Bldck @ Bldck @beehaw.org

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Stalwart Stolid Solid

I mean… not really.

🛰️ Space Race Fatalities Comparison: Soviet Union vs United States

Key Takeaways

• 🇺🇸 U.S. suffered more astronaut fatalities, including test pilots and training accidents.
• 🇷🇺 Soviets had higher total human losses, especially among engineers and soldiers during explosive launch and fuel testing incidents.
• 🔥 The Apollo 1 fire led to sweeping design and safety reforms in NASA.
• 🚨 The Soyuz 1 and Soyuz 11 tragedies were fatal in-flight accidents; Soyuz 11 remains the only in-space human fatality.
• 🕵️ The Nedelin disaster, one of the worst rocket catastrophes in history, killed over 100 but was kept secret for decades.
• 🧾 Transparency and institutional accountability were key differences: NASA publicly investigated accidents; the USSR often concealed failures.

Spreadsheet? Why does it have to be an app?

I just started a spreadsheet for tracking coffee beans

• Operation Condor: right wing dictators in South America repressing leftists with the support of Americans and possibly the French
• Gladio: Post WWII Allied Forces and then NATO intelligence operations to delegitimize and destabilize leftist groups in Eastern Europe from end of WWII through the 1990s
• Ranch Hand: US led effort to destroy the foliage and agricultural land in Vietnam to deprive the Viet Cong of food and places to stage attacks
• PBSuccess: CIA led coup d’état in Guatemala at the request of the United Fruit Company (now Chiquita)
• Phoenix Program: CIA led effort to infiltrate the Viet Cong

Just posted this in a thread about watching the show Andor. Additional context, I’d watch the movies first before you decide to get into any of the shows

——-

I highly recommend Rogue One as well. It follows Cassian Andor as a spy for the rebellion immediately after the second (and final) season of the show.

Rogue One is a story set immediately before the first movie: Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. Immediately as in the final scene of Rogue One is the first scene of A New Hope.

Similar to the other commenter, the problem is that Rogue One is by far the best movie of the entire franchise, so you start at the high point.

If you like the movie and want more Star Wars, I recommend this order. I’ll list the title and the “episode” number

1. Rogue One (3.9)
2. A New Hope (4)
3. The Empire Strikes Back (5)
4. The Phantom Menace (1)
5. Attack of the Clones (2)
6. Revenge of the Sith (3)
7. Return of the Jedi (6)

There are three more movies after #6, but there’s almost no point in watching them.

It’s really important to remember that a lot of the Star Wars movies aren’t good but they’re cultural institutions and you kinda have to accept them as they are. The writer/director of the original trilogy spent a lot of time tweaking and editing them after their original releases including adding new scenes digitally created decades after the release.

Coming from the software development side, I interpret this statement a little differently.

I used to work with a team:

• 1 engineering manager whose sole focus was management, developing talent and problem solving around the organization
• 1 very senior engineer who could do the work of 10 ordinary engineers
• 2-3 mid level engineers who could work somewhat independently, as long as they were provided guidance to start
• 1-2 junior engineers who could only handle the most basic tasks and needed hand holding through most projects

Rather than working full tilt, the senior engineer did a lot of work pair programming and helping the juniors develop into better engineers. He accomplished half of what he could, but the team was better for it.

Fifteen years later, no one hired juniors anymore. We hire 1-2 seniors, 2 mid levels and that’s it. Everyone is expected to focus on developing software. No one cares about training or education.

The problem with this is we aren’t backfilling the ranks. If we don’t train juniors, they never become mid levels. Without mid levels, we won’t identify the best to become seniors.

In a world where game development happens on the fringes (indie studios or solo developers), who’s going to hire a junior that can’t contribute meaningfully to the project?

Small building HOAs like this are for managing joint property like the roof, common stairs and yard work. They also hold insurance and pay common utilities.

It’s not the same as a subdivision HOA that tells you what color your house can be and how short the grass must be

https://archive.is/2025.05.10-080733/https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2025/may/10/are-we-heading-for-another-world-war-or-has-it-already-started

The name Mar-a-Lago means "sea to lake" in Spanish, reflecting the fact that the estate extends from one end of Palm Beach Island to the other, touching the Atlantic Ocean on the east and the Lake Worth Lagoon on the west

FreshRSS

One time I was at a specialty beer and cheese shop and I saw this guy pushing a cart alone with two children. He generally looked beaten down and glum. The kids are rambunctious, he’s exhausted, wife is missing but obviously in the store with them.

He is browsing the cases, killing time waiting for his wife to come back. He grabs a small block of cheese, looks interested it and adds it to the cart.

A few minutes later, the wife returns and immediately spots the cheese block. She picks it up and screams “$10? For a block of cheese you haven’t even TRIED yet? Absolutely not.”

Then she hurled it back in the case and stomped off while he sullenly followed her with the cart and kids

Shakshuka with some pita is one of my comfort foods. I use David Lebovitz’s recipe

I use Arctic for Lemmy on iOS

Typically for devices that require a hub, it’s because they do not have WiFi chips. Often manufacturers leave off WiFi chips because the power draw is too high for the batteries, but there are other reasons too.

The hub act as a bridge between whatever local networking protocol is used (zigbee, z-wave, BLE) and the LAN. For example, a lightbulb may use z wave to talk to a hub, the hub uses Ethernet/wifi to connect to the LAN, the LAN connects to the WAN.

In some cases, you can setup a system that controls everything locally without needing an internet connection at all. This is often preferred in the home automation space by users who want to ensure reliable access to devices.

Some centralized hubs can talk directly to many brands of devices without needing many proprietary hubs, but they tend to be expensive or require a licensed dealer to install.

For a DIY option, look into Home Assistant running on a raspberry pi

I think the best part of the book was the hubris of the government. They threw technology at a problem that was untested and unplanned.

if we spend enough money, surely we can solve the problem

Such a late 80s and 90s sentiment

Actually I really liked The Andromeda Strain including its ending, but it had a similar let down feeling. I think it’s worth the read. See how we thought about pandemics in the 90s before we had a major outbreak in the western world (excluding HIV)

Crichton is best when he’s writing hard science fiction like Andromeda or Jurassic Park. Sphere is too science fantasy for him and he struggles with how to make it work.

You disliked the ending to The Sphere more than The Andromeda Strain?

Oh you’re in for a treat! I love all these books

If I had to pick, I’d go with Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow first. It’s very accessible and very good

Same Bed, Different Dreams is a treat, but it can be a little confusing. Especially if you don’t have much context with the history of the Korean Peninsula

• One Day by David Nicholls because it uses overlapping narratives and different perspectives to tell one story
• The Dog Stars by Peter Heller because it uses a post apocalyptic backdrop to take you on an emotional journey with the characters
• This Strange Eventful History by Claire Messud because its overlapping narratives over decades continually recolor events and motivations and outcomes
• Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin because its three protagonists have their own stories to tell, but they are intertwined and dependent. -Same Bed, Different Dreams by Ed Park because the complex story structure lends itself to a powerful emotional journey for the protagonist and the reader

People who like war thunder tend to be military folks. Some of those military folks have access to sensitive materials. Some of those people make bad choices about sharing sensitive materials