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Tar_alcaran, to memes in 'political cartoons ARE NOT MEMES!!!' lmao

Yes. Or rather, it was flashlight photography, as opposed to “old fashioned” photography where you had to hold perfectly still for several seconds. Of course, flash powder existed before, but it was messy, dangerous, flammable and left a layer of white ash everywhere. Most people today would only recognise the pan full of magnesium flash powder from cartoons, but you can probably guess it wasn’t popular at parties or with hobbyists.

In the 1920s, flash bulbs were the awesome new thing, meaning you could take split second photos, and those could be action shots, and not staged and posed portraits. Taking a flashlight was doable quickly and easily, and of course as we all know, most random photos by random people aren’t great.

The name photograph was already used for the old thing, so “flashlight” became the obvious abbreviation.

Tar_alcaran, to memes in He's a Maoist now

That’s pretty high praise for Ben Garrison.

Tar_alcaran, to historyporn in Stockholm on 'H-Day', when Sweden swapped from driving on the left-side of the road to the right, 1967

When renting mopeds in SE Asia, I asked which side of the road they drive on. The man answered “we drive where there is shade”. I laughed, rented the moped and returned it 30 minutes and 2 near deaths later.

Tar_alcaran, to historyporn in South African diamond miner being x-rayed at the end of his shift to prevent theft, 1954

Sorry, I had a brainfart there. You’re completely right.

The tube itself emits xrays, but soft xrays have a very high chance of being absorbed by Carbon, Nitrogen and Oxygen. And since that’s mostly what makes up a human, that’s kinda bad.

Also he’s digging up diamonds, which is in rocks full of radioactive materials. Diamond mine tailings are famously radioactive (and interesting) due all the thorium and radium in them.

Tar_alcaran, (edited ) to historyporn in South African diamond miner being x-rayed at the end of his shift to prevent theft, 1954

You might be thinking that getting an x-ray every day is bad for the miners, but this is a ye-olde look through machine. Yes it’s bad for the miners, but the guy looking at it is putting his face and uppee body right in the beam here. And I’m guessing he does hundreds of these a day.

Then again, old timey x-ray machines were pretty soft, so (edit) AND the miner is getting big dose of alpha and beta radiation too. And at least the technician isn’t breathing coal dust, so it’s probably a toss up who gets cancers first.

Tar_alcaran, to historyporn in South African diamond miner being x-rayed at the end of his shift to prevent theft, 1954

100% accuracy with enough attempts!

Tar_alcaran, to memes in Sugar, spice and too little nice

the boomers were the creators of the internet and tech

No, a very tiny number of them were. The vast majority can just about connect to their own wifi assuming the guide was printed and not a QR code.

Gen Z grew up with tech just basically works, and hides all the complicated stuff behind 17 submenus and automatic installs. I know plenty of gen Z who literally don’t know what a file path is.

Millenials and Gen X are the generations who needed to know tech if they wanted to use it. Unlike tech savvy boomers, there’s a lot of them, since computers were consumer products by then. And unlike gen Z, nothing was simple or automatic and there were no guides. You learned how to learn, or you didn’t get to use a PC for anything other than solitaire.

Tar_alcaran, to memes in Sugar, spice and too little nice

At least Happy Days have us Mork and Mindy, somehow.

Tar_alcaran, to memes in Sugar, spice and too little nice

I know boomers who would code circles around any of the kids who think that configuring wifi is the height of tech literacy.

I know one of those too. And all the others call their grandkids to configure the wifiinstall the internet on their phone for them.

Tar_alcaran, to historyporn in Anti-Air Searchlights at the Rock of Gibraltar, WW2, 1942

How do you report on stuff while sealed in? I mean, I get a cable and antenna, but how do you actually learn things?

Tar_alcaran, to historyporn in Filipino "Women Guerrilla" corps practicing marksmanship, WW2, 1941

What rifle is that, and why does it have what seems to be a grenade sight?

Tar_alcaran, to science_memes in The real double-slit quantum eraser they don't want you to know about!

He had one kerfluffle in '09 about climate change, but quickly corrected it. I can’t find the actual post, but ![scienceblogs.com/…/james-randi-stands-corrected-p](references to it) are ![discovermagazine.com/…/randi-skepticism-and-globa…](are plenty).

Nobody should be taking Uri Geller seriously, so that’s good.

The “Randi is a pedo” is from a very obviously take smear campaign that is about as real as any of the fraudsters randi debunked.

As for mediation, a massive number of the claims about it ARE fake. Randi has some very clear YouTube videos about his opinion on meditation.

It really sounds like you have a personal grudge against the guy. So now I’m wondering which of your beloved ideas he debunked, or if you simply didn’t spend the 40 minutes requires to research these claims.

Tar_alcaran, to science_memes in The real double-slit quantum eraser they don't want you to know about!

Btw, please don’t use Anti-Asian phrases created by a literal Pedophile in your debunks (Woo Woo)

Wut? I’m pretty sure this has been a derogatory term for pseudoscience since at least the early 90s. I dunno what you think the origins of the word are, but the only relation to Asian people or culture I can find are in the form of it being used to mock charlatans peddling vaguely Asian-sounding spiritual beliefs.

Tar_alcaran, to asklemmy in Tech workers - what did your IT Security team do that made your life hell and had no practical benefit?

I’m honestly not sure how they thought that would work.

Just manually copy-paste everything. That never goes wrong, right?

Tar_alcaran, to asklemmy in Tech workers - what did your IT Security team do that made your life hell and had no practical benefit?

Lots of safety measures really suck. But they generally get implemented because the alternative is far worse.

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