Overview
Today swings between hard tech and human touch. We have missiles kept straight by a tiny wheel, Starlink racing toward a dense constellation, a Tesla game teaching orbital docking, and a blunt warning about munitions. On the softer side, wood turns into art, a music video shows cleanroom craft, and a birdhouse and a Border Collie win hearts. UI and AI round things out, from Apple’s handwriting to Google’s live translation, plus a fresh debate over how we will learn online.
The big picture
Space and defence
The tiny rolleron that keeps missiles steady
Engineering Explained breaks down the rolleron, a small fin-mounted wheel that spins up from airflow to give gyroscopic stability. Born in the 1950s, it keeps missiles like the AIM-9 from rolling without electronics, which means lower cost and higher reliability in fast, hot environments. The clip’s replies in multiple languages show its wide reach. 🔗 Post link
Starlink heads for 10,000 satellites and V3 gigabit
Sawyer Merritt highlights SpaceX’s march past 10,000 satellites by February 2026. V3 birds are slated to roll out at scale around Q4 next year, bringing gigabit user speeds and a big step up in total downlink capacity. It is a brisk snapshot of how fast orbital internet is scaling. 🔗 Post link
Tesla adds the SpaceX ISS Docking Simulator
Nik Cruz Patane shows Tesla’s Holiday Update game that mirrors the real manual Dragon 2 docking interface. It turns careful thruster taps and attitude control into a living room challenge, and it is closer to training software than a typical arcade mini game. 🔗 Post link
Submariners chip ice with long poles
Lord Bebo shares a clip of U.S. Navy crews clearing ice from a submarine sail after punching through Arctic pack ice. It is maintenance with stakes, protecting sensors and reducing drag before diving again. The calm chatter against a harsh backdrop says it all. 🔗 Post link
Palmer Luckey warns of an 8 day munitions burn rate
Anduril’s founder cites wargames that exhaust precision munitions in a week, then argues industry must be ready for day nine and beyond. It tracks with studies pointing to thin stocks, and it underscores the push for faster, more adaptable production. 🔗 Post link
Interfaces and tools
A 4x4 macro pad as a full keyboard stand in
Charles Patterson unboxes a compact macro pad with a rotary knob, pitching it as a keyboard replacement for creative work. With QMK and custom layers, it turns repetitive commands into single taps, though price and setup still keep these gadgets niche. 🔗 Post link
Steve Lemay’s touch on Apple’s handwriting UI
Apple Design credits Steve Lemay, now Head of UI Design, for the Pencil handwriting and gesture system that feels physical on glass. From Aqua to iPhone’s keyboard history, his track record hints at thoughtful refinements to come. 🔗 Post link
Google Translate brings live speech translation to any headphones
Shay Boloor notes Google’s expansion of real time speech translation beyond Pixel Buds to all Android headphones across 70 plus languages. It nudges instant translation toward a standard feature, and raises questions for language learning apps that serve different goals. 🔗 Post link
Why GUI demos keep shuffling windows, plus a jab at Figma
wavefnx addresses live window moves in GUI videos, anchoring it to performance and message throughput in a new Rust GPU UI. A curt reply comparing it to Figma sparks the usual split between cheerleaders and sceptics in dev circles. 🔗 Post link
Craft and culture
Root carving turns raw wood into fine sculptures
The Best shares artisans coaxing deities, dragons and doorways from massive roots. The craft draws on natural grain and form, with months of patient chiselling. Viewers call out the care in the details, and the clip spreads fast. 🔗 Post link
A square ruler that does far more than 90 degrees
World of Engineering features a sliding aluminium square that locks angles, scribes lines and even draws circles. It is a neat upgrade on a classic T square, and a reminder of how small, well designed tools save time at the bench. 🔗 Post link
A rare look at chip fab in an indie music video
LaurieWired points to The Postal Service’s 2003 video with real cleanroom scenes at Skyworks. Yellow lit photolithography, wafer handling and guarded kit show up on screen, offering a glimpse of work that usually stays behind closed doors. 🔗 Post link
Play, AI and the internet’s soft edges
No Law, a new cyberpunk RPG, turns heads
The Seal flags Neon Giant’s first person leap into Port Desire with Gavin Drea as the lead. The trailer hints at choice driven systems and punchy combat, and the genre crowd is watching closely. 🔗 Post link
Grokipedia, a pitch for interactive history
Brian Roemmele imagines pausable, queryable timelines, like ship design from 8000 BC to today. The replies compare it to Wikipedia, and surface the ongoing debate over live, model driven knowledge versus static pages. 🔗 Post link
The $5K Minimax video challenge
InVideo opens a contest to use Hailuo AI’s viral effects in short clips, with cash prizes and a simple entry path. It is an invite to play with cinematic tricks, from UFO lifts to chaotic chases, using plain prompts. 🔗 Post link
A birdhouse, a camera, and a tiny saga
Enezator posts a window birdhouse time lapse, from twig gathering to hatchlings. It is neat, kind, and reminds you how close nature is when you make space for it. 🔗 Post link
Maya the Border Collie, mayor of the pavement
Puppies shares the famous cabin built so Maya can greet passers by while her human works. It is enrichment for a working breed, plus a smile for everyone who walks past. 🔗 Post link
Why it matters
Simple physics still wins. The rolleron shows how passive stability can solve hard problems without fragile parts. That spirit runs through the submarine pole work and the square ruler too, where practical fixes beat complex systems.
Space is becoming infrastructure. A 10,000 satellite network with gigabit targets, a consumer car sim that mirrors astronaut training, and a loud call to refill stockpiles point to a world where orbital and defence tech touch daily life, not just policy papers.
Interfaces shape behaviour. From Apple’s analogue styled handwriting to macro pads and GPU driven GUIs, the tools we touch nudge how we think and create. Google’s live translation sits nearby, lowering the cost of understanding but not replacing the work of learning.
Culture teaches, quietly. A music video can explain cleanrooms better than a brochure. A birdhouse time lapse can spark care for wildlife. A woodworking clip can send thousands hunting for better tools. And yes, a game trailer can set the tone for a year of play.
