I’m not sure what you’re showing here. A comparison? The sheer number of planes at one time?

An interesting point about the radio visibility of our civilization is that it was incredibly short lived. Sure, we have some unique items that may be visible if specifically searched, such as radiation or organic chemical signatures/ratios. But the whole thing about blasting space with radio and TV signals? Basically just a 100 year stint. Current devices are much more focused, so there’s less spill, and by going digital, identifiable waveforms are much rarer. We went form nothing, to being the social media addict of the solar system, to blending back into the static in a matter of a century.

I didn’t read that, too long and no pictures

You came here, read here, commented here. But you “don’t care” lol

Let’s say that whole idea is true: her dad bought her entire first contract and a warehouse of CDs to get her first album up to [checks notes] 19 in the charts.

Then what? So what? Genuinely curious what a generous startup payment has to do with her future success? How does that differ from parents saving money for their kids college tuition so they can go on to a successful career after? She certainly had a privileges growing up in an upper-middle class with a complete, supporting family that relocated to the heart of her original music’s location, but how does that take away from the juggernaut of a career after that? Do you belittle great doctors if their parents funded medical school instead of fearing the debt and never starting? Do you think of an engineer any lesser if they drove 10 hours and dormed at MIT for their schooling instead of sticking with the local community college? This just comes across as being jealous her parents had some money and that she has proven to have talent. It’s not like she invested $1bil of daddy’s money to make it into $10mil by never turning profit and only keeping 10m by not paying any of the contractors.

I don’t even like her music. I don’t care for country and none of her pop follows the melody tones I like except one, single song. I just don’t get what people try to say when they bring up her dad giving her startup money as a teenager. What, that it gave her a leg up? Nobody just gets lucky

I think he’s full of shit. One day, he’s at a post-lunch meeting, cranky as shit, because he spent all his lunch money on clothes. A few days later he rails us for scheduling a meeting during lunch, mad as hell, because he’s hungry. Dude nearly dies choking on a sleeve hotdog. I’m kinda thinking he’s actually just against meetings in general with this lunch inconsistency

Friendly reminder that “nonprofit” doesn’t mean it’s a charitable and honest corporation. Not saying DSI is bad, just that nonprofits love to bury profits in executive salaries as “cost of operations” while making people picture volunteers doing good.

I agreed, thinking immediately of larger un/sparsely populated regions. While DSI is American and probably biased, this part has something to do with it that would set it apart from some other places:

The certification involved a years-long arduous effort by federal, state and local officials, community members and several legal jurisdictions. It required parties to agree to the plan as well as monitor the night sky and institute lighting improvements, DarkSky International said in a statement.

I’m sure there’s some casual bribery suggestive donations

Confirmed: superbowl is rigged by McDonald’s rump

+2 for Tron Legacy. I play through the soundtrack on long drives or when I just need an hour of thoughtless music. It’s a movie I’ll watch when nothing else is on. It just gives me a certain feeling like rather than seeing something cool, I feel more like I’m experiencing a different world. It scratches an exploration itch outside the normal avenues (space, underwater, wilderness, etc) by being a non-tangible universe. And of course the non-traditional score composed by Daft Punk is entirely the right choice for a digital world film. Maybe it kinda resembles playing a video game, which should be exactly the goal anyway. I know the visual stun comes from dark scenes and flares of lights, feeling like an amalgam of the Onion headline saying “Not sure if art actually good, or just lights up” but who am I to argue with the mush running my body?

I was just there 2 weeks ago. I’m not sure about your time, transportation, or proximity to it, but if you’ve never seen it, the grand canyon. I always thought it’d be touristy and not worth the hype, but it’s insane. 7,000ft up on a massively flat area and there’s just this massive hole in ground that’s 4x as wide as you are higher than sea level. I spent an hour hiking down south Kaibab (and 90+ mins coming back up) and didn’t even exit the white top portion of the canyon (down to ooh ahh point). It’s like 3 hours to drive but totally worth tagging onto my trip from across the country. It’s also a dark sky park. Yes, most of AZ is dark, but there’s something to be said for being in a designated stargazing area in the middle of the night. The other distant places I went to were the Meteor Crater, petrified Forest, Montezuma Castle, Sedona, and Lowell Observatory (flagstaff) where I touched the pluto discovery telescope and hung out for amazing telescope viewing from modern devices from 8-10p. Beware, north gets cold fast.

As for Phoenix, I didn’t have a car while I was actually staying there for a few days, so my travels were all walked from the Hilton resort against the Phoenix mountain reserve. I wondered if I could chuck it up that mountain and, sure enough, I could. I walked 45 mins to get there and 45 mins up to the peaks (mostly flat bike paths until the peaks) and had a gorgeous view of the city at sunset. I enjoyed the variety at 1227 Taproom with 25 beers on tap, several ciders and meads, and some seltzers as well as nearly-expired $4 mystery beer cans. The two mexican/taco joints there were cool too, but every other one I went to was cool too except for alibertos (chain) lol. For having such great winter weather, I did not get the feeling it was walk friendly. Maybe just the wrong section. Coming from a region known to be fast and rude, phx seemed so relaxed. I flew out of 30°F at home and was happy to just be outside in the 70s. Other suggestions here are probably better but it’s just amusing I was just there for the first time

Gorgeous time to be there though if you come from somewhere that’s cold in March