There is quite a bit more than just the cooling system in the picture. Coax cables take control signals from room temperature to the quantum processor and readout signals back. The signal paths include attenuation, filtering and amplification in various stages. The processor itself is in a magnetic shield, which is the grey cylinder at the bottom.

It really is a genuine question. I want to understand some logic, anything at all, that compels Russia to behave the way they are.

I’m far beyond trying to convince anybody and way too old to care what people say. Occasionally, and seemingly today is one of those occasions, I quite like to call out idiots. It is a small pleasure, but a pleasure nonetheless.

Quite how you concluded that my post was an excuse to post a link to BBC is beyond my admittedly limited comprehension. The logic that took you to that conclusion is intriguing, so please do explain.

You further imply that BBC is an iffy source. For me, that is a devastating perspective. Would you kindly help me find sources that are less iffy, please?

ZZ Top on holiday

However, wiping eyes with fresh chillies is clearly preferable to either.

This happens easily for big successful organisations. Over decades a strong culture aligned with how they succeed forms. Once the market changes requiring a culture change, a seemingly invincible company suddenly stumbles. They simply can’t respond even if they what they should change.

Ex. Rolls Royce CEO stated this phenomenon well: culture eats strategy for breakfast.

The number of arsehole men is too damn high. Whenever I see or hear these stories my blood boils.

Remember when email was useful? I remember when it was magical!

Time for a story from the ancient times. I had this idea and asked my professor for advice. He said he knew a person on the other side of the world who would know all about it. “This is his ‘email’ address.”

I had never heard about ‘email’ so I needed to learn what it was and how to send one. I wrote my message and off it went. The very next morning I had a reply. One of the best experts on a topic I was keen about had shared their thoughts from the other side of the world, just like that.

In that time, a long time ago as you’ll appreciate, that interaction was magical.

In an instant I understood the power of the Usenet. A while later and with a couple of additional protocols they started calling that the Internet.

I made couple of bass tramps tuned to the room’s main resonant frequencies, which I measured. I followed instructions from the book.

I added sound absorber panels to the walls and ceiling to kill immediate reflections from the main speakers plus a sprinkling of additional panels to kill reflections and also act as decoration. I also needed to move one radiator because it was in the worst possible location for my setup.

The room got thick curtains to improve absorption, and they also darken the room as it is dual use music listening and home cinema room. A few defraction elements went into the ceiling for a good measure. The ceiling is made of custom panels that I made myself from wood and fabric to allow sound energy through to the various acoustic elements behind them.

I also spent a fair amount of time with subwoofer placement, but in the end it became a bit of a compromise between sound and placement of furniture. Nothing a bit of signal processing can’t deal with, mind.

Master Handbook of Acoustics is your friend if you want to learn what to do to your room. Overkill for most, admittedly, but it contains everything you need to know.

I think there is another aspect that is important: limit the blast radius. Shit inevitably happens when you create something new and complex, and when it does, you’d rather minimise the impact where possible.

So far I’ve found everything I looked for, and a few new ones too. Their app features for lyrics and other songs you might like work great. Admittedly, I’m an old metal head who loves singing to a song at the top of the voice, out of tune of course, so I might not be skirting the kinds of niches you like.

I switched to Tidal a few weeks ago, primarily because of lossless streaming, but also fuck Spotify for your price hikes. Not going back.

Latinum. Fix that for you.

Almost all albums I love most took several listens to get into. Music that sounds great on first listen often becomes boring quickly. More challenging stuff takes its time but in the end delivers much more pleasure.

The story of Nokia the company is long and meandering. Its roots go back to late 1860’s in the town of Nokia in Southern Finland, near the city of Tampere, from where they’ve gone through all sorts of businesses, including rubber boots and industrial capacitors to name just two. You might even find an old Nokia TV knocking about. The mobile handsets phase was in some sense but a blip in the story, although a spectacular one. I’m sure they’ll keep going in one way or another for a fair while still.

I have seen that pose before!

Here are Myles and Ronnie.

Neighbouring town has a street called Pig Lane. Where the police station is. Perfection.