European Southern Observatory Captures Surface of Star 600 Light Years Away

On June 26, 2017, the European Southern Observatory published this image of the surface of Betelgeuse, a star in the Orion constellation that is about 600 light years from the Earth.

According to ESO,

Betelgeuse is one of the largest stars currently known — with a radius around 1400 times larger than the Sun’s in the millimeter continuum. About 600 light-years away in the constellation of Orion (The Hunter), the red supergiant burns brightly, causing it to have only a short life expectancy. The star is just about eight million years old, but is already on the verge of becoming a supernova. When that happens, the resulting explosion will be visible from Earth, even in broad daylight.

Luke 19:26-28

Luke 19:26-28 (King James Version)

26 For I say unto you, That unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him.

27 But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

28 And when he had thus spoken, he went before, ascending up to Jerusalem.

Tails 3.0 Released

The latest version of the privacy-oriented Linux distro, Tails, is now out. Tails 3.0 is based on Debian 9 and includes a number of usability and security improvements.

Among those is a requirement to run Tails on 64-bit platforms,

Tails 3.0 works on 64-bit computers only and not on 32-bit computers anymore. Dropping hardware support, even for a small portion of our user base, is always a hard decision to make but being 64-bit only has important security and reliability benefits. For example, to protect against some types of security exploits, support for the NX bit is compulsory and most binaries are hardened with PIE which allows ASLR.

 

Medicom Wonder Woman (Movie Version) Action Figure

Normally, I am not a fan of action figures based on movie versions of superheroes. By the time a movie modifies the superhero so he or she looks acceptable on-screen, the process of then transforming that back into an action figure just looks weird. If you want to see some seriously goofy looking action figures, for example, go check out those based on Christian Bale’s version of Batman. Ugh.

This Medicom action figure of Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman, however, is the exception to the rule. Part of this is due to how well the movie version of Wonder Woman looks. Gadot’s version is both drop-dead gorgeous while still maintaining a core that screams power. (As much as I love the 1970s TV show, the Lynda Carter version of the character over-emphasizes the glamour aspect of the character at the expense of believability that she’s an Amazonian badass).

 

Gary Gygax’s FBI File

Reason crime reporter C.J. Ciaramella filed a FOIA request for any FBI files on TSR Hobbies, the creators of Dungeons & Dragons. The incident is largely forgotten now, but the FBI actually raided the TSR offices in 1980 because its agents thought that a scenario in the Top Secret RPG was actually a real assassination plot.

Along with records related to that 1980 raid, the FBI sent him what was essentially Gary Gygax’s FBI file (PDF).

As Ciaramella summarizes the file in Reason,

An FBI source in the report alleges that Gygax was “eccentric and frightening,” carried a weapon, proudly responded to every letter he received from an inmate, and had a Liberian holding company. It concludes: “He is known to be a member of the Libertarian Party.”

. . .

In short, Gary Gygax wasn’t a snitch and fought the power.