Today’s the day: We EU citizens can cast our vote for the only EU institution we have direct voting power for. But unlike your own government, the EU often feels far away, something we can’t directly influence anyway, and is often used as a scape goat for politicians. Kurz Gesagt dives into these questions: Is the EU Democratic? Does Your Vote Matter?

Stranger Things

When several staff members of the US embassy in Cuba fell ill to an unknown cause, only described as piercing, high-pitched noises, speculation ran wild about secret services mounting attacks using new and unknown weapons. Then scientists and doctors got involved, and, well: Was It an Invisible Attack on U.S. Diplomats, or Something Stranger?

Lifetime Supply of Interesting Links

You’ve probably come across a competition where you win a life-time supply of that companies product. Have you ever wondered how that actually works? ‘I’d get 400 toilet rolls at a time’: how it feels to win a lifetime supply.

Really Long Distance Calls

Space probes are indispensable for exploring our solar system, including the very outer edges of it. They’ve sent back pictures and data from our neighbouring planets (and other stellar bodies) that we would have never been able to see here on earth. But all of that requires being able to talk to the probes — and that’s the purpose of NASA’s deep space network: Deep space dial-up: How NASA speeds up its interplanetary communications.

I Knew You Were Going To Type That

Ever since we’ve started typing on our phones, way before we even considered calling them “smart”, there has been text prediction to speed up text entry. How does your phone know what you’ll type next?

📖 Weekly Longreads 📚

Like so many other STEM fields, programming is dominated by (mostly white) men. But the early pioneers of computing were actually much more gender balanced. What happened in between? The Secret History of Women in Coding.

🦄 Unicorn Chaser 🦄

Normally, satellites look straight down. But they don’t have to: Gorgeous Low-Angle Satellite Photo of San Francisco.