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Happy Harding Whalebomb Day from !

It is the birthday of infamous figure skater Tonya Harding and the anniversary of this unwise application of TNT:

youtube.com/watch?v=yPuaSY0cMK

@paolovicini and they seem to have provided s breakwater against the predicted red wave. I hope their contribution will be remembered and rewarded over the next two years.

#Jekyll is kicking my ass right now. I’m trying to put some html code as a code block into my article but Jekyll is rendering the #LiquidCode in the code block and not leaving it as just code. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Any Jekyll/Liquid folks out here?

Sometimes I also dip my toe into #solarphotography .

This kind of #astrophotography requires a lot of safety gear and you should never do it unless you know what you’re doing and have the correct equipment. Nobody wants to set their eyeballs or #telescope on fire right? 😁
Here’s a couple of solar shots from a while back, one showing a #sunspot and the other a prominence! They were shot using a specialised #hydrogenalpha filter and a mono camera

@owen they are using the same potentiometer setup they use for the stick. (I mean why design something twice?) Stick forward is towards 0 and stick back is towards MAX_VALUE.

@MtnWaver Those extra options are not part of the standard mastadon and so you are unlikely to find them in an app unless the fork that Qoto is using becomes a lot more mainstream.

See that small white dot just left of center, you may think it is Venus shining in the evening sky, but it is Earth as viewed from Mars.

Every person alive is in that one pixel.

Hat tip: (At)ThePlanetaryGuy on the birdsite

Well dang.. #NASA #Artemis1 #Astrodon..

Jim Free - NASA’s Associate Administrator for Exploration Systems Development.

Update on our #Artemis I mission:

Having been here since 2016, I can tell you there is definitely no such thing as a consensus on usage of content warnings on the fediverse. It's a decentralized network that doesn't belong to any one party, so by definition there is no single culture on it. Different corners have different expectations and customs.

Guide to Content Warnings

On qoto, the only toots that require a content warning (CW) are:

- Spoilers
- NSFW (Not Safe For Work) – this is up for interpretation, but I assume refers to tits and dicks
- Using a derogatory epithet or racially charged language in a toot that itself is not racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise hateful speech (such as quoting a passage from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for critical purposes)*

Other reasons someone may want to use CW’s here on qoto:

- Strobe effects (to avoid triggering an epileptic seizure in people who are susceptible)
- Violence, accidents, rape, suicide, self-harm, death, etc., including to non-human animals (PTSD, etc.)
- Food (pics of food can prompt people with metabolic syndrome, eating disorders, which are relatively common)
- Pics of drugs (may trigger use by people who are addicted)
- Very long posts (so uninterested readers don’t have to scroll through them)

It’s better if the CW description is more specific (without itself containing CW-eligible content). Instead of just “Spoiler”, say “Spoiler – The Wizard of Oz”. Also, it’s generally a good idea to repeat the CW description within the toot itself at the top of the toot for those who may have the auto-open feature enabled.

What doesn’t need a CW:

- swear words
- content that might hurt someone’s feelings
- unpopular opinions
- political content
- pictures of animals (that are alive and well)
- content from those with autism or who are otherwise neuro-atypical
- using the CW as a title or heading for your toot or trying to place actually content into the CW description is irritating for others

Overuse of the CW feature ultimately undermines it’s usefulness because it forces people to have to click on each toot or just enable the auto-open feature. However, someone with a condition like epilepsy or PTSD, the auto-open feature is not really an option so CW overuse effectively forces people with disabilities to click each toot while everyone else can just enable the auto-open feature, which doesn’t seem fair.

Other Mastodon instances have varying rules and views on CW use.

Note: I’m not an admin or moderator here, this is just my opinion. I don’t always adhere to these guidelines and you can do what you want.

- - - -

* This epithet restriction isn’t listed in the rules, but it was adopted as a compromise in response to some specific events. Of course hate-based speech such as sexist, racist, homophobic or anti-trans speech will not be tolerated. (Note: I personally block anyone who uses epithets in any context because the intent is often ambiguous and you can communicate the same info without explicitly using the epithet.)

@TrechNex@mstdn.social So my chosen server does not have a requirement to CW politics and in fact discourages it as it leads to overuse (qoto.org/@Pat/1093215339289551) Can I assume that people who choose to follow me outside of my own server know what they are getting into?

mastodon.social/@planet4589

OMG! OMG! The God of Orbital Mechanics is here! 'Scuse me while I take some time to fan-ferret scream!

Last night's Hack Night was superb fun & our best-attended yet. I think we had about 70 people!

The evening's challenge was Huffman-encoding, and here's my attempt in #Haskell:

gist.github.com/686509b436c3e2

Unfinished! I was busy being host so I didn't get the full 90mins. #excuses

@Pat I am getting feedback form people that they really want to avoid political posts after a very trying election season. I'm happy to oblige esp on a Sci/Tech focused server.

US Politics 

Just a reminder that in site of the challenges for the was very accurate. The races that polled as very close were very close. The races that polled as sure things went the way the polls said they would. The issue was media outlets taking some races where polls said Republicans had a 50.1 to 55% chan e of winning and assuming that all of them would be Republican victories. Democrats over-performed the polls by only 2-3% nation wide and that was enough to sneak by some very close contests.

In summary the only way the polling for the was wrong is if you think polls make binary predictions not statistical odds.

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Qoto Mastodon

QOTO: Question Others to Teach Ourselves
An inclusive, Academic Freedom, instance
All cultures welcome.
Hate speech and harassment strictly forbidden.