In the news: 2013 – The Year of Solar Flare

Are science fiction literature authors correct when they write about solar flares causing Earth’s communications to fail and causing catastrophes worldwide or is this simply a convenient plot device? The year 2013 has seen the most solar flares since 2003 because the Sun’s magnetic field cycle is reversing polarization, as it does every 11 years. This reversal causes larger and more frequent solar flares, which explains why this year has seen a large number of these impressive solar weather occurrences in many years.
In the news: 2013 – The Year of Solar Flare

Deaths, Australia, 2012

This release contains statistics for deaths and mortality in Australia.
Deaths, Australia, 2012

Not All “Viruses” Are Viruses: 10 Malware Terms Explained

Most people seem to call every type of malware a “virus”, but that isn’t technically accurate. You’ve probably heard of many more terms beyond virus: malware, worm, Trojan, rootkit, keylogger, spyware, and more. But what do all these terms mean?
Not All “Viruses” Are Viruses: 10 Malware Terms Explained

Blowing Up A Building In Slo-Mo Is A Great Way To Start The Month

Is there a better way to ring in November than watching a controlled explosion? Sure there is, if said explosion was captured by a Phantom Flex high-speed camera at 2500 fps. The Slow Mo Guys are back and after playing around with a couple of grenades (please don’t try that at home) they set their sites — or viewfinder — on their largest explosion yet.
Blowing Up A Building In Slo-Mo Is A Great Way To Start The Month

Earth's Hellish 'Twin Sister' Discovered

Two studies of an Earth-sized planet circling the sun-like star Kepler-78 show it has Earth-like amounts of iron and rock, the first world of its size that scientists have been able to calculate both density and diameter.
Earth's Hellish 'Twin Sister' Discovered

10 Surprisingly Inspirational Quotes From Evil People

Just because you’re a horrible human being it doesn’t mean that you don’t have something insightful to say. In fact, several of history’s worst people have said some truly inspiring things. Here are some that we’ve found especially perceptive.
10 Surprisingly Inspirational Quotes From Evil People

New Wolfram Problem Generator: Practice and Learn

We are proud to announce Wolfram Problem Generator, a website where students decide which topic they want to practice and we provide the questions and solutions. This is an exciting new way to help students with their classes: previously, students provided their own practice questions and Wolfram|Alpha helped them find answers with Step-by-step solutions. Students can now ask Wolfram|Alpha for help with practice and homework questions and can do practice problems with Wolfram Problem Generator.
New Wolfram Problem Generator: Practice and Learn

Five Ancient Cannons Rescued From Blackbeard's Sunken Ship

Looking like something straight off Davy Jones’s ship in the Pirates of the Caribbean, five cannons saw air for the very first time in almost 300 years yesterday as they were lifted from what’s believed to be legendary pirate Blackbeard’s sunken ship.
Five Ancient Cannons Rescued From Blackbeard's Sunken Ship

How to burn 20 hours of video on a single long-play DVD

Creating your own video DVDs has really become easy in recent time. Most programs ship with all required components so that you only need to use a single one to convert all video files in the appropriate format before the converted data is burned on a disc.
How to burn 20 hours of video on a single long-play DVD

Long-form YouTube: videos of entire long-distance train journeys

YouTube has been an existence-proof of forms of video that were lurking in potentia, unable to come into existence due to limitations of the distribution channel. The two-to-three-minute video has now been firmly established as a genre (with the six-second video hot on its heels), but there's plenty of room at the long end of the scale. Case in point: subculture of YouTubers who post full-length train journeys, hours and hours' worth -- and if that's not long-form enough, how about 134-hour sea crossings?
Long-form YouTube: videos of entire long-distance train journeys

Star Wars bloopers

Unexpectedly hilarious! Sound kicks in at 0:45s.
Star Wars bloopers

Five Best Travel Routers

you’re hitting the road and taking your gadgets with you, a good travel router will help you share the Wi-Fi in your hotel, office or anywhere else. The best ones do it with no hassle, easy setup, and small form-factors that slip nicely into a carry-on bag. Some even keep your gadgets charged while they’re connected.
Five Best Travel Routers

10 Things You Didn't Know About 'The Simpsons'

For over 20 years, The Simpsons have been the most famous animated family in the world. YouTube channel Alltime10s dug deep to find some facts that even super fans might be surprised to learn.
10 Things You Didn't Know About 'The Simpsons'

The 20 Scariest Google Street View Sightings

Google's Street View technology does more than capture mundane shots of city streets. As the platform has evolved, Google has offered striking images from exotic places like the Galápagos Islands, Mount Fuji and the Eiffel Tower. You can even take a look inside CERN's Large Hadron Collider. But Street View has also revealed unintentional surprises, from murder and mayhem to people's most embarrassing moments, and it has the potential to capture terrifying images, too.
The 20 Scariest Google Street View Sightings

Watch All Six Apollo Moon Landings In One Glorious Video

NASA successfully landed six moon missions from 1969 to 1972 — and had one legendary failure. It was a monumental era for NASA, and thanks to bonkers YouTube user lunarmodule5, now you can ride along on a space video mashup of all six heart-pounding landings at once. It’s breathtaking.
Watch All Six Apollo Moon Landings In One Glorious Video

Five Tricky Job Interview Questions (And The Right Answers)

No matter how much interview preparation you do, there’s always that moment when the unexpected question shows up. Here are five particularly sneaky examples, why they get asked, and how you should respond.
Five Tricky Job Interview Questions (And The Right Answers)

How to Identify Which Hardware Component is Failing in Your Computer

Concluding that your computer has a hardware problem is just the first step. If you’re dealing with a hardware issue and not a software issue, the next step is determining what hardware problem you’re actually dealing with.
How to Identify Which Hardware Component is Failing in Your Computer

15+ Best Smart Gardening Tools and Gadgets

Passionate about gardening and plants, no matter where you are? Then you need to stop for a moment and have a look at all these awesome gardening gadgets and tools that we’ve gathered here. No matter if you live in a small flat or maybe you have a huge garden, these are all devices that will help you take better care of your plants and transform your garden into a true smart greenhouse of the twenty-first century.
15+ Best Smart Gardening Tools and Gadgets

50 Educational Podcasts You Should Check Out

Maybe you don’t have time to sit down and sift through the latest education blogs for ideas and inspiration. If the thought of trying to carve out more hours in your day leaves you feeling overwhelmed, this list is for you.
50 Educational Podcasts You Should Check Out

Stay Updated On The NSW Fires: Google Crisis Map, Frightening Twitter Photos

Google Australia has set up a mirror to the NSW Rural Fire Services’ fire alert map, meaning that this link will get you to all the latest emergency warnings for the fires now burning out of control around the state. We’ve also embedded an auto-refreshing Twitter stream to help you keep up-to-date.
Stay Updated On The NSW Fires: Google Crisis Map, Frightening Twitter Photos

Viral Video Recap: Must-Watch Memes of the Week

In this week's Viral Video Recap, cats get their turn in the "Wrecking Ball" spotlight. The clip features two cats batting a wrecking ball made of yarn and crashing into walls of toilet paper rolls.
Viral Video Recap: Must-Watch Memes of the Week

Family Friendly sites listed on Blackstump Australia Issue 11/2013

The latest issue of new Family Friendly sites listed on The Black Stump.
Family Friendly sites listed on Blackstump Australia Issue 11/2013

The Complete Guide to Twitter Etiquette

Forget distinguishing the salad fork from the dinner fork. Today's lessons in etiquette are all about looking good on social media. And Twitter, as the microblogging platform of choice for more than 200 million users, is one of the most influential platforms.
The Complete Guide to Twitter Etiquette

10 Windows Tweaking Myths Debunked

Windows is big, complicated, and misunderstood. You’ll still stumble across bad advice from time to time when browsing the web. These Windows tweaking, performance, and system maintenance tips are mostly just useless, but some are actively harmful.
10 Windows Tweaking Myths Debunked

This Video Puts 30 Popular Life Hacks To The Test

If you’ve seen some of the tips and hacks we’ve posted and wondered if they actually work, check out this video from Mental Floss. John Green put 30 different life hacks to the test with some surprising results.
This Video Puts 30 Popular Life Hacks To The Test

Exploding Toilet Sends Brooklyn Man To The Hospital

Bad things often happen in mysterious, inexplicable ways. Michel Pierre of Brooklyn experienced this first hand this week when he pulled the handle of his toilet, and the whole thing exploded in his face. The blast knocked him out and sent him to the hospital where he got 30 stitches.
Exploding Toilet Sends Brooklyn Man To The Hospital

Long Lost 'Doctor Who' Episodes Uncovered in Nigeria are Now on iTunes

Here's a treat for Doctor Who fans: Nine episodes from the 1960s that were missing from the BBC's archives were found in Nigeria and are now exclusively available for download on iTunes.
Long Lost 'Doctor Who' Episodes Uncovered in Nigeria are Now on iTunes

4 New Google Maps Features That Make Travel Easier

Even as Apple has been trying to rework its maps efforts — with a radical new redesign for iOS 7 and Hopstop acquisition — Google has been consistently adding features in its Google Maps app after it came back on iOS in December 2012 and quickly surpassed 10 million downloads. Google has since rolled out update after update, like live traffic alerts and transit updates in major cities. It bought traffic navigation app Waze in June.
4 New Google Maps Features That Make Travel Easier

Yahoo! Mail Plus turns into Yahoo! Ad Free Mail: all relevant changes explained

If you have followed the news today or opened your Yahoo! email inbox on your computer or in a mobile application, you may have noticed that things have changed quite a bit, and mostly for the better.
Yahoo! Mail Plus turns into Yahoo! Ad Free Mail: all relevant changes explained

Internet Activity, Australia, June 2013 (ABS)

Contains details of internet activity supplied by all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Australia. It includes information on internet subscribers and their type of connection, the type of user (business/household), the volume of data downloaded, the speed of the internet connection and the location of the subscriber (by state or territory).
Internet Activity, Australia, June 2013

10 Common Tech Questions (And Their High-Tech Explanations)

There are certain problems we all deal with every day, but don’t know why. Why do I need to keep resetting my router? Do I have a virus? What happens when a site I use gets “hacked?” Whether you’re the tech-savvy friend that’s always answering these questions or the friend doing the asking, here are the answers to the most common conundrums.
10 Common Tech Questions (And Their High-Tech Explanations)

Make Your Embarrassing Old Facebook Posts Unsearchable With This Quick Tweak

It seems like every few months Facebook changes its privacy settings and unlocks a bunch of your previously hidden (or semi-hidden) information. This week, Facebook is tweaking Graph Search so that it can search posts, photos, check-ins, and comments. Basically, any word you’ve written on Facebook.com is now searchable.
Make Your Embarrassing Old Facebook Posts Unsearchable With This Quick Tweak

ScriptBlock for Chrome blocks scripts from running automatically on websites

One of the core reasons that I'm using Firefox as my main web browser is the NoScript extension for it. It blocks all scripts from running automatically on websites, ships with options to enable scripts temporarily or permanently, and offers a wide area of additional security features that protect the browser well from many threats on today's Internet.
ScriptBlock for Chrome blocks scripts from running automatically on websites

Adobe Treating Australians As Lesser Beings Even After Details Of 2.9 Million Accounts Were Stolen

Oh, Adobe. Not content with overcharging Australians and trying to dodge questions about it, now we’re getting second-rate treatment even when you’re attacked by hackers. Sigh.
Adobe Treating Australians As Lesser Beings Even After Details Of 2.9 Million Accounts Were Stolen

Fukushima Leaks Radioactive Water Into The Pacific Ocean (Again)

Officials from the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) have announced that the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has been leaking radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean again.
Fukushima Leaks Radioactive Water Into The Pacific Ocean (Again)

Why (And How) You Should Regularly Calibrate Your Laptop's Battery

You may already know your battery is best served by shallow discharges, but calibrating your battery occasionally is important too. If you don’t, the display that shows you how much charge is remaining can be wildly inaccurate.
Why (And How) You Should Regularly Calibrate Your Laptop's Battery

Awesome Pictures Of Australia's Phone Network Being Built 50 Years Ago

Today in Sydney, Telstra is hosting a reunion of workers who helped build the first coaxial cable connecting Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra. These days we’re busy arguing over the benefits of fibre and copper for the NBN, but one thing hasn’t changed: laying those cables is some seriously hard slog, as you can see in these pictures of the network being built.
Awesome Pictures Of Australia's Phone Network Being Built 50 Years Ago

Why We Get Jet Lag (And How To Avoid It)

It’s four in the morning and you’re stuck in your hotel room, bored out of your skull but wide awake. Thanks jet lag! That’s the price you pay for changing so many time zones in a single aeroplane ride. Here’s why it happens, and how you can prevent it from ruining your trip.
Why We Get Jet Lag (And How To Avoid It)

A Brief History Of Sending Animals To Space

If you believe news reports last week, Iran plans to launch a Persian cat into space in the next six months or so. Why does anyone launch animals into space?
A Brief History Of Sending Animals To Space

Google's Comparison Tool Compares Two Things Quickly

Google has added a new comparison tool to its search results that allows you to compare two things with a simple search query. Just type the two things you want to compare, and let Google do its thing.
Google's Comparison Tool Compares Two Things Quickly

What's the Best Cloud Backup? Top 3 Online Backup Services

From the list of more than 20 backup services, we have picked up the three best cloud backup services which are chosen due to many factors like – features, reliability, ease of use and compatibility. We have tried and tested all the best services on cloud servers and ran some rigorous test to ensure the best cloud backups.
What's the Best Cloud Backup? Top 3 Online Backup Services

Bill Gates Apologizes for Ctrl-Alt-Del Design, Blames IBM

Bill Gates said that a convoluted login screen was a big design flaw for Windows, but he's not taking credit for it.
Bill Gates Apologizes for Ctrl-Alt-Del Design, Blames IBM

Take the impossible "literacy" test Louisiana gave black voters in 1964

Here's the first page of a three-page "literacy" test that racist authorities in Louisiana presented to black people as a way to keep them from voting in 1964. You had 10 minutes to complete the test, and one wrong answer out of 30 disqualified you.
Take the impossible "literacy" test Louisiana gave black voters in 1964

Best Google Street View photos

It's been a while since I've visited artist Jon Rafman's Google Street View site. He finds interesting Google Street View photos and posts them to his site, 9-Eyes (the Google cars have a 9-lensed camera on them). The photos are incredible. I don't know how he does it.
Best Google Street View photos

The 6 Best Tools for Making Memes

Love them, hate them or flat out don't understand them at all, memes are here to stay — at least for the foreseeable future. Immortalized on Reddit, the most popular memes spread through the web like a weird, low-resolution wildfire.
The 6 Best Tools for Making Memes

The Logic Behind 19 Common Interview Questions

Go on enough job interviews and you’ll quickly learn most interviewers ask the same questions. But what are employers really looking for when they ask things like “Where do you see yourself five years from now?” This graphic spells out the reasoning behind typical questions like that.
The Logic Behind 19 Common Interview Questions

Greg Anderson's photos of the 2013 Beard And Mustache Championships

Greg Anderson's photos of the 2013 Beard And Mustache Championships in New Orleans are astounding. Here are 164 more.
Greg Anderson's photos of the 2013 Beard And Mustache Championships

How to Track Gmail Messages with Google Analytics

Google Analytics is normally used for tracking visits to your web pages but did you know that the Analytics service can also be used for tracking your outgoing email messages in Gmail. You can add the Google Analytics tracking code to your Gmail messages and you’ll instantly know if your email message has been seen or opened by the recipient.
How to Track Gmail Messages with Google Analytics

Kenya Westgate Mall Attacks: Who to Follow on the Ground

The deadly siege at an upscale Nairobi shopping mall continues after a terrorist attack killed at least 68 and injured more than 175 on Saturday, according to officials. An unknown number of people are being held hostage inside Kenya's Westgate Mall, as the death toll steadily climbs.
Kenya Westgate Mall Attacks: Who to Follow on the Ground

How to Forward Yahoo Mail to Gmail: 7 Steps (with Pictures)

If for any reason you have to forward your Yahoo e-mail to gmail, you have to make a slight change to your Yahoo mail settings. It may seem complicated. but it's actually very easy to do! This step-by-step guide will "walk" you through the process.
How to Forward Yahoo Mail to Gmail: 7 Steps (with Pictures)