Wow…somehow, I hadn’t heard about this, but thanks to the Bad Astronomer, I’m back in the loop. Armadillo Aerospace recently (June 2nd) completed a run through of the requirements to win the Lunar Lander Challenge (they didn’t acually win, b/c the challenge is at a set time later this year, but their vehicle performed all the tasks. Pretty good dry run.) There’s a rocking movie available at their site. (AA, btw, is the John Carmack [id software co-founder] nerd space company.)

thanks to the Bad Astronomer for the link!

Maglev is dead — Great post by the Yorkshire Ranter (I just love the name), and he nails home an important truth to boot. Read this part, and laugh out loud like I did: John Waclawsky said that there are two kinds of technology, the kind that provides a direct benefit to the end user, and the kind that’s designed by people who think they can see the future. These, he said, are also known as success and failure..

Outstanding. And a much better explanation that what I normally say; something along the lines of they like it because it’s shiny. But the same meaning underneath. I like new tech as much as anyone (and way more than most), but I’m not a fan of Architecture Astronautics, or complicated for the sake of…well, being complicated. It also explains why tech I don’t like sometimes ends up in the successful pile…sometimes that crap IS actually useful! *grin*

And the maglev point is dead on; it’s totally shiny. Good show, Yorkshire Ranter!

Ok…finally got it set up in DNS: kenkennedy.info is now a redirect to this site. I gave up on getting the .com; I have a namespace collision with a wrestler, no less. *sigh* So either he or squatters seem to have most of the decent permutations; I should have snapped it up when I had a chance years ago. Oh well! kenkennedy.info should work well enough for an easy to remember, less nerdy URL…it’s not like I’m trying to hide anything, though, since it redirects to here. Just another way to find me.