Google was kaput

The reason why google was broken this afternoon: Some more background info here

Railgun on track for 2012 deployment trials on US warships

Yes, it's not science fiction anymore. Railguns are being succefully tested. Recent tests have shot a 3,2kg projectile at mach 7, with an acceleration of 20.000g. A railgun is a purely electrical gun that magnetically accelerates a conductive projectile along a pair of metal rails (wiki).

Another more energetic test video. Railguns have a few advantages. The impact of the round relies purely on kinetic energy, so there is no explosion and thus less collateral damage. The ship doesn't have to carry explosives anymore, so there no danger of the ammunition room blowing up during combat. The railgun under development also has a planned range of 200 miles compared to 13 miles for the typical navy artillery. Read more... ESA has also studied the use of railguns to launch cargo into space.

The Energy Scale

Zombies again

I Want the New Lumix DMC-TZ7

Information on this camera has only just been released and it will be on sale in April. A few highlights: - 12x optical zoom - 12 megapixel CCD - Wide-angle LEICA lens, 4:3, 3:2, 16:9 - HD-ready video recording at 1280x720 with stereo sound - 3" LCD Price is not yet known. Full specs...

Ricky Gervais - Bad Excuse

99% Nuclear Waste Destruction

U of T at Austin scientists propose destroying nuclear waste from other nuclear fission reactors using a fusion-fission hybrid reactor, the centerpiece of which is a high power Compact Fusion Neutron Source (CFNS) made possible by a crucial invention, the Super X Divertor. The CFNS would provide abundant neutrons through fusion to a surrounding fission blanket that uses transuranic waste as nuclear fuel. The fusion-produced neutrons augment the fission reaction, imparting efficiency and stability to the waste incineration process. One hybrid would be needed to destroy the waste produced by 10 to 15 LWRs (light water reactors). So Seven or eleven hybrids would be needed to match up with the existing 104 nuclear reactors in the United States. Thirty to forty-five would be needed to match up with the worlds existing nuclear fission reactors. The process would ultimately reduce the transuranic waste from the original fission reactors by up to 99 percent. More...

Via Next Big Future, a very interesting blog following technological development. If this works there is one less reason for those environMentalists to whine about nuclear energy.

SGP hypocrisie

"In Groot-Brittannië rijden al honderden bussen rond met atheïstische slogans, maar of het in Nederland ook zo ver zal komen, is nog maar de vraag. De SGP heeft gewaarschuwd bezwaar aan te zullen tekenen, want openbaar vervoer moet wat de partij betreft 'echt openbaar' blijven." bron: NOS GODVERDOMME wat een hypocriete christen honden. De treinstations hangen al jaren vol met christenspam. Ik heb Bassie van der Vlies om opheldering gevraagd :)

The Lorenz Attractor

2D mathematical systems (imagine the motion of a point in a flat plane) always move to a fixed point, a periodic/repeating orbit or to infinity. The motion thus stops, repeats itself or always keeps moving in the same direction. That seems logic to most and is stated (and proven) in the Poincare-Bendixson theorem. The funny thing is that this does not hold for 3D (imagine the motion of a point in 3D space) or higher dimensional systems. Not all motion in 3D moves to a fixed point, periodic motion or infinity. The 4th option is a chaotic motion. This motion is deterministic, stays in a bounded region, but does not follow a pattern. In 1963 Lorenz (not the more famous Dutch Lorentz), a meteorologist published a paper about convection in the atmosphere. He used the following model, This model created the following images when the "motion" is visualized in a 3D phase-space diagram, And the following graph when variable x is plotted versus time,

The Irony! The Irony!

More Moscow Murder

"ANOTHER RUSSIAN fighting for human rights and the rule of law has been murdered in Vladimir Putin's Moscow. Stanislav Markelov, a lawyer who defended Chechens brutalized by Russian troops and journalists who wrote about the abuses, was shot in the head yesterday by a masked man carrying a silencer-equipped pistol. An opposition journalist who tried to intervene, Anastasia Baburova, was also fatally shot in the head. This occurred in broad daylight, on a busy street in central Moscow less than half a mile from the Kremlin. [...] The larger story here is of serial murders of Mr. Putin's opponents, at home and abroad. Ms. Baburova, 25, is at least the 15th journalist to be slain since Mr. Putin took power. No one has been held accountable in any of the cases."

Space Shuttle Cockpit

cybr edit: seems to be a composite mock up image. Proof 1 & 2

Condom clames life

see more pwn and owned pictures Didn't we try this? And failed miserably?

1,474 Megapixel Panorama of Obama's Inauguration

Here is the link to the viewer. You can actually find sniper teams on some of the roofs. Also look for evil Cheney in his wheelchair behind Obama.

80L of Mercaptan = Very Smelly

A spill of 80L of methanethiol, the odorant often used to provide a warning smell for natural gas caused a whole province in the Netherlands to complain of gas leaks and stink. People can smell this compound at a level of 0.002 ppm. Strangely the Netherlands doesn't use this compound to provide odor to natural gas. We use tetrahydrothiophene, which is less toxic and not corrosive to the pipelines.

ROTTERDAM - Een bedrijfsongeval in de Botlek, waarbij een grote wolk mercaptaan vrijkwam, heeft vrijdag in een groot deel van Zuid-Holland voor consternatie gezorgd. De geurstof mercaptaan wordt in kleine concentraties standaard toegevoegd aan aardgas, zodat het reukloze en explosieve aardgas in geval van een lekkage snel kan worden gedetecteerd. Bij de meldkamers van brandweer en politie en bij de beheerders van het gasnet regende het vrijdag telefoontjes van verontruste burgers die meenden dat ze een gaslek op het spoor waren. De meldingen over een penetrante gaslucht kwamen onder meer uit Den Haag, Rotterdam, Rozenburg, Maassluis, Naaldwijk, Vlaardingen, Schiedam, Bleiswijk en Spijkenisse. In Vlaardingen werd voor de zekerheid een school ontruimd. Meer...

Vodka tax cut to ease Russian pain

"Amid a financial crisis that is cutting jobs and eroding growth, there is finally good news for Russians. The head of the new state alcohol agency - gleefully dubbed the "ministry for vodka" by the press - was advocating cutting taxes on the national tipple to make it more accessible, the Izvestia daily reported."

Subwoofer Kitty

Good video to test your subwoofer with.

Man Babies

That's some freaky photoshopping. More here...

The Slingshot Man

Rufus Hussey

H2O = cool

I'm back from snow fun in the French Alps. Here are some panoramas I stitched, all made on different days, click for high-res:

The Mont Blanc Massive (4810 m) on the far right of the last image.

8 Years of Bush Fail

Almost time for a new president. Time to look back.

Most Offensive Page on the Internet?

I was linked to an entry on Encyclopedia Dramatica when somebody talked about being offended in a forum. *WARNING* this is very offensive, and extremely disgusting and shocking *WARNING* really, you DON'T want to see this Here it is, the entry on Offended.

Methane Found on Mars

It could be life!

"Methane is quickly destroyed in the Martian atmosphere in a variety of ways, so our discovery of substantial plumes of methane in the northern hemisphere of Mars in 2003 indicates some ongoing process is releasing the gas," said Dr. Michael Mumma of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "At northern mid-summer, methane is released at a rate comparable to that of the massive hydrocarbon seep at Coal Oil Point in Santa Barbara, Calif." Methane -- four atoms of hydrogen bound to a carbon atom -- is the main component of natural gas on Earth. It's of interest to astrobiologists because organisms release much of Earth's methane as they digest nutrients. However, other purely geological processes, like oxidation of iron, also release methane. "Right now, we don’t have enough information to tell if biology or geology -- or both -- is producing the methane on Mars," said Mumma. "But it does tell us that the planet is still alive, at least in a geologic sense. It's as if Mars is challenging us, saying, hey, find out what this means." Mumma is lead author of a paper on this research appearing in Science Express Jan. 15. If microscopic Martian life is producing the methane, it likely resides far below the surface, where it's still warm enough for liquid water to exist. Liquid water, as well as energy sources and a supply of carbon, are necessary for all known forms of life. Full Story...

Hide&Seek: Artic style!

Naga Jolokia Pepper

The Naga Jolokia Pepper (also known as Bhut Jolokia, Ghost Chili, Ghost Pepper, Naga Morich) is the hottest pepper in the world. Maybe something Douche would like to try.

At first he only eats a little bit:

This is where it ranks on the Scoville scale.

The Internet as Predicted in 1968

The Most Viewed YouTube Video :(

embedding disabled, so here's a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQ25-glGRzI 112,607,207 views at the moment, what a sad world we live in.

Cadillac One a.k.a. The Beast

Obama's new ride: To illustrate the armor used in these cars a pic of the last one, Mr. Bush's ride:

Freak Wave

I thought this was quite an interesting documentary.

The world's oceans claim on average one ship a week, often in mysterious circumstances. With little evidence to go on, investigators usually point at human error or poor maintenance but an alarming series of disappearances and near-sinkings, including world-class vessels with unblemished track records, has prompted the search for a more sinister cause and renewed belief in a maritime myth: the wall of water. Waves the height of an office block. Waves twice as large as any that ships are designed to ride over.

Or you can download the torrent.

Paper vs Paper Fight

Church Wars

Atheist buses denying God's existence take to streets

Organisers originally hoped to put the message on just a handful of London buses, as an antidote to posters put up by religious groups which they claimed were "threatening eternal damnation" to non-believers. But after the campaign received high-profile support from the prominent atheist Prof Richard Dawkins and the British Humanist Association, the modest £5,500 target was met within minutes and more than £140,000 has now been donated since the launch in October. Enough money has now been raised to place the message – "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life" – on 200 bendy buses in the capital for a month, with the first ones taking to the streets . A further 600 buses carrying the adverts will be seen by passengers and passers-by in cities across England, Wales and Scotland, from Aberdeen and Dundee to York, Coventry, Swansea and Bristol. In addition, two large LCD screens bearing the atheist message have been placed in Oxford Street, central London, while 1,000 posters containing quotes from well-known non-believers will be placed on Underground trains for two weeks starting on Monday. Full Article.... As expected: 'No God' campaign draws complaint An atheist campaign claiming "There's probably no God" has been reported to the advertising regulator.

World War II The Lost Color Archives

In relation to pimp's post I went looking and found this really nice WWII color video documentary. There's not much footage of battle and explosion, but it does show a lot that went on outside of the fighting. The narration is good and the diary and letter excerpts are also well chosen. The scenes are authentic. The color is real.

http://shop.history.com/detail.php?p=68182 See World War II as the soldiers saw it--in color--in this extraordinary DVD set narrated by John Thaw (Inspector Morse). * Extraordinary footage which was unseen for decades after the war. * See World War II as never before--in color. * DVD Features: 15 Minutes of Bonus Footage; Static Menu, Scene Selection. World War II has been the subject of countless books and documentaries, but none has ever shown the epic conflict like this. Drawing exclusively from color footage obtained from sources throughout the world, this epic DVD set shows the conflict the way the soldiers saw it. Adding to the immediacy of this important collection is a treasury of personal memories culled from letters and diaries, expressing the fears doubts, thrills, and anguish of those who lived and died in the epic conflict. The result is an intimate account of the experience of war, rather than a tired battlefield history.

IMDb link Torrent link

Photos of Nazi Germany, Part 2

As promised, here is the rest of the photos of nazi Germany

Apple Introduces New MacBook Without Keyboard

Bob and Steve

Douche's recent WoW machinima post reminded me of this. Here is a playlist of all Special Agent Bob and Secret Agent Steve episodes made with the game Splinter Cell.

Solar-powered sea slug harnesses stolen plant genes

"Elysia chlorotica is a lurid green sea slug, with a gelatinous leaf-shaped body, that lives along the Atlantic seaboard of the US. What sets it apart from most other sea slugs is its ability to run on solar power. [...] Young E. chlorotica fed with algae for two weeks, could survive for the rest of their year-long lives without eating, Rumpho found in earlier work. [...] In their latest experiments, Rumpho and colleagues sequenced the chloroplast genes of Vaucheria litorea, the alga that is the sea slug's favourite snack. They confirmed that if the sea slug used the algal chloroplasts alone, it would not have all the genes needed to photosynthesise. They then turned their attention to the sea slug's own DNA and found one of the vital algal genes was present. Its sequence was identical to the algal version, indicating that the slug had probably stolen the gene from its food."

Photos of Nazi Germany

A site with a lot of photos of Nazi-Germany can be found here. I'll post part 2 a little later.

Biggest black hole in the cosmos discovered

"The most massive known black hole in the universe has been discovered, weighing in with the mass of 18 billion Suns. Observing the orbit of a smaller black hole around this monster has allowed astronomers to test Einstein's theory of general relativity with stronger gravitational fields than ever before.

The black hole is about six times as massive as the previous record holder and in fact weighs as much as a small galaxy. It lurks 3.5 billion light years away, and forms the heart of a quasar called OJ287. A quasar is an extremely bright object in which matter spiralling into a giant black hole emits copious amounts of radiation."

Nationale Wetenschapsquiz 2008 - Antwoorden

Ze hebben nog 4 fouten weten te vinden in mijn foutloze inzending, 2 te veel voor de reis naar Domburg. Ik had vraag 8, 9, 11 en 12 fout. Bij vraag 8 ben ik niet overtuigd van hun antwoord; je zou geen interferentietoon horen. Verder vergt strijken meer inspanning dan lopen, hebben alle weegschalen te lage pootjes en kan je 7 m zuigen in plaats van 3 m.

brilliant WoW fight animation

The Craft of War: BLIND from percula on Vimeo. Seriously the best WoW fight animation I've ever seen. I wonder how he made it.