# linkeyes
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Weekly Round-up 2018.51
There Is a Spider That Feeds Its Young Delicious Milk, Because Nature Is Scary
Scientists typically define mammals as animals that have hair, produce live young, and produce milk. It’s a simple definition, but nature is very good at defying simple definitions. Platypuses, for instance, lay eggs. And plenty of non-mammals produce milk for their young. One group of researchers from China have discovered that even spiders produce milk, and it’s so nutritious that their offspring eat it for a surprisingly long time.
The Privileged Two
Mr Tubridy is too privileged himself to get into the style of interviewing that is needed to really interrogate Fine Gael’s privatisation goals; as the taoiseach is too privileged to even see the problem of homelessness in the first place, except as a kind of abstract “problem”, out there somewhere.
Westford resident gives town the middle finger
If you find yourself doing a double-take while driving down Route 128 between Westford and Fairfax — yes, that is a seven-foot-tall sculpture of a raised middle finger, carved from a 700-pound block of pine and perched atop a 16-foot pole on the property of Ted Pelkey.
Ted Pelkey, I salute you.
Meet the Money Burners
Harris doesn’t know why people burn money. He makes a point not to ask. “One of the rules I set myself was to never ask or tell anyone to burn their money” For Harris, it’s less about why he does it and more a question of, “Why not?”
I don’t get this at all, but I find the topic fascinating.
How a long-forgotten virus could help us solve the antibiotics crisis
Viruses have a bad reputation – but some of them could one day save your life, says biotech entrepreneur Alexander Belcredi. In this fascinating talk, he introduces us to phages, naturally-occurring viruses that hunt and kill harmful bacteria with deadly precision, and shows how these once-forgotten organisms could provide new hope against the growing threat of antibiotic-resistant superbugs.
The darkest building on Earth
The building’s exterior is covered with a substance called Vantablack VBx2, a derivative of nanomaterial Vantablack. Touted as the darkest man-made substance in the world, the original Vantablack is so black the human eye can’t quite decipher what it is seeing.
It is said to be the closest thing to a black hole we will ever experience.
That’s because Vantablack is not a color, it’s the almost complete absence of color.
Nasa’s Juno probe films Jupiter’s storms
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Weekly Round-up 2018.42
John Herety on the ‘heartbreaking’ closure of JLT-Condor
“Hang on a minute, I’ve not died, no-one’s died, life’s gonna go on!” John Herety says, half-agreeing that seeing the news in print was like reading his own obituary and half laughing at the very concept. “It’s not as bad as you think. A well-established team that’s been around for a few years in your eyes has suddenly gone, but not in our eyes.”
Dr. Rachel McKinnon – transgender athlete
In a recent study by Stephané Bermon and Pierre Yves Garnier, they tested over 2,000 IAAF world championship track and field athletes and found that 1/6 of the male athletes were in or below the female range of testosterone, so a disproportionate amount of elite males have very low testosterone. This study showed there is absolutely no relationship between testosterone in terms of performance in males. The relationship they found in women was weak and sporadic.
When science doesn’t back your opinion up, of course the science is wrong.
Original Big Bird, Caroll Spinney, Leaves ‘Sesame Street’ After Nearly 50 Years
“I always thought, How fortunate for me that I got to play the two best Muppets?” he said. “Playing Big Bird is one of the most joyous things of my life.”
I haven’t seen Seasme St. in years but loved it when I was small. Oscar was my favourite of course.
Relax, Ladies. Don’t Be So Uptight. You Know You Want It.
Here’s a fun game. Ask yourself: What strongly held opinion of mine will my grandchildren one day struggle to understand?
China Plans to Launch an ‘Artificial Moon’ to Light Up the Night Skies
Scientists are hoping to hang the man-made moon above the city of Chengdu, the capital of China’s southwestern Sichuan province, according to a report in Chinese state media. The imitation celestial body — essentially an illuminated satellite — will bear a reflective coating to cast sunlight back to Earth, where it will supplement streetlights at night.
If this worked, they project savings of $173 million per year in electricity costs. There are soo many questions though. I’ll file this under “not going to happen”.
Britain fell for a neoliberal con trick – even the IMF says so
Privatisation and austerity have not only weakened the country’s financial position – they have also handed unearned wealth to a select few. Just look at a new report from the University of Greenwich finding that water companies could have funded all their day-to-day running and their long-term investments out of the bills paid by customers. Instead of which, managers have lumbered the firms with £51bn of debt to pay for shareholders’ dividends. Those borrowed billions, and the millions in interest, will be paid by you and me in our water bills. We might as well stuff the cash directly into the pockets of shareholders.
I can’t think of one example where privatisation of anything in Ireland has been good for it’s citizens.
They Shall Not Grow Old
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Weekly Round-up 2018.41
The Return of United Pixelworkers
We missed the community. We missed designing products for ourselves. We missed that killer Aaron Draplin-designed logo. UP is what put us on the proverbial map, and has been more responsible for our success than any other single thing we’ve ever done as a company since 2009. We knew we couldn’t allow it to stay dormant forever.
\o/
For each t-shirt, pin, notebook, or other item that you purchase, 10% of our gross revenue will go to an industry-related organization in need.
Double \o/
The Scullabogue Memorial
I took a diversion through Old Ross where I observed a signpost pointing towards the ‘Scullabogue Memorial’. This was, as far as I could see, the only signpost on any public road to an especially significant and poignant memorial. Yet, after two hours of driving around the rural hinterland of New Ross, my wife and I still could not find the memorial
This was my first time to hear about the Scullabogue Massacre and boy was it horrific.
during the 1798 rebellion when some insurgents massacred up to 200 noncombatant men, women and children, most of whom were Protestant, held prisoner in a barn which was then set alight.
A friend of mine then shared some links with me of Bagenal Harvey and Pitchcapping. I still know very little about the 1798 rebellion but these boosted my knowledge this past week.
Optical Illusion
Old Comics on Instagram
I’ve a small collection of old comics and magazines, and I’ll be sharing some panels and covers on oldcomics.
Restoring Old Paintings
Baumgartner Restoration is a second-generation art conservation studio in Chicago. Follow Julian as he completely restores a damaged painting.
Can’t Postpone I’m Pregnant
Sophie Power didn’t race UTMB, a 105-mile trail race around Mont Blanc, just three months after giving birth to her son Cormac because she wanted to make a point to the world. She raced UTMB because she wasn’t prepared to give up on a dream she’d been chasing for four years. “Yes, if I could have deferred that place I absolutely would have done so,” says Sophie. “I had my place in 2014 and I lost that because I was pregnant and I couldn’t defer it. I tried to get in to race CCC [a 63-mile race that is part of the UTMB running festival] in 2015, and then in 2016 and 2017 I tried for UTMB. I missed out two years in a row, which means you get your automatic place in 2018,” explains Sophie. “I knew that it would be a long time before I got another place.”
In 2018, it’s almost unbelievable that athletes can get race deferral for an injury but not pregnancy. Almost, but not quite, because it happens all the time.
UTMB is one of the most famous ultra-distance races in the world, and it should lead by example here and allow pregnant women to defer. Sophie Power you are amazing 👏
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Weekly Round-up 2018.40
Have Ferrari been bending the rules?
"Our battery layout, it’s quite complex, so we agreed with the request that we had from the FIA to work together with them and to facilitate their work, we add a second sensor.
But it doesn’t change in any case the performance of our car."
Despite their denials it sure looks that way, as the new FIA sensor might have forced their hand to turn-off rule bending software.
Robotic limbs for mobile devices.
"In real-life communication, we use touch to communicate emotions with others. However, current technology doesn’t use touch as an information channel. This project is just one approach for how we can receive a remote touch. Another aspect of this work is the relationship we are building with our mobile devices."
My first app – a phone that can flip me off :)
Car carrying combustible crowds crazed by Krispy Kreme.
" For some reason, introducing any stimulant like this one into Irish society is like introducing a packet of Mentos into a recently shaken up bottle of Diet Coke. We shake violently. We rupture. We convulse, as a people. It’s a mess."
I loved this article by Carl Kinsella on the car-park craziness in Blanch recently, all due to the fact that a 24 hour donut drive-thru opened.
Teeny tiny Chinese chips used to hack U.S. companies.
"Nested on the servers’ motherboards, the testers found a tiny microchip, not much bigger than a grain of rice, that wasn’t part of the boards’ original design. … investigators determined that the chips allowed the attackers to create a stealth doorway into any network that included the altered machines"
Industrial espionage stories although in many cases terrifying, are also pretty cool to read about.
Moths observed drinking the tears of sleeping birds
"moths gently insert their straw-like proboscis into the eyes of their unwary hosts, sucking out the nutrient-laden tears. Scientists have watched moths drink the tears from various mammals, and even reptiles like turtles and crocodiles. But on birds, not so much."
Nature continually reminds me how awesome it is.
Movie Magic