Like Automattic (Matt’s company), Three Rings has also long been ahead of the curve from a “recruit
talent from wherever it is, let people work from wherever they are” perspective. Until I was recently reading (more than I had previously) about the way that Automattic “works” I was
uncertain about the scalability of Three Rings’ model. Does it work for a commercial company (rather than a volunteer-run non-profit like Three Rings)? Does it work when you make the
jump from dozens of staff to hundreds? It’s reassuring to see that yes, this kind of approach certainly can work, and to get some context on how it does (in Automattic’s case,
at least). Nice video, Matt!
My 12th favourite and my 27th favourite YouTubers just did a collaboration and it’s brilliant. Also: I totally knew seven out of the twelve terms Dr
Doe brought to the table and would have been able to guess at least one more (as well as, of course, knowing what TomSka meant by his
British slang), so this video made me feel clever.
Just showing the simulation which we used to validate the Whirly Dirly Corollary. Kind of a fun fact about our Solar System and orbiting bodies in general. Check out our Physics Today
article!
“Ammo can” style cache containers are commonplace in the USA but very rare in the UK. As a result, British cachers coming across them for the first time sometimes report difficulty in
opening or closing the containers or accidentally removing the lid and being unable to reattach it. This video quickly examines an ammo can cache so that you might know your way around
it.
#strawfiechallenge – 1 minute of simulated breathing difficulty in recognition of sufferers of cystis fibrosis
Today I’m attaching a clothes peg to my nose and breathing through a straw for 60 seconds. As I won’t be able to talk while I’m doing this, I’ll type an explanation why:
Like most people, I’ve spent most of my life lucky enough to not really know anything about cystic fibrosis. I first really became aware of it when my friend Jen‘s son Lorcán was diagnosed with it (you may remember I shared a video of hers
previously).
It’s a lifelong disorder with no known cure.
It’s a genetic disorder, and as many as one in every 25 people carries the gene that can cause it. Inherit two genes and you’re a sufferer. Among other symptoms, it causes frequent lung
infections and difficulty breathing.
I’m taking part in the #strawfiechallenge as an exercise in appreciating how difficult it can be to cope with reduced lung function. A new drug, Orkambi, is helping to extend the lives
of sufferers in other countries around the world. But it’s not yet available in the UK. :-(
CF sufferers want #OrkambiNow. They need your politicians to act.
Summary: if an idealised weight slides into another, bouncing it off a wall then back into itself, how many times will the two collide? If the two weights are the same then the answer
is 3: the first collision imparts all of the force of the first into the second, the second collision is the second bouncing off the wall, and the third imparts the force from the
second back into the first. If the second weight weighs ten times as much as the first, the answer turns out to be 31. One hundred times as much, and there are 314 bounces. One thousand
times, and there are 3,141. Ten thousand times, and there are 31,415… spot the pattern? The number of bounces are the digits of pi.
Why? This is mindblowing. And this video doesn’t answer the question (completely): it only poses it. But I’ll be looking forward to the next episode’s explanation…
Brian and Nick are back for the first time in, like, forever. Do you remember what happened before this? It was The Faux
Pas, two years ago. And before that? And before that? And before that? The short of it is that it’s been a long time since your mom’s butthole was just fine.
Computerphile at its best, here tackling the topic of additional (supplementary) processors, like FPUs, GPUs, sound processors, etc., to which CPUs outsource some of their work under
specific circumstances. Even speaking as somebody who’s upgraded a 386/SX to a 386/DX through the addition of a “math co-processor” (an FPU) and seeing the benefit in applications for
which floating point arithmetic was a major part (e.g. some early 3D games), I didn’t really think about what was really happening until I saw this video. There’s always more
to learn, fellow geeks!
