it's been a week since the last one

October 12, 2020

Welcome to Corgi-Class Starship, the newsletter that sometimes does question the logic of putting Tweetdeck on its second monitor but still can't think of anything better to do with it as of yet 

You'll Like This

Update(s) on thing(s) I made or somehow helped to bring about.Idea Factory GiveawayNo new episode this week, but that's okay! It's been an every-other-week thing for a while now, so you know the deal anyway.Our ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ratings in Apple Podcasts hold steady at 33; I'm not worried about it because quite frankly I would rather that you vote. This is probably unsurprising.Instant Band Night 15: Gone Til NovemberIt seems laughable to try to throw Instant Band Night without a proven vaccine in place. Let's see what's up in November 2021.Facebook event's still there in case you (like me) can't yet escape the vortex of Facebook* * s t a y   h o m e   / /   s t a y   h e a l t h y * * 

Medium Ramble

Skippable if you're in a hurry.I don't really have anything this time, folks, except for a nagging question: if Trump has thus far displayed little indication that he'll comply with the transfer of power should he be voted out, why do we think voting him out is the answer? "This guy says he's not gonna listen to the vote, so we gotta vote!" seems like something only a person marginally in touch with certain harsh realities would suggest. I understand the logic that if he loses BY A FUCKING LANDSLIDE then he might maybe take the hint that we don't want him there, but given his propensity to scream voter fraud where literally none exists, that also does not sound like a likely path to success.The true question I want a real answer to is "If he refuses to leave, do we know who we're gonna be able to trust to drag his ass out of there?" Is it going to have to be us, literally us, or can we count on somebody in the military command structure to give an order or two? Do I not want to know? This shit has been creeping me out for a while now. Sorry. Am I the only one, though, or has this been nagging at you too? 

#dadthoughts

Also skippable if you're in a hurry or don't care. No judgment.I don't think it's an exaggeration in any way/shape/form to say that Quentin is a happy little guy with a consistently sunny disposition (not that I would love him any less if he were a tiny mopester). Which is what made it maybe a little extra heartbreaking when he turned to me a few days ago with a smile on his face and announced "I miss people!" Me too, buddy; me too. 

Fascination Corner

I read a lot of newsletters; here are some links that caught my eye. 

  • Ed Yong is unstoppable; he cannot be stopped, nor should he be. "What Strength Really Means When You’re Sick: The metaphors that Trump and others use when talking about COVID-19 are making the pandemic worse." (~$Atlantic) 

  • I have by this point ceased to be surprised at the pointless, bottomless cruelty of these evil fucking assholes, but that doesn't mean we can't keep pointing it out. I'd all but forgotten about Jeff Sessions, and now I'm contemplating putting him in my Top Ten Hate List (the top five can't be dislodged at this point). ($NYT) There's audio you can listen to of the kids (this story is TWO YEARS OLD), and there is absolutely nothing in this or any other timeline that could make me press PLAY on that. (ProPublica) 

  • There's theoretically enough resources to sustain a population 3x bigger than what we have now on the planet, provided we rearrange some things drastically. It's a highly unrealistic but thought-provoking scenario. (Science Alert) (Actual paper) 

  • Goddammit, I thought we were done with the murder hornets??? Of course they'd have a "slaughter phase." (Gizmodo) 

  • Facebook's commitment to secrecy about how it uses its data means there's no immutable way to push back against the erroneous assumption dipshit politicians keep making about a so-called "anti-conservative bias." (NPR) Speaking of secrets, Facebook's ordering its third-party moderation contractors back to the office and they're not happy. Who would be? (BuzzFeed News) 

  • Feral cats are wrecking ecological shop in Australia, and there's now a controlled experiment underway involving releasing Tasmanian devils into a fenced-in corner of the mainland -- for the first time in literally thousands of years -- to see how they handle 'em. (Gizmodo) 

  • Social trust in America is collapsing; not good at all. (~$Atlantic) 

  • In an effort to figure out where stolen sea turtle eggs are going, scientists have developed a 3D-printed decoy with GPS trackers in 'em. Unfortunately, there are no pictures. (Cell Press via Science Daily) 

  • A forthcoming paper for Neuroethics just called "In Defense of the Hivemind Society" argues that .... well, it's probably obvious from the title. (PDF) 

  • Following the utter collapse of the Bon Appetit YouTube channel, we're starting to see signs of something I'm going to call the Distributed Bon Appetit Test Kitchen Cinematic Universe. First Sohla gets her own show on the Babish channel (playlist), and Claire announces her departure for destinations currently unknown (Vulture). I really hope there's a red-hot bidding war going on behind the scenes for all the people who left, and that we'll see them all pop up in different places with different excellent shows by the year's end. 

  • Spinach can be made into a fuel cell catalyst, which means there are definitely sustainable ways to make 'em. (American U) 

  • The menu of the future might include some weirder fish. Sure, they seem "climate-friendly" now, but how do we stop from overfishing them, too? (U of Copenhagen) Speaking of fish, some of them can regenerate their eyes after injuries, and we have those genes, too -- they're just turned off for some reason. (Johns Hopkins) 

  • It's possible to correlate gentrification with cafe, bar, and restaurant openings in a given area. (Eater) 

  • Certain kinds of fine gemstones grew much, much quicker in the crust of the planet than any of us thought previously. (Rice) 

  • "Moth-deployed sensors" is certainly an ......... interesting concept for what I imagine is probably a lot of applications, but I wonder how much of a pain in the ass it is to mount them in the first place. (U of Washington) 

  • While shooting is still being figured out for the most part, Hollywood producers have more time to read books, which is creating an explosion of adaptation deals. (~$LA Times) 

  • Some scientists in Korea worked out a way to produce sheets of stem cells that can be harvested in just two days, about half the time it would normally take. (POSTECH) 

  • How to read the news without going insane. (~$Vanity Fair) 

  • Engineers at UCSD build a soft robot that puffs itself around in the water squid-style, and yes, there is video. (Jacobs School of Engineering) 

A Fictional Thing

Something made-up that somehow suggested itself to me and which I could not escape.A band and their albumEnglish Nanny, A Fleeting Moment of Total Animal Panic 

Thanks

If you've read this far, I thank you. Feel free to forward this to someone you like, or inflict upon someone you don't.