Science and tech roundup

It has been a very interesting week as far as scientific and technological news. In the middle of the whole economic crisis, this gives me both entertainment and hope. Here's a quick round-up.

Astronomers find Tatooine!

It doesn't look like this at all.

Well not so much, but they think they've found proof of a planet orbiting around a binary star system, that is, two stars rotating around each other. The planet is thought to be a cold gas giant, something like Saturn, and not the hot arid Star Wars deal. We will have to keep searching for the Jedis somewhere else.









NASA announces big rocket to reach the Moon and Mars

This particularly interests me, because I can't figure out how we were more impressive 50 years ago than we are now, as far as space programs go. The announced rocket, "Space Launch System", will cost several billion dollars. How can the US afford it you might ask? Well, the program won't start until 2017 and the first mission isn't planned before 2021. It's a long wait, yes, but it's better than nothing.

Shortly after, the critics started raining in. One of The Space Frontier Foundation's co-founders, Rick Tumlinson, said "It is a sad day for our space program. (...)
"Although they're trying to dress it up in the colors of the Saturn V, it's a Frankenstein rocket, built from rotting remnants of left over Congressional pork. And its budgetary footprints will stamp out all the missions it is supposed to carry, kill our astronaut program and destroy science and technology projects throughout NASA."

Well... Damn. We'll have to wait and see how this develops. It might be just a move by the Obama administration to captivate some more voters, time will tell.

Windows 8 out for testing

Microsoft has provided developers the opportunity to download and test Windows 8 prior to it's launch (link here). Many people have gotten their hands on it and opinions have been flying around, mainly that it's too late and not innovative enough to break Android and iOS's dominance in the mobile operating system market (which is one of M$'s main aims with this release).

In the meantime, Apple is due to release it's new iPhone 5 in less than a month (specifically October 5th). I have no idea about the changes or new features cos personally I don't give a damn about the iPhone.

I leave you with this golden piece of comedy. It's a guy talking about a lot of shit he doesn't really understand, so he made up his own science. If you do understand science, even a little bit, you can see right through his bullshit. Intensity 30 earthquakes? Yeah guy, you go!