Monday Links from the Gap Between Teams Meetings vol. DCCXCIII

[NickFitz]

I just had a quick look at the news, and quite honestly you'll feel better ignoring it all and reading this lot instead

• Madness, Melancholy, or Murder: An Ancient English Farm’s 50-Year-Old Mystery - ”Andrew Chamings returns to his childhood farmland to investigate the mystifying deaths of the Luxton siblings. What really happened down that dark country lane?” Dark doings in Devon
• Plastic waste in bird nests can act like a tiny time capsule - ”Expiration dates help biologists trace the building of some avian homes back in history—in one case to 1991.” More details in the paper Birds documenting the Anthropocene: Stratigraphy of plastic in urban bird nests
• What’s the deal with the gut-brain connection? - Your digestive system affects you more than you realise: ”It affects your mood, your sleep, even your motivation to exercise. There's convincing evidence that it's the starting point for Parkinson's disease and could be responsible for long COVID's cognitive effects. And it sits about 2 feet below your brain.”
• Neither Elon Musk Nor Anybody Else Will Ever Colonize Mars - Albert Burneko explains why neither we nor anyone who comes after us will be making a home on the red planet: ”Mars does not have a magnetosphere. Any discussion of humans ever settling the red planet can stop right there, but of course it never does.”
• An Airbag Charge To Launch A Projectile - HT to DoctorStrangelove for this project you probably shouldn't undertake: ”It’s not particularly easy to buy small explosive charges. At least, it’s not in the UK, from where [Turbo Conquering Mega Eagle] hails. But it is surprisingly easy to get your hands on one because most people drive around with one right in front of them in the form of their car airbag. In a burst of either genius or madness, we can’t decide which, he decided to use an airbag charge to launch a projectile.”
• Monumental Sandstone Reliefs from the Neolithic: New Insights from the Camel Site in Saudi Arabia - Remarkable stone age sculptures: ”Today the austere deserts of Saudi Arabia evoke images of wandering nomads. But in late prehistory Saudi Arabia was surprisingly green and hospitable, the product of a humid period that lasted for at least four thousand years. One familiar figure, however, that unites the two scenes are camels.”
• License to Shill: Inside Amazon’s 007 Takeover - ”It’s the Bond movies’ most shocking plot twist in decades. But will the tech giant’s surprise buyout of the franchise prove deadly? Or could it breathe new life into cinema’s most famous spy?” The real story in here is that Barbara Broccoli said Amazon's ideas were stupid (because they were), and Jeff Bezos was so infuriated at his lackeys being criticised by a woman that he spent a billion dollars to get rid of her
• Elliott 803B - The case of the blown fuse and the diode - HT to DoctorStrangelove again for this tale from the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park: ”On the afternoon of the 18 May 2019, our Elliott 803 suffered a major power supply failure which resulted in the machine turning itself off with a bit of a ‘pop’. The source of the ‘pop’ was unclear, but luckily Peter Onion was on hand at the time and began his investigation.”
• Op amp on the Moon: Reverse-engineering a hybrid op amp module - And yet another HT to DoctorStrangelove for finding this interesting post in Ken Shirriff’s archive: ”I recently obtained a mysterious electronic component in a metal can, flatter and slightly larger than a typical integrated circuit. After opening it up and reverse engineering the circuit, I determined that this was an op amp built for NASA in the 1960s using hybrid technology. It turns out that the development of this component ties connected several important people in the history of semiconductors, and one of these op amps is on the Moon.”
• Matte Shot - a tribute to Golden Era special fx - A great blog for movie buffs: ”This blog is intended primarily as a tribute to the inventiveness and ingenuity of the craft of the matte painter during Hollywoods' Golden Era. Some of the shots will amaze in their grandeur and epic quality while others will surprise in their 'invisibility' to even the sophisticated viewer. I hope this collection will serve as an appreciation of the artform and both casual visitors and those with a specialist interest may benefit, enjoy and be amazed at skills largely unknown today.” This photo shows what happens when mattes and miniatures meet the slate
  
  

Happy invoicing!

[Zigenare]

Peter Onion of the "How to kill a raspberry Pi with a camera" fame... Small world...

[DoctorStrangelove]

I think I read the book about the Luxtons, "Earth to Earth" by John Cornwell*, many years ago. It certainly seems familiar.

I wonder if the Reichsleiter has read that thing about Mars. . Probly too busy reading H2G2 & launching tulip into orbit. He's really popular in the comments.

Which led to my recalling this:

https://philipkdickreview.wordpress....ssible-planet/

You can rely on PKD. .

* Certainly did because I've just found the book in a box moved due to "The Great Spider Hunt move everything & clean under it" which is currently ongoing and has reached the hall.

Oh look: there's a new edition available:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Earth-Viole...1&gad_source=1

[Uncle Albert]

Thanks Nick. Very good links this week. Oh, and that Auke-Florian Hiemstra chap should look on top of his head as I'm pretty sure there's a coot nesting in there.

[northernladuk]

[*]License to Shill: Inside Amazon’s 007 Takeover - ”It’s the Bond movies’ most shocking plot twist in decades. But will the tech giant’s surprise buyout of the franchise prove deadly? Or could it breathe new life into cinema’s most famous spy?” The real story in here is that Barbara Broccoli said Amazon's ideas were stupid (because they were), and Jeff Bezos was so infuriated at his lackeys being criticised by a woman that he spent a billion dollars to get rid of her

This one makes made me glum. Particularly because I read it in a new article talking about what the gender of James Bond might be as well as a couple of American actors that might make the cut thrown in with the UK ones. Thankfully common sense seems to have been restored with the most popular possibilities all being English and male. For me it's got to be Idris but they are cutting it a bit fine. He's getting on a bit. Cavill is a no for me, not sure why, just being superman, the witcher, maybe he's too clean cut in the face, dunno but no. Cillian Murphy looks too peaky blinders than JB but I think he'd be OK... They also mentioned Arran Taylor-Johnson but anyone thinks that it's acceptable to grow a beard and not shave their neck should never go near the JB part..but we will see.

Then there is the bit in the article about them bleeding the franchise dry with spin off's and prequels. Not looking forward to that but again, I'll try keep an open mind and watch them.

[NickFitz]

Thanks Nick. Very good links this week. Oh, and that Auke-Florian Hiemstra chap should look on top of his head as I'm pretty sure there's a coot nesting in there.

Good news! There's an additional photo gallery page I hadn't seen earlier, or which might not have been up then: https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wi...002/bes2.70008 which includes a photo of him with a couple of coots!