I Tell You. You Decide If You Care.

Reality is stranger than fiction. I was writing some short fiction and needed to know the relative melting points of metals . Ever heard of " incoloy " or " hastelloy "?  Yeah, me neither. I swear those names were made up by Asimov  or Tolkien , right? Nope. Turns out those particular metals came out of a lab, and have industrial uses . Although, I'm undecided if " Special Metals Corporation " was named by a very unimaginative paper pusher, or some genius with the same sense of ironic humor that came up with" Umbrella Corporation ." ( image source - it's Gallium melting at body temp)

Is it wrong that I'm turned on by Alyson's incredible skill level and passion for cosplay? I love cosplay. I've dabbled a bit, but I'm a rank amateur. Mostly, I'm a gamer by day, and dabble with a bit of convention cosplay in the evenings when it's dark, I've had a drink or two, and no one really cares, anyway. (And yah, I've still got a male friend not far away, because .) Anyway, ran across  Alyison Tabitha  when looking for Final Fantasy cosplay, just because. Check out her incredible work at her gallery. And gender-bending!  And she nails Jack Sparrow's body language! Freaky  Wow !

Something about MacOS Sierra and 2048-bit encryption on ssh and a work around until you generate new keys. Smart stuff and probably important of you use MacOS. I don't know. As a nerd, it was interesting to learn, but I don't use a Mac (or ssh, that I know of). If you've got a Mac, you might want to read this  thread by Cindy Brown.

As a general rule, I'm a fan of intellectual property rights ,  so that inventors and creators can be sure to get fair compensation for their works, but I'm not a fan of locking up the IP, making it impossible for people to use. The idea that an artist got "an exclusive right" to "the blackest black" is just absurd.  I have to imagine it was as much publicity stunt by the creators of Vantablack as it was anything else. I applaud Stuart Semple for thumbing his nose back the Vantablack people by saying " your pet artist can't have my pinkest pink ." The root IP lockup is very silly, so the resultant "IP war" is absolutely silly. Plus, it's kind of a gorgeous shade of pink.  For a few bucks, I might buy myself some and see if I can finger paint with it :-) Tangentially, here is a really good primer on Intellectual Property . And finally, yeah, being allowed to play with the Pinkest Pink doesn't exactly make m...