10 Thoughts for November 13, 2014

1. Space: That's so European.  When watching the live streaming video of ESA's coverage of the Rosetta comet landing, one couldn't help but notice how ESA had over two dozen speakers talk.  The science took up a dozen minutes in total; the speeches took hours, and in the end they all drank champagne, except for the scientists still trying to figure out what went wrong.  The crowd did not want to end on a down note, so when a scientist started to describe some of the problems they were having -- a gas cartridge not firing and the hooks not deploying -- the live stream coverage quickly broke away back to the emcee as she paraphrased the scientist by explaining that Philae had landed.
2. Space: The Philae lander has sent back its first image from the comet's surface, which, if you compare photos from the area it was targeting, to the image before it was about to touch down, it sure looks like it might have missed its mark a bit and got stuck next to a rocky spot rather than a flat area, no?
3. Ukraine: You gotta be kidding me...Russia is at it again, sending troops into Ukraine? Putin is truly attempting to wag the dog away from Russia's impending economic collapse.
4. YouTube: We know a lot more details about YouTube Music Key, the subscription music video service, now.  It's a twofer program (as I had previously suspected), where for one price you'll get both YouTube Music Key and Google Play Music All Access.  The key here is that you'll get YouTube music videos without ads.  Which of course means that if you want to stream music video mixes, you'll be seeing more ads than before.  But it also means that YouTube has now built up a library of mixes for you, already -- a new thing you'll find in your personalized YouTube page without having to join Music Key.
5. Portland: The proposed Street Fund, meant to help the backlog of streets in disrepair, will dedicate just 47% of the tax money to repairing streets.  I've never heard of such a ridiculous proposal, ever.
6. Internet: Fire Tom Wheeler.  His attempt to state that his department is beholden to no one, is a farce, as he is supposed to work for the American people.  The American people spoke loudly and clearly when we sent in millions of comments to the FCC against his previous proposal to cement rules that would have destroyed Net Neutrality.  Fire his ass, now.
7. Football: Let me answer the obvious question as to why Jameis Winston's lawyer requested a delay of his student code conduct meeting at Florida State University, over a 2-year old rape allegation.  The delay was strategically timed to avoid being kicked out of school before FSU gets a chance to play in at least one bowl game, and perhaps two (the national championship on January 12).  With the minimum 10 school days between the hearing and the official decision, it means that the soonest Winston would receive any punishment would be January 8, when taking the FSU academic calendar into consideration.  Oh, and it's also long after the Heisman vote and award.  This, after his lawyer complained about the long delay between the original complaint and the previously scheduled hearing.
8. The other Football: Via SI, "The Russia 2018 bid gave the “dog-ate-my-homework” excuse to Garcia, saying pertinent e-mails and documents had been on computers that were leased and returned to their owner. The owner told Garcia the computers had been destroyed. Russia was still cleared by Eckert." So, FIFA is itself so corrupt as to excuse the laughable BS from Russian officials.  No really, read the SI summary of the attempts to curry favor with FIFA officials from multiple nations.  That FIFA accepted Russia's excuse is just telling how corrupt FIFA is, at its core.
9. Android: The moment that we've all been waiting for has begun, Android Lollipop is now rolling out to Nexus devices.  This is why we buy Nexus devices, after all.  :D
10. Blog: A tiny note, that this blog passed the 100K views mark on Wednesday.  All-time traffic, in order of views: US, Russia, Germany, UK, France.  Apparently I don't insult Canada enough, because they came in 6th place -- sacrebleu! Les Canadiens avec les grandes tetons, ooh la la! (Channeling my inner South Park.)