Oct. 20, 2024, 4:45 p.m.
NESTED! Blood rain, mosquito lasers, barbed wire phone, Navajo Pentium
Nested!
Hi girlies! Hope you’re thriving in this weird weather. Here’s some things I’ve read in the last couple of months.
Wikipedia is the best website
A list of individual rocks to fall asleep to.
“It’s raining cats and dogs” isn’t just a saying: there have been dozens of recorded instances of rains of animals. Mostly fish, frogs and spiders caught in tornadoes. You’re welcome for the nightmare fuel.
“See also: blood rain.” (probably caused by a red algae)
About 0.01% of people have situs inversus, a condition where all internal organs are mirrored from their normal position (for example, their heart is on the right, and appendix on the left). It generally does not cause medical problems, and most people with it are not even aware of their unusual anatomy.
A mosquito laser — “humorously referred to by some as a WMD (Weapon of Mosquito Destruction)” — is a proposed device to reduce the spread of malaria in developing countries, detecting mosquitoes by their size and the speed of their wind flap.
Poto and Cabengo are two identical twin sisters who fully developed a invented language as children, spoken by only the two of them, due to a lack of exposure to other languages. It’s an extreme example of cryptophasia, which happens with many twins.
Pheasant Island is a small uninhabited river island whose administration alternates between France and Spain every six months.
Over a longer period: Russian leaders have consistently alternated between being bald and hairy since 1825.
One 1994 Caribbean Cup round between Barbados and Grenada was notable because both teams attempted to score own goals in the last few minutes of the match, aiming to take the game into extra time. The strategy was successful for Barbados, who advanced to the finals, and FIFA decided this wasn’t against the rules of the tournament (but modified the rules afterwards).
This strategy was not successful for a Malagasy team who scored 149-0 with own goals in protest of a refereeing decision, eventually leading to the… dissolution of the whole Madagascar football federation? At least they got a Guinness world record.
It’s decorative gourd season, motherfuckers
Mildly interesting
A fascinating breakdown of OnlyFans’ economics, which could be called “one of the most significant media platforms since TikTok”.
And re-sharing this great thread debunking myths about sex work online.
Earth will have a temporary 'mini moon' for two months (an asteroid about the size of a school bus that has fallen into the Earth’s orbit). This is apparently not uncommon!
A brief but fascinating history of ad-hoc telephone networks made with barbed fence wires in the countryside!
I didn’t know that, but the UK is a rare termite-free country since 2021 after a 27-year long scare in Devon.
Public health studies show that it might be time to retire the pint as a default measure for beer in the UK and serve two-thirds.
Everything is depressing
Trees and land absorbed almost no CO2 last year: “the sudden collapse of carbon sinks was not factored into climate models, and could rapidly accelerate global heating”. Fantastic.
Google Images is serving AI-generated images of mushrooms that don’t look like the mushrooms they should be, which may have fatal consequences for foragers.
A research paper demonstrated that LLMs will always hallucinate (as a fundamental mathematical property of how they work), which is something that “we need to live with” apparently.
Branding is inescapable everywhere, but a logo on a prosthetic limb ”is like a tattoo you didn’t ask for.”
Why exactly are friendship breakups so brutal.
Good to look at
There’s growing progress in making birth control medicine for men. Even if they work, one key aspect will remain the human factor: "How can I go from living in a world where I have taken on responsibility? I know that I'm compliant. The risk is all with me. Now, do I really trust my [partner]?”
Loved this article about this Navajo weaving that reproduces an original Intel Pentium chip — and about into the rich link between Fairchild manufacturing and Navajo communities in the 60s and 70s.
Some psychologists are trying to use Dungeons & Dragons as a tool for group therapy (and it seems successful!)
A group of people in Istanbul commute by swimming in the Bosphorus Strait every morning.
ICYMI: previously unknown Mozart music discovered in a German library. RIP to all the YouTube comments that said “Mozart has been real quiet since this dropped”.
Work! Design! Tech!
Some very excellent advice for design portfolios. I’m currently going through a ton of them as we’re hiring, and I wish this kind of guidance felt like common sense to more designers. If I have to read another case study that explains the double diamond process to me again…
From the same blog, also loved this theory of two lanes to prioritise your own work between “speed and efficiency” and “quality and robustness”.
Very sensible guidelines for Command Line Interfaces if you’re building a new CLI tool.
Great advice for managers of all kinds: be a thermostat, not a thermometer. Notice the mood of those around you, but don’t reproduce it if that’s not what you want to achieve.
Fun play thing: Infinite Mac lets you play with classic Macs and software in your browser.
Add chaos,
Victor