Welcome to this week’s edition of our Friday Quality Linkage column. Please enjoy this week’s collection of interesting and entertaining links. Brew a fresh cup of coffee, find a comfortable place, and relax.
Photo: Graeme Mitchell, The New York Times
The Loyal Engineers Steering NASA’s Voyager Probes Across the Universe »
Kim Tingley of The New York Times Magazine profiles the small team of aging-but-dedicated engineers who are still piloting the Voyager mission, even as its mission winds down:
All explorations demand sacrifices in exchange for uncertain outcomes. Some of those sacrifices are social: how many resources we collectively devote to a given pursuit of knowledge. But another portion is borne by the explorer alone, who used to be rewarded with adventure and fame if not fortune. For the foreseeable future, Voyager seems destined to remain in the running for the title of Mankind’s Greatest Journey, which might just make its nine flight-team engineers — most of whom have been with the mission since the Reagan administration — our greatest living explorers. They also may be the last people left on the planet who can operate the spacecraft’s onboard computers, which have 235,000 times less memory and 175,000 times less speed than a 16-gigabyte smartphone.
What a great story. These people deserve so much respect.
Photo: Julius Yls (second place, “People” category)
Photo: Misha De-Stroyev (third place, “Cities” category)
Winners of the National Geographic “Travel Photographer of the Year” Contest »
The winners of National Geographic’s annual travel photography contest have been announced, and as you’d expect, the entire gallery is amazing.
The Secret Rhythm Behind Radiohead’s “Videotape” »
For the first episode of her new “Earworm” series about her favorite trends and sounds in music, Estelle Caswell of Vox examines the musical illusion that powers Thom Yorke’s favorite Radiohead song.
Funky Cover of “Creep” »
Speaking of Radiohead, I really dig funk band Scary Pockets’ cover of “Creep”. Not much else I can say about it except watch and enjoy.
Ryan Holiday: Stoic Philosophy 101 + Ego is the Enemy »
I’ve mentioned several of Ryan Holiday’s books here on T&T, all of which center around applying the tenets of ancient stoicism to everyday life today. In this recent conversation with Kevin Rose, he covers the basics of stoicism and how it can be useful for anyone.
Daniel Craig — Flip Flopper »
Nathan Kontny, writing for Basecamp’s Signal v. Noise blog, uses actor Daniel Craig as an example that there’s nothing necessarily wrong about flip-flopping on a strongly held opinion:
Should we build this product? Prioritize that feature? This marketing plan? If you have weak opinions you won’t have the energy to get unstuck. You’ll be paralyzed in indecision. And you won’t be able to convince anyone else to follow you through the challenges.
[…]
I think more of us have to step up and form strong opinions about the decisions we have. Anytime you have a inkling about what’s right, use that energy to see it through. Stay open minded when people and situations naturally push back, but either way you win and increase your productivity, energy and drive.
Skater’s Paradise: On/Off »
I found this video via Jason Kottke, who describes it perfectly:
With each beat of the metronome in this visually striking and inventive video of a skateboarder, the scene switches from day to night and back again. It’s not a complicated effect but combined with the simple electronic beat, it is mesmerizing.
Got any suggestions for articles, videos, stories, photographs, and any other links you think we should be posting in our weekly Quality Linkage? Please do let us know on Twitter.