How do you feel about the sentence "WA Police Force is now operating a central command centre out of Telstra's Wellington Street exchange tower in Perth"? Because that's a thing that's happening right now. They've combined "the services and resources of the former State Operations Command Centre (SOCC) and Police Operations Centre into one high-tech, purpose-built facility" that just happens to be in the same building as Telstra's exchange because it "provides excellent power and connectivity resiliency and will literally put WA Police as close as they can possibly get to our state's most critical piece of telecommunications infrastructure". Police have never been much for the optics of their actions, have they?
The USA has landed something on the Moon for the first time since Apollo 17 all the way back in 1972. NASA gave a company called Intuitive Machines US$77m in 2019 to build and launch the Nova-C Moon lander carrying a few science instruments and now they've done it. While it as routine in the early 70s for things to be on the Moon and people took it for granted, it's actually really fucking hard and to do it for "only" US$77m is quite the achievement. They even launched a little CubeSat called EagleCam so it can relay images from the lander via wi-fi then back to Earth, making it the first wi-fi network on the Moon. Wikipedia has a bunch of info on the IM-1 mission, the Nova-C spacecraft and the instruments it deployed.
Ken Shirriff has a wonderful look at all the integrated circuits that made the revolutionary Polaroid SX-70 instant camera possible. While everything in there is now pretty mundane, at the time of its release in 1972, this was all cutting edge stuff - you could call it the iPhone of its time, with Fairchild and Texas Instruments battling to create an exposure control circuit board at the right price. Before the SX-70 getting the exposure correct for a Polaroid was a huge pain in the arse, but the exposure control circuit board automated it all. Also on the topic of the SX-70 is this gorgeous short film/ad about the camera by the Eames brothers (yeah the chair dudes).
Here's five interesting discussions over on The Sizzle's paid subscriber forum for you to enjoy over the weekend. If you are not a paid subscriber but want to get involved, visit https://thesizzle.com.au/payme to get onboard.
IM-1, the first NASA Commercial Launch Program Services launch for Intuitive Machines' Nova-C lunar lander, will carry multiple payloads to the Moon, including Lunar Node-1, demonstrating autonomous navigation via radio beacon to support precise geolocation and navigation among lunar orbiters, landers, and surface personnel. NASA’s CLPS initiative oversees industry development of small robotic landers and rovers to support NASA’s Artemis campaign. (NASA Image and Video Library)
📻 Heart Factory - Sleater-Kinney
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