
How (analog) traffic lights work
Make has a neat video they’ve found about how traffic lights work. Mostly analog, but talking about the solid state version toward the end.
GSM cracked
Turns out those cell phone calls of yours aren’t so private anymore. Honestly, I know that this is quite the technical feat, but I’m surprised that it’s taken this long. Just goes to show you the level of difficulty involved in dissecting this kind of information.
Secret code protecting cellphone calls set loose %u2022 The Register
I’ve just learned….
Madame Curies lab notebooks are classified as intermediate nuclear waste.
A first for open source
Firefox declared as the leading and most prominent browser in the market. This is a major step for the open source browser and it’s never ending war with it’s closest competitor IE.
Interesting listening devices
Here are some images of various listening modification devices used during earlier wars. They were used to listen for incoming planes. Pretty ingenious.
For the world to be interesting, you have to be manipulating it all… – but does it float
The Known Universe
Wow! There seem to be a good number of these kinds of videos popping up lately. This one is a breathtaking view of the known universe to scale. It’s constructed by the Hayden Planetarium. Absolutely amazingly done.
I’d love to see one of these with human understanding of the universe over time.