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Around The Web Tech (General)

Project 1794

Project 1794 Flying Saucer

Pretty cool records recently declassified. From ExtremeTech:

The aircraft, which had the code name Project 1794, was developed by the USAF and Avro Canada in the 1950s. One declassified memo, which seems to be the conclusion of initial research and prototyping, says that Project 1794 is a flying saucer capable of “between Mach 3 and Mach 4,” (2,300-3,000 mph) a service ceiling of over 100,000 feet (30,500m), and a range of around 1,000 nautical miles (1,150mi, 1850km).

Looks a lot like the Avrocar in many respects. I wonder how many UFO reports in that era were perhaps manned or unmanned tests of this aircraft. I’d imagine it’s possible that while this is now declassified, the US Government still isn’t going to admit to what degree it was tested.

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Around The Web Tech (General)

The Genius of Airline Baggage Tag Design

Slate has a great read on the design of airline baggage tags. My favorite part is the description of what the design needs to be able to deal with:

Let’s look first at how an ABT is made. In the interconnected, automated, all-weather world of modern aviation, tags must be resistant to cold, heat, sunlight, ice, oil, and especially moisture. Tags also can’t tear—and crucially, if they’re nicked, they must not tear further—as the bag lurches through mechanized airport baggage systems. And the tag must be flexible, inexpensive, and disposable. Plain old paper can’t begin to meet all these requirements. The winning combination is what IATA’s spokesperson described as a “complex composite” of silicon and plastic; the only paper in it is in the adhesive backing.

Bag tags must meet another set of contradictory requirements. They must be easy to attach, but impossible to detach—until, that is, the bag arrives safely at its destination and the traveler wants to detach it. Old tags were fastened with a string through a hole, but mechanized baggage systems eat these for breakfast. The current loop tag, a standardized strip of pressure-sensitive adhesive, looped through a handle and pressed to form an adhesive-to-adhesive bond, debuted with the ABT in the early ’90s. And the ABT, unlike string tags and earlier loop-y tag ideas, is easily attached to items that lack handles—boxes, say. Simply remove the entire adhesive backing and the loop tag becomes a very sticky sticker.

If you really think about it, it’s a pretty daunting set of requirements. The design they went with is not only quite simplistic and easy to print out it’s also quite effective.

While you can reduce it to a mundane sticker it’s a pretty impressive feat of engineering from the selection of a glue that can meet these requirements to a composite “paper”.

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Around The Web Audio/Video

Awesome Dodgeball Move

Awesome Dodge Ball Move

Here is perhaps the greatest dodgeball move ever. This is part of why I think Dodgeball needs to become an olympic sport.

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Space

Upcoming Comet To Be Brighter Than Moon

From Astronomy Now:

A new comet has been discovered that is predicted to blaze incredibly brilliantly in the skies during late 2013. With a perihelion passage of less than two million kilometres from the Sun on 28 November 2013, current predictions are of an object that will dazzle the eye at up to magnitude —16. That’s far brighter than the full Moon. If predictions hold true then C/2012 S1 will certainly be one of the greatest comets in human history…

Well, guess I should mark the calendar. This sounds like something I won’t want to miss. How could you miss something that will be “one of the greatest _____ in human history”?

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Funny

Wampa Freezes Luke Upside Down Win

Luke Wampa Freezer

Wampa and frozen Luke upside down in a freezer. Whoever did this, you are awesome.

Via Fail Blog

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Audio/Video Funny

Shippo / Brain Controlled Tail

Brain Controlled Tail

Anyone want to take a guess what country this is from? I guess this will be successful among the Furry fans.

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Networking Politics

U.S. Government Goes IPv6

I didn’t even realize, but the mandate to go IPv6 has passed for the U.S. Government. Not that it really mattered anyway. Until consumer devices ship IPv6 ready and enabled, and ISP’s start rolling out IPv6, this is just an exercise is what will hopefully save work later on.

Seems most Government websites I’ve checked so far that are IPv6 are using CDN’s to provide IPv6 connectivity. I’m betting behind the scenes it’s all IPv4 still.

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In The News

Looking At Cute Animals Can Boost Productivity

From the “you can’t make this stuff up department” over at LifeScience:

Previous studies have shown that humans slow down their speech when talking to babies, and the Japanese researchers speculated that viewing the cute images may have had a similar effect — slowing the behavior of the students who saw the cute baby animal images and improving their accuracy in the game. In addition, the researchers suspect the baby-animal group got a boost in nurturing feelings, something that would likely benefit performance in the care-related task that involved helping someone (even if that someone was an anthropomorphic game board).

So now you have an excuse to look at /r/aww. Here are some monkeys to help you work.