The Night Thread Mk. IX

Shit news mate.

Cancer is awful.

I'm sorry mate.

God Dammit.

Sorry mate.

Sorry to hear that man

Awful news mate.

Fuck man.

Awful news mate. Thoughts with you

Oh jesus christ, sorry to hear that mate. Can't imagine what you're going through.

Sorry to hear about the news chum.

Sorry to hear that. : /




How well do you know the world? Play Geoguessr to find out!

http://url.geoguessr.com/6z09

Well proud of the Lousiana one (watching True Detective actually helped me recognise the landscape), but then I fucked up big time with the one in Russia and Australia.

In happier news: First payslip at my new job \o/

Does anyone remember TPJ? Didn't know he appeared on University Challenge

You do realise these are different every time right, so we have no idea what you're talking about.

Anyway, I find it pretty easy to guess which country you are in based on road markings, post boxes, signs, utility poles etc. The difficult thing is guessing the location within that country.

Zoom in on the map on the link I provided, smartass.



Pfft, those hints are like cheating. Try getting them right without doing that.

17637 was my highest score. Got like 8000 points at once for correctly locating the main street of Westhampton, NY.

Its blocked in the UK.

\o/

Fuck Fieldbus technology.

Bazinga!

Man builds an F1 replica with $4k

And good fucking riddance, not touching Fieldbus ever again.

Shit is going down in Ukraine


again

You say again like it stopped at some point

So are Russia going to invade? I wish someone assassinated Putin. He's nothing but a gangster in a suit

Just posted this on Twitter:

Those who say it isn't necessary to understand history are totally wrong - just look at what's occurring in Ukraine at the moment.

Ukraine's ousted President, Viktor Yanukovych asked President Vladimir Putin to use Russia's armed forces "to establish legitimacy, peace,
law and order, stability and defending the people of Ukraine." Let's go back in time to WW2 - remember when Hitler wanted 2 control Austria?

He forced the Austrian leader, Kurt Schuschnigg, to appoint Arthur Seyss-Inquart as Minister of Interior. Seyss was a Nazi sympathizer

Hitler had threatened Schuschnigg with military action if he did not comply. Anyway, Schuschnigg shortly resigned after this incident.....

Who became the new leader of Austria? BOOM. You guessed correctly - Arthur Seyss-Inquart. And what was the first thing he did?..........

He invited Hitler and his army to march into Austria and thus take over the country (Anschluss)... And isn't the same thing happening

In Ukraine as the ousted Ukrainian President asked Putin to sent Russian troops to Crimea? Crimea has a Russian majority as well by the way

It was part of Russia till 1954. Then it was given 2 Ukraine. History always repeats itself because many refuse to learn from past mistakes

A special mention must go to @efitz6 as he thought me all the WW2 history stuff about Hitler and Austria. All I did was connect the dots

RTÉ was 'hacked' during Primetime tonight. About 20 mins of "Irish-Ukrainians not Russians" being said on a loop.



A quick remix was made

This is pretty awesome:

http://www.policymic.com/articles/81873/experience-just-how-big-the-universe-is-in-one-mind-blowing-interactive

Watching the Oscar Pistorius trial while in work. Technology is mad

If I may, I think you're drawing the wrong parallels.

Yanukovych is an elected official, pro-Russian yes, but there's been little to suggest his election was fraudulent. Although his actions since have led to him being kicked out I think you're drawing the wrong parallels between him and Seyss-Inquart, him asking Russia to intervene is about restoring his power, not handing Russia an excuse to invade the Ukraine.

Russia's action has been limited to the Crimea, too, and thats important. You recognise that Crimea is historically and ethnically Russian, but you miss that Crimea is strategically important to Russia, if you're looking for parallels look at stuff like the London Straits Convention and the Treaty's of the Dardanelles. Russia's black sea fleet is historically very important, by a freak of geography Russia's access to warm water ports has been historically low and in Sevastopol they have their only warm water port on the black sea (I think they're building/have built another one at Novorossiysk but there's negligible strategic value to that site atm).

For Russian interests in the middle East and Eastern Europe the loss of Sevastopol would be pretty devastating, yes the Black Sea fleet is becoming increasingly obsolete, but Russia paid about £42bn for access to that port until 2042 4 years ago. It's obvious they will protect that investment.

I also think there's an extent to which Putin is poking the American response. He won a huge diplomatic victory over Syria and left Obama with egg all over his face, Russia's resources are much poorer, but America's response to crises recently has been dithering. Whether Crimea becomes Russian or not, this is about showing that, in reality, Russia has as much of a claim to Crimea as the Ukraine, if not more.

Put simply, it's more complicated than the Cold War rhetoric of 'RUSSIA BAD/WEST GOOD' there's a lot more complicated themes of strategy, politics and a whole host of post-Soviet issues of integration of Russian speakers into former-USSR states like Ukraine, Georgia (see the South Ossetia conflict), Estonia and so on.

EDIT: South Ossetia is a good example. Because Russia got involved, America shouted a lot and then an independent commission found that it was started how Russia said, by a bunch of Georgians artillery striking Russians.

John Kerry telling Russia that one doesn't invade a country on phony pretext was hilariously hypocritical.

Awesome from Neymar and Brazil