Tootfinder

As usual we watched the "Stoertebekker" stage play at Ralswiek on Rügen Island. The stage setups and wardrobes were as awesome as always. They really try to improve on that every year and come up with clever mechanisms to transform the building for the various acts of the play. The script this year left room for desire ;) Nevertheless a happing worth attending
htt…

It's now been 16 years since the Special Edition remake of The Secret of Monkey Island shipped 19 years after the original game.

Indian Creek Village,
the “Billionaire Bunker” near Miami,
couldn’t get approval to discharge its waste into a neighboring town’s sewer lines.
So the village quietly persuaded state lawmakers to force the issue.
In a world where billionaires are increasingly exercising political clout,
the fight over sewage in Indian Creek suggests the degree to which their influence is extending not just to policy in the White House and Congress but to some of the most foundat…

A Billionaire Island Where Bezos and Kushner Live Is Fighting Over Sewage
Indian Creek Village, the “Billionaire Bunker” near Miami, couldn’t get approval to discharge its waste into a neighboring town’s sewer lines. So the village quietly persuaded state lawmakers to come to the rescue.

Sky and ITV renew their long-standing content partnership, ensuring major ITV shows remain on all Sky TV platforms in the UK, without disclosing financial terms (Lily Ford/The Hollywood Reporter)
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-ne

Sky and ITV Renew Long-Standing Content Deal
ITV's biggest shows, such as 'Love Island' and 'Trigger Point,' will remain available across all Sky TV platforms in Britain.

Voted in the Hottest 100 of Australian songs. Suspect my finished list was totally different to my first ten selections. #hottest100

Fascinating article, from the island of Seil:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/15/biology-mycorrhizal-fungi-map-restoring-world-forests

Supporting SEN\'{C}OTEN Language Documentation Efforts with Automatic Speech Recognition
Mengzhe Geng, Patrick Littell, Aidan Pine, PEN\'A\'C, Marc Tessier, Roland Kuhn
https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.10827

Supporting SENĆOTEN Language Documentation Efforts with Automatic Speech Recognition
The SENĆOTEN language, spoken on the Saanich peninsula of southern Vancouver Island, is in the midst of vigorous language revitalization efforts to turn the tide of language loss as a result of colonial language policies. To support these on-the-ground efforts, the community is turning to digital technology. Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) technology holds great promise for accelerating language documentation and the creation of educational resources. However, developing ASR systems for SEN…

At the Hiroshige exhibition, in the British Museum. It's so peaceful and cool here. And the colours are magnificent.
#art #japan

Green Therapy
(an impression from an early morning hike last July)
#ForestFriday #LandscapePhotography #NaturePhotography

Judge Blocks ICE Plans for Rikers Island Office Indefinitely - The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/13/nyregion/ice-rikers-island-judge-mayor-adams.html

"Coral reefs and seagrass get new protections off Tanzania’s Pemba Island"
#Tanzania #Coral #CoralReef #Environment

Coral reefs and seagrass get new protections off Tanzania’s Pemba Island
Tanzania will establish two new marine protected areas off the eastern coast of Pemba Island in the semiautonomous region of Zanzibar, the fisheries minister for Zanzibar announced at the United Nations Ocean Conference in Nice, France, on June 10. Zanzibar’s minister for blue economy and fisheries, Shaaban Ali Othman, said at the conference that the […]

I’ve been fascinated by the great auk for a while and was delighted to find this one on the shore of Skerjafjörður. This sculpture is easier to get to than the one Reykjaness by Todd McGrain. This sculpture is by œlöf Nordal, more info in alt.

Call For a Ban on Horse-Drawn Carriages in Mallorca #AnimalRights

Call for a Ban on Horse-Drawn Carriages in Mallorca
Dozens of horses on the Spanish island are forced to pull tourist carriages until they collapse from exhaustion. Join us in calling for a ban on this cruel practice.

"""
"[…] Wanting a man got me into awful troubles more than once. But wanting to get married, never! No, no. None of that for me."
"Why not?" Tenar demanded.
Taken aback, Moss said simply, "Why, what man'd marry a witch?" And then, with a sidelong chewing motion of her jaw, like a sheep shifting its cud, “And what witch’d marry a man?"
They split rushes.
"What's wrong with men?" Tenar inquired cautiously.
As cautiously, lowering her voice, Moss replied, "I don't know, my dearie. I’ve thought on it. Often I’ve thought on it. The best I can say it is like this. A man’s in his skin, see, like a nut in its shell." She held up her long, bent, wet fingers as if holding a walnut. “It’s hard and strong, that shell, and it’s all full of him. Full of grand man-meat, man-self. And that’s all. That’s all there is. It’s all him and nothing else, inside."
Tenar pondered awhile and finally asked, "But if he's a wizard—"
"Then it's all his power, inside. His power’s himself, see. That’s how it is with him. And that’s all. When his power goes, he’s gone. Empty." She cracked the unseen walnut and tossed the shells away. “Nothing."
"And a woman, then?"
"Oh, well, dearie, a woman's a different thing entirely. Who knows where a woman begins and ends? Listen, mistress, I have roots, I have roots deeper than this island. Deeper than the sea, older than the raising of the lands. I go back into the dark." Moss’s eyes shone with a weird brightness in their red rims and her voice sang like an instrument. “I go back into the dark! Before the moon I was. No one knows, no one knows, no one can say what I am, what a woman is, a woman of power, a woman’s power, deeper than the roots of trees, deeper than the roots of islands, older than the Making, older than the moon. Who dares ask questions of the dark? Who’ll ask the dark its name?"
"""
(Ursula K. Le Guin, Tehanu)

"Rhode Island Freedom to Read Act is First in Nation with Special Guarantees to Writers and Readers Against Censorship"
https://pen.org/press-release/rhode-island-freedom-to-read-act…

Rhode Island Freedom to Read Act is First in Nation with Special Guarantees to Writers and Readers Against Censorship - PEN America
Joining a growing number of states that are passing laws to protect the right to read, Rhode Island’s newly signed Freedom to Read Act provides safeguards for both public and school libraries, protections for librarians and staff and is the first in the nation to guarantee writers and readers a special right of action against censorship.

Aunque parezca difícil de creer, hay un nuevo šlbum de King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, la banda que desde el 2012 ha publicado 27 discos de estudios ademšs otros tantos en vivo, compilaciones y remixes y EP.
«Phantom Island»
https://open.spotify.com/album/3koVdFrX…

The one good thing about the whole US interference in #Greenland thing is that I no longer have to explain to journalists and others that the island is part of the Kingdom of Denmark (for now). But there's so much more that people should know about Greenland.
Which is the thrust of this piece:
https://www.thearcticinstitute.org/who-expert-greenland/

Congratulations on the retirement of Bill Curry after 13 years as head of the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences, following an already amazing, full career at Wood's Hole Oceanographic Insitution where he was a leader in marine geology, #climate and #carbon cycling research.

what if we kissed in the "fresh kills" estuary at staten island 👉👈

Fallout: Spies On Norfolk Island
Great Australian Pods Podcast Directory: #GreatAusPods

"Restoration, protection aim to save Belize’s coral reef from extreme heat and disease"
#Belize #Environment #CoralReef

Restoration, protection aim to save Belize’s coral reef from extreme heat and disease
PLACENCIA, Belize — After Hurricane Iris decimated the coral reef at Laughing Bird Caye National Park in 2001, many wrote off the UNESCO World Heritage site as a coral graveyard. But a small group from the coastal village of Placencia, Belize, about 18 kilometers (11 miles) from the island, saw hope. In 2006, the park […]

If you're trying to do the trick that was shared for #nintendoswitch2 where you can use a USB HDMI capture dongle HDMI to USB-C cable to use your iPhone as a camera - don't use the True Visage app mentioned in the video
That will rely on screen sharing mirroring and you'll potentially get an aspect ratio mismatch and see the dynamic island floating in your view
I'd personally suggest the free "Blackmagic Camera" app instead, and then go to:
Settings->Monitor->HDMI Out
Switch from Mirror Display to Video Feed and it will cleanly output your camera. Works for a Lightning to HDMI out adapter for older phones, too
Then just tap on Lense and FPS and pick which combo you like.
Also, if you're not getting any output signal make sure the capture dongle you're using supports 1080p out - not sure the Switch 2 supports anything higher as camera input

China's Hainan province tests letting some corporate users bypass the Great Firewall and access the global internet, as it seeks to become a free-trade port (Ben Jiang/South China Morning Post)
https://www.scmp.com/tech/policy…

China will drop the Great Firewall for some users, but only in southern Hainan
Employees of companies operating in the island province can apply for the ‘Global Connect’ scheme, but some content will remain restricted.

Me: Hey, we could ride those bikes!
Partner: They’re locked up.
Me: Are they, though?
(That was last night. There were two bikes there. Note that we are on an island, there’s only so far a thief would get. There are tons of unlocked bikes around. I’m sure the owner just went for a ride. Still a funny photo though!)
#bikeTooter

lol that's quite the caption https://gothamist.com/news/staten-islands-lost-city-of-wild-beaches-is-a-spiritual-refuge-for-new-yorkers

Staten Island's 'lost city' of wild beaches is a spiritual refuge for New Yorkers
Many of the borough's beaches are secluded and lack lifeguards. For many visitors, that’s key to their appeal.

Up close, the aging visages of the moai are riddled with signs of erosion and staining.
They are gradually wearing away to dust.
Tuki, who works in Rapa Nui's tourism industry, is essentially watching these stunning figures slowly disappear.
"My father told me that the moai would go back into the ocean one day," she says.
Tuki's father, who died in 2020, was a famed contemporary moai sculptor.
The original statues, mostly carved between 110…

Is this the end for Easter Island's moai statues?
Easter Island's famous moai statues are crumbling into the sea, forcing locals to face urgent decisions about how best to protect their heritage.

On the new BC Ferries being built in China.
Do we all remember the last time the BC NDP went down the road of “building a shipbuilding industry to build ferries”?
It has its own Wiki, of course.
"In addition to major delays and cost overruns, the ferries never fully met their original specifications, and only operated briefly in a reduced capacity, before being auctioned off at a substantial loss by the subsequently elected BC Liberal Party government.”
No, I'm not thrilled that China, an authoritarian state, is going to be building these ferries. But no BC or Canadian firms bid on the contract. And right now, the expertise in ship building is in China and Europe (the Island and Salish class vessels were built in Europe).
I don't blame the NDP for not repeating the same mistake 30 years later.
And the ferries will still be refit and maintained for their full service life within BC.
#BCPoli #BCNDP #FastFerry #Shipbuilding.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_ferry_scandal

It did happen before, but 43.6°C on the island of Gran Canaria, in the Atlantic Ocean, is quite extreme. Hottest place in Spain yesterday.
(That's 110.5F)
Source: @aemet.es

JD's joke's on us, there *are* no left wing billionaires
Ain't that many left wing politicians left in the USA, either, and I bet the ones we have left *weren't* on Pedophilia Island chartered flights

I think the root of the “AI” evil is when AI researchers in the 1960s recognized that they outrageously underestimated the complexity of the human mind.
They became utterly humiliated by their self-congratulatory promises from the 1950s that AGI was just a few years away—and then went full goblin mode that’s lasting to this day, even if the original researchers (like Minsky*) died long ago.
*probably raped children on Epstein’s island

Concentrated valence nucleons transfer in heavy-ion collisions: implications for questing the stable superheavy elements
Zepeng Gao, Yinu Zhang, Long Zhu
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.06839

Concentrated valence nucleons transfer in heavy-ion collisions: implications for questing the stable superheavy elements
The multinucleon transfer process is regarded as a promising pathway for producing the stable superheavy elements. However, the underlying mechanism, especially the possible transfer channels for sailing to the ``island of stability'' are poorly known. In this work, the time-dependent Hartree-Fock theory is used to investigate the collision dynamics of $^{136}$Xe, $^{198}$Pt, $^{238}$U + $^{238}$U reactions. A novel reaction channel of the concentrated valence nucleons (CVN) transferring is fou…

Join us at DWeb Camp Cascadia this August on Salt Spring Island https://dwebyvr.org/camp/
You can follow the @… account or just use / foll…

Sold to the Trump family: one of the last undeveloped islands in the Mediterranean;
Ivanka Trump & Jared Kushner have spent over $1bn on an Albanian island that will be a luxury resort – once unexploded ordnance has been removed
https://www.thegua…

A Corrective Frequency-Constrained Unit Commitment with Data-driven Estimation of Optimal UFLS in Island Power Systems
Miad Sarvarizadeh, Lukas Sigrist, Almudena Rouco, Mohammad Rajabdorri, Enrique Lobato
https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.05062

A Corrective Frequency-Constrained Unit Commitment with Data-driven Estimation of Optimal UFLS in Island Power Systems
This paper presents a novel corrective \gls{fcuc} formulation for island power systems by implementing data-driven constraint learning to estimate the optimal \gls{ufls}. The Tobit model is presented to estimate the optimal amount of \gls{ufls} using the initial rate of change of frequency. The proposed formulation enables co-optimizing operation costs and \gls{ufls}. The aim is to account for optimal \gls{ufls} occurrences during operation planning, without increasing them. This would potentia…

stuff busta would enjoy

There’s a new museum on Naoshima Island! This NYT article also describes the many other museums and exhibits installed there.
This is the “art island” that Lynn and I visited a couple months ago. Looks like we’ll have to go back! This time we’ll know to book rooms way in advance (and to stay longer than two nights).
🎁 link

Japanese Islands’ 10th Tadao Ando Museum Caps a Billionaire’s Quest
Benesse Art Site Naoshima, a sprawling art constellation on three islands, adds a 10th museum by the star architect Tadao Ando that caps the cultural quest of Soichiro Fukutake.

There's a mysterious 'carbon sink' in the hinterlands of the South Island... absorbing more carbon than expected... I'm following this research with interest. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/564407…

All I know about Love Island season 2 is that the men are bunch of scrubs. I heard it on NPR.

"Maldives resort islands expand solar to meet half of power demand"
#Maldives #SolarPower #Energy #Renewables

Maldives resort islands expand solar to meet half of power demand
The Fari Islands in the Maldives are developing a mix of floating and ground-mounted solar installations expected to meet up to 50% of the archipelago’s electricity demand on sunny days. The systems form part of a broader plan to expand renewable energy use across the four-island resort development.

Million-Year-Old Evidence of Epic Journey Near ‘Hobbit’ Island Discovered by Scientists https://www.404media.co/indonesian-island-sulawesi-early-humans-hobbits-calio/

Eighty years ago, on Aug. 6, 1945, a B-29 bomber named the Enola Gay took off from Tinian Island, in the Northern Mariana Islands,
for a mission that its flight crew knew would make history
‘My teeth told me’:
What it was like aboard the Enola Gay
https://www.washingtonpost.co…

‘My teeth told me’: What it was like aboard the Enola Gay
Eighty years ago, a group of B-29 bombers flew a world-altering mission. Here are memories of the crew.

‘Swashbuckling and cheeky’: island festival celebrates Ireland’s ‘pirate queen’ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/29/grace-o-malley-pirate-queen-ireland-festival-achill-island?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other…

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2409.17061 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_qu…

Against (unitary) interpretation (of quantum mechanics): removing the metaphysical load
On 6 June 1925 Heisenberg arrived at Helgoland/Heligoland island to escape a fit of hay fever. He returned with a sketch of a strange theory of the micro-world of atoms, which we now call quantum mechanics. This e-print of ours attempts to present a look on that theory which tries to return to the original insight of Heisenberg, on what should be the essence of a theory of atomic realm: it must be a theory of the observable events, in which fundamentally unobservable quantities have no place. N…

Disney and ITV agree a deal to stream hit shows like The Bear and Love Island on each other's platforms for the first time, starting July 16; both can sell ads (Daniel Thomas/Financial Times)
https://www.ft.com/content/97a2dea6-4639-45c1-8499-aa3eed935413

2 years later, my Freedom of Information Request shows a snapshot of Government ignoring Vancouver Islanders for 20 years.
On June 28, 2023 I submitted a Request for Information to the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure of British Columbia for documents related to the Island Railway on Vancouver Island. It took two years to receive the response.
#VancouverIsland #BC #BCPoli #transportation #FOiA #Canada #CdnPoli
https://chrisalemany.ca/b/2tp

MambaITD: An Efficient Cross-Modal Mamba Network for Insider Threat Detection
Kaichuan Kong, Dongjie Liu, Xiaobo Jin, Zhiying Li, Guanggang Geng, Jian Weng
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.05695

MambaITD: An Efficient Cross-Modal Mamba Network for Insider Threat Detection
Enterprises are facing increasing risks of insider threats, while existing detection methods are unable to effectively address these challenges due to reasons such as insufficient temporal dynamic feature modeling, computational efficiency and real-time bottlenecks and cross-modal information island problem. This paper proposes a new insider threat detection framework MambaITD based on the Mamba state space model and cross-modal adaptive fusion. First, the multi-source log preprocessing module …

Taiwan has issued a land warning as Typhoon Danas approaches from the southwest, bringing the threat of heavy rain and strong winds. The storm is expected to peak from Sunday afternoon through Monday morning, affecting 18 counties and cities across the island.
https://youtu.be/DmtZ4TGKqN0

🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on KEXP's #VarietyMix
The Coup:
🎵 Long Island Iced Tea, Neat
#TheCoup
https://open.spotify.com/track/2dmZdwbc2oht3iwZ3BjIMy

I was late to pick my daughter up from camp because #NYCParks closed a huge portion of Corona-Meadows Flushing Park. Apparently for some kind of music festival. There was, of course, no bike detour. The area has highways running through it, and the bridges over the highways are cordoned off. How do you get to

“The Miyawaki forests aren’t going to solve all our problems,” she says. “It’s not a magic wand, but it will solve one of the thousands of problems we have. We need a system of solutions, and this is one of them.”
https://engl…

Miyawaki in Nezahualcóyotl: The Japanese method of creating forests comes to Mexico
The municipality, adjacent to Mexico City and surrounded by concrete, suffers from the heat island effect. The community came to the rescue with this accelerated tree planting method

Buzzword-First Strategy cartoon - Marketoonist | Tom Fishburne https://bit.ly/4koSqvW

Climate change melts nearly 25% of glaciers on pristine sub-Antarctic island #Antarctic

Climate change melts nearly 25% of glaciers on pristine sub-Antarctic island
Almost a quarter of the glaciers in one of the world's last pristine ecosystems have melted from climate change, according to new research from Monash University.

Trade the Cracker Barrel for #Caribbean...Buy a $200k home on one of these 5 isles, and you get free dual #citizenship allowing you #visa-free access to up to 150 other countries ...

This has the fingerprints of Dog-E sabotage.
What is also bothersome is the way that agency spokespeople have so quickly become the kind of sycophantic courtiers that Jonathan Swift described on the floating island of Laputa in his book Gulliver's Travels.
"Sudden loss of key US satellite data could send hurricane forecasting back ‘decades’"

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.03085 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_…

How probable is the Lyman-$α$ damping wing in the spectrum of the redshift z = 5.9896 quasar ULAS J0148+0600?
The shape of the Ly-$α$ transmission in the near zone of the redshift $z=5.9896$ quasar ULAS J0148$+$0600 (hereafter J0148) is consistent with a damping wing arising from an extended neutral hydrogen island in the diffuse intergalactic medium (IGM). Here we use simulations of late-ending reionisation from Sherwood-Relics to assess the expected incidence of quasars with Ly-$α$ and Ly-$β$ absorption similar to the observed J0148 spectrum. We find a late end to reionisation at $z=5.3$ is a nece…

The interaction of turbulence, magnetic islands and zonal fields in fluid plasma models with cubic non-linearities
Daniele Villa, Nicolas Dubuit, Olivier Agullo, Xavier Garbet
https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.23593

The interaction of turbulence, magnetic islands and zonal fields in fluid plasma models with cubic non-linearities
It is shown that magnetic islands generated by pressure-gradient-driven turbulence are common across a wide range of conditions. The interaction among turbulence, magnetic island and other large scale structures (the zonal flow and the zonal current), largely determines the dynamics of the system. Turbulence takes a background role, providing energy to the large-scale structures, without influencing their evolution directly. The growth of the zonal current is linearly related to that of the mag…

Sold to the Trump family: one of the last undeveloped islands in the Mediterranean (Marzio Mian/The Guardian)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/24/trump-family-kushner-undeveloped-island-mediterranean-sazan-albania
http://www.memeorandum.com/250624/p85#a250624p85

Australia introduces 'climate visa' for Tuvaluans as rising sea levels threaten the island nation. #climatechange #climatesolutions #climate

A Special ‘Climate’ Visa? People in Tuvalu Are Applying Fast.
Nearly half the citizens of the tiny Pacific Island nation have already applied in a lottery for Australian visas amid an existential threat from global warming and sea-level rise.

Disney and ITV agree a deal to stream hit shows like The Bear and Love Island on each other's platforms for the first time, starting July 16; both can sell ads (Daniel Thomas/Financial Times)
https://www.ft.com/content/97a2dea6-4639-45c1-8499-aa3eed935413
…

#Norway is ending #coal #mining

We just went to see "The Ballad of Wallis Island". It was really good. Anyone else seen it? Loved the unseen character, the cinematography, and the superb acting. A real treat.
#Film

Peripheral subgroups of Kleinian groups
Alex Elzenaar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.00297 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2508.00297

Peripheral subgroups of Kleinian groups
The conformal boundary of a hyperbolic $3$-manifold $M$ is a union of Riemann surfaces. If any of these Riemann surfaces has a nontrivial Teichmüller space, then the hyperbolic metric of $M$ can be deformed quasi-isometrically. These deformations correspond to a small pertubations in the matrices of the holonomy group of $M$, which together give an island of discrete representations around the identity map in $ X=\mathrm{Hom}(π_1(M), \mathsf{PSL}(2,\mathbb{C})) $. Determining the extent of th…

"There was once a programming environment made by Microsoft called Visual J . It allowed one to write, debug, and run Java code on Windows. Visual J was the first serious, usable, complete IDE Java ever had, at least until IntelliJ IDEA appeared in 2001."
https://deprogrammaticaipsum.com/w…

Write Anywhere, Run Once
Back in the days when I had a day job in the .NET galaxy, I had a colleague who was a terrific C# developer… born in the island of Java. Given the looks I got from him, I think I was the first to point this fact to him. Or maybe I just pissed him off. In any case, here go some personal anecdotes around Java, stretching back 23 years.

⛽ Floating platform to produce synthetic fuels using wind, seawater, and air
#fuels

Floating platform to produce synthetic fuels using wind, seawater, and air
Off-grid, modular, and seaworthy: KIT (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology) and partners intend to produce synthetic fuels on a floating platform using wind energy, seawater, and ambient air. For this purpose, the "PtX-Wind" project was launched under the H2Mare lead project. A corresponding modular plant was installed on a barge and lies operational at anchor in Bremerhaven. Later this year, it will start producing synthetic fuel directly on the sea just off Helgoland Island.

Earlier this month, #TomPatterson released a free (public domain) print-quality physical map of maritime Southeast Asia. It could actually almost double as a map of SEA except the northern part of Myanmar is cut off. 🗺️
https://

Right now there's an ACM design technology conference happening with hundreds of people flying in to a conference facility on a remote island to discuss the conference theme of how to make their work more sustainable. In-person participation only.

Good time for Xi to create a crisis around Taiwan.
https://apnews.com/article/taiwan-china-planes-center-line-british-ship-b1618804e7a4bc66c411cb3cb171480a

China sends scores of planes across central line in Taiwan Strait
China has sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early Friday, 61 of which crossed the central line in the Taiwan Strait unofficially dividing the sides. China considers Taiwan its own territory and uses such deployments to advertise its threat to encircle and possibly invade the self-governing island. It wasn't clear why so many planes were scrambled between late Thursday and early Friday, as tabulated by Taiwan's Defense Ministry. The planes were sent in two separate tranch…

The US Virgin Islands have their own territorial court system, and any crimes committed there may be territorial crimes, not federal crimes.
The prosecution of such crimes would not need US DOJ nor White House permission to proceed.
Epstein Island is in the US Virgin Islands.
#USpol

A Tiny Gecko Species Once Thought Extinct Just Made a Comeback in the Galšpagos https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/tiny-gecko-species-once-thought-extinct-made-a-comeback-in-galapagos/

A Tiny Gecko Species Once Thought Extinct Just Made a Comeback in the Galápagos
Scientists confirmed the rediscovery of a tiny gecko species once thought extinct on Rábida Island in the Galápagos.

Recently ran into some YouTube videos of a couple Greek guys running an Italian restaurant in (on the island of, at least) #Montreal.
That tracks as much as anything will track today.
(The way they blatantly praise the often-mediocre cheese megabrand they use for their pizza—like they've received a visit or two from the "sales enforcers" in the past—also tracks…)

Movies watched in July, ranked (being on the bottom doesn’t mean it’s bad)
(1/2)
- The Graduate (1967) 🌞
- Kneecap (2024) 🔁
- The Ballad of Wallis Island (2025)
- The Substance (2024) 🔁
- 28 Days Later (2002) 🔁
- A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) 🩸🔁
- 28 Years Later (2025)
- F1 (2025)
- Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004) 🌏🔁
- 28 Weeks Later (2007)
- An Unfinished Film (2024)
- …
🔁 — rewatch
🩸 — Creepy Crypt
…

On the orientation of historic Christian churches of Fuerteventura: conciliating tradition, winds and topography
Maria Florencia Muratore, Alejandro Gangui, Maitane Urrutia-Aparicio, Carmelo Cabrera, Juan Antonio Belmonte
https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.18161

On the orientation of historic Christian churches of Fuerteventura: conciliating tradition, winds and topography
We present the results of an analysis of the precise spatial orientation of colonial Christian churches located in the Canary Island of Fuerteventura (Spain). Our sample consists of 48 churches, most built during the period between the Castilian conquest led by the Norman Jean de Béthencourt in the 15th century and the end of the 19th century. We examine whether the standard tradition was followed regarding the orientation of the apses of historic churches eastwards. While most of the religiou…

The Arctic island of Svalbard is so reliably frigid that humanity bet its future on the place.
Since 2008, the "Svalbard Global Seed Vault" — set deep in frozen soil known as permafrost — has accepted nearly 1.4 million samples of more than 6,000 species of critical crops.
⭐️ But, the island is warming six to seven times faster than the rest of the planet, making even winters freakishly hot -- at least by Arctic standards.
Indeed, in 2017, an access tunnel to the…

Troubling scenes from an Arctic in full-tilt crisis
The heat that hit Svalbard in February was so intense that scientists could dig into the ground with spoons, "like it was soft ice cream."

My phone chose this as its lock screen background, so I just have to share it. On Jurmo island in the Gulf of Finland, May 2022.

"The places that need to worry are those that look vulnerable or unlikely to fight back. Greenland may fall into that category — which suggests that Denmark and the EU need to find ways of letting Trump know that there will be a price to pay if he makes a move on the island"
Trump always chickens out on foreign policy too - https://on.ft.com/458Z5FI v

"a federal judge in Rhode Island has prohibited officials from setting new restrictions on grants issued by the Violence Against Women Act based on Trump's executive order purging the federal government of "gender ideology.""
Trump crackdown hits legal wall with new ruling - Raw Story
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-judge-2673870689/

Them: "check out this asshole legislator getting heckled!"
Me: "Ooh that's a nice protected bike lane with.. is that a bus island? In-lane stops? Sweet!"
https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://bsky.app/profile…

Major food wholesaler says cyberattack impacting distribution systems https://therecord.media/major-food-wholesaler-cyberattack-impacting-distribution

Tina Louise. Sole survivor of the Gilligan's Island curse.

En 1994 llega el disco con el que Pulp da el salto a la fama. His 'n' Hers, publicado bajo el sello Island Records. Ahí se incluye el temazo «Do You Remember the First Time».
https://open.spotify.com/track/0txLC5NA64M8siGn3mnET0

Shinichi Kobayashi has idyllic memories of growing up on Naoshima, one of the nearly 3,000 islands scattered across Japan's Seto Inland Sea.
"We would go clam digging," said the 75-year-old, who became the island's mayor in 2018.
"During the summer, I would spend entire days swimming in the sea, catching turban shells and fish, getting deeply tanned."
"I don't recall seeing any foreign visitors," he added.
Kobayashi's hom…

Setouchi Triennale 2025
The Setouchi Triennale is a contemporary art festival held every three years on the islands of the Seto Inland Sea.

"Climate change melts nearly 25% of glaciers on pristine sub-Antarctic island"
#Antarctic #Climate #ClimateChange

Climate change melts nearly 25% of glaciers on pristine sub-Antarctic island
Almost a quarter of the glaciers in one of the world's last pristine ecosystems have melted from climate change, according to new research from Monash University.

Lots of fuss about an offshore wind cable through the Wadden Sea and the island of Schiermonnikoog. Much less attention for the fact that the entire tidal flats of the Wadden Sea will start drowning when sea level rise reaches a rate of 6 mm/year. https://nos.nl/l/2575462

Omstreden stroomkabel bij Schiermonnikoog komt er toch, 'op z'n minst kortzichtig'
De minister zegt dat de kabel met respect voor de natuur en perspectief voor de landbouw wordt aangelegd, maar burgemeester Ineke van Gent noemt het een slecht besluit.

🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on KEXP's #VarietyMix
The Cure:
🎵 Alone (Ex‐Easter Island Head remix)
#TheCure
https://schwerkraftrecords.bandcamp.com/album/the-cure-alone
https://open.spotify.com/track/1FlKUh04wsO7Z2AFmzplCw

The small Island Class vessels (2019-2021) were built in Romania by Dutch firm Damen Shipbuilding: #BCPoli #BCNDP #FastFerry #Shipbuilding

Experts raise concerns that Malta's expedited MiCA licensing process may lack sufficient enforcement and oversight; OKX received a MiCA license in four days (CoinDesk)
https://www.coindesk.com/news-analysis/202

'Like Ordering McDonald's:' Malta's MiCA Fast-Track Draws Oversight Concerns
Some people think Malta is nimble and innovative when it comes to regulation. But others see a fast track to regulatory arbitrage.

"You’re only asking for trouble,”
said Charles Massimo, a Long Island, New York-based financial advisor and senior vice president at Wealth Enhancement. 
Pros and cons of private assets in 401(k)s
Retirement plans represent a significant market.
Defined-contribution workplace plans
— which include 401(k)s and 403(b) plans, among others
— held $12.2 trillion as of the end of the first quarter of 2025, according to the Investment Company Institute, a tr…

What private assets in 401(k) plans mean for investors: 'You’re only asking for trouble,' one advisor says
Millions of investors may soon have access to private assets in their 401(k) or other workplace retirement plans. What to know about the risks and rewards.

Central American countries most affected by plastic bottle pollution #America

Central American countries most affected by plastic bottle pollution
Most of the plastic bottles and caps that pollute the Pacific coasts of Latin American countries are of local origin, and are mainly produced by the multinational companies The Coca-Cola Company, Aje Group and PepsiCo. The countries most affected by these pollutants are those in Central America, probably due to high consumption of beverages in plastic containers, poor waste management and transport by ocean currents. On the island coasts, bottles of Asian origin are more abundant, probably dump…

"Indigenous divers on Chile’s island restore seabed to protect seafood sources"
#Chile #Environment

Indigenous divers on Chile’s island restore seabed to protect seafood sources
Daniel Caniullán has been diving in the cold waters of the Guaitecas Archipelago in northern Patagonia, Chile, for more than 30 years. “Just by looking at the seabed landscape, you can tell what species you are going to find,” he says. Just as it is possible to recognize the loss of a diverse forest on […]

Adrienne Jones-McAllister told News 12 Long Island that she was undergoing an MRI on her knee
when she asked the technician to get her husband, Keith McAllister, to help her get off the table.
She said she called out to him.
The man, 61, entered the MRI room while a scan was underway
The machine’s strong magnetic force drew him in by the metallic chain around his neck, according to a release from the Nassau County Police Department.
He died Thursday afternoon

Man dies after heavy weight-training chain around neck pulls him into MRI machine
A man whose large metallic weight-training chain around his neck pulled him into an MRI machine in New York after he wandered into the room has died. Nassau County police on Long Island say the 61-year-old man died Thursday afternoon, a day after he entered a room while a Magnetic Resonance Imaging scan was underway at Nassau Open MRI. The police department said in a statement that the strong magnetic force drew him in by his metallic chain. Authorities did not release his name. A person who an…

🏴‍☠️🐒🏝️ Found my long lost diskette 22 of "The Secret of Monkey Island", will finally be able to finish a play-through after all these years.

2,000 species at high risk of extinction from natural disasters, study finds https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/2000-species-at-high-risk-of-extinction-from-natural-disasters-study-finds/

2,000 species at high risk of extinction from natural disasters, study finds
In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria’s assault on the Caribbean island of Dominica in 2017, researchers made a heartbreaking discovery: dead and dying hummingbirds scattered across the forest floor. Among them were purple-throated caribs (Eulampis jugularis), the specialized pollinators of the island’s Heliconia plants. This single storm threatened an evolutionary partnership millions of years in […]

"What birds can teach us about repurposing waste"
#Birds #Animals
https://phys.org/news/2025-06-birds-r…

What birds can teach us about repurposing waste
Modern cities are evolution engines. Urban snails in the Netherlands and lizards in Los Angeles have developed lighter shells and larger scales to cope with the heat island effect, where temperatures can be several degrees above the surrounding area.

TUVALU is preparing to carry out the first planned migration of an entire country in response to the effects of climate change.
Recent studies project that much of its territory could be submerged in the next 25 years due to rising sea levels, forcing its inhabitants to consider migration as an urgent survival measure.

The First Planned Migration of an Entire Country Is Underway
The Pacific island nation of Tuvalu could be submerged in 25 years due to rising sea levels, so a plan is being implemented to relocate its population to Australia.

"2,000 species at high risk of extinction from natural disasters, study finds"
#Animals
https://news.mongabay.com/2025/07/2000

2,000 species at high risk of extinction from natural disasters, study finds
In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria’s assault on the Caribbean island of Dominica in 2017, researchers made a heartbreaking discovery: dead and dying hummingbirds scattered across the forest floor. Among them were purple-throated caribs (Eulampis jugularis), the specialized pollinators of the island’s Heliconia plants. This single storm threatened an evolutionary partnership millions of years in […]

The United States is moving B-2 bombers to the Pacific island of Guam,
as Donald Trump weighs whether the United States should take part in Israel’s strikes against Iran.
It was unclear whether the bomber deployment is tied to Middle East tensions.
The B-2 can be equipped to carry America’s 30,000lb GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator,
designed to destroy targets deep underground.
That is the weapon that experts say could be used to strike Iran’s nuclear program, i…

"Deforestation in the Philippines may have caused infertile hybrids of endemic frogs, study finds"
#Philippines #Frogs #Deforestation

Deforestation in the Philippines may have caused infertile hybrids of endemic frogs, study finds
In 1996, when herpetologist Rafe Brown accompanied a few biologists to the Philippine island of Mindanao to study frogs, they heard a cacophony near their campsite. In a puddle that skirted the forest, hundreds of chubby frogs with big, bright eyes had gathered, looking for mates to breed with. Brown said he remembers hearing two […]

"Could giving this pod of dolphins the same legal rights as humans help keep them safe?"
#Dolphins #Animals
…

China’s president, Xi Jinping, has reportedly told his generals to be ready by 2027 to conquer the self-governing island of Taiwan,
which he regards as stolen sovereign territory.
US officials warned last week that China already has sufficient capability to invade now,
with amphibious landing craft,
D-day-style floating docks, paratroopers and expanded air combat and missile forces in a constant state of readiness.
Recent intimidating offshore military exercises…