sumea (u/sumea) - Readit News

sumea commented on Sweden Investigates New Cable Break Under Baltic Sea nytimes.com/2025/02/21/wo... · Posted by u/xnx

maxglute · 6 months ago

Wonder if there's any industry reports on if there's more demand for subcable repair/servicing than typical/projected.

sumea · 6 months ago

There is a company, TeleGeography, that collects data about telecommunications industry. I recently read their recent blog post[1] about undersea cable breaks.

To summarize the article: On average, 199 cable faults per year from 2010-2023. Two thirds of these faults are caused by external forces like fishing vessels. Most cable faults are not made public. The preliminary data from 2024 suggests slightly more publicly disclosed faults, but nothing extraordinary. It is hard to detect the physical cause of cable damage. One likely cause is inexperienced crews on poorly maintained ships.

Personally, I do not believe all the cable faults in the Baltic sea are pure accidents. Russia (and China) have found the "perfect" way to test how we react and play their games. This testing is nothing new and it has happened before in many forms. It is likely that we have not even noticed some of the testing or they are not made public.

[1] https://blog.telegeography.com/is-it-sabotage-unraveling-the...

sumea commented on I tasted Honda’s spicy rodent-repelling tape and I will do it again (2021) haterade.substack.com/p/i... · Posted by u/voxadam

delfinom · 6 months ago

You are repeating FUD. There is no soy in the final plastic.

The plastic is derived from soy that serves as a cheap source of organic molecules, but it's converted into polymers no different from petroleum based plastics.

Did you know that most wall paint is made from corn? It's hyper processed into latex.

sumea · 6 months ago

Maybe it is mostly FUD, but it does not mean it is impossible. Yes, soy-based plastics are very processed, but it does not mean that the end product has no impurities that "smell" like soy. Rodents have very sensitive smell and some can even detect landmines. Also, plastics made solely from biomaterial or with bio-based components (e.g. plasticizers) are not (always) chemically exactly similar to petroleum-based plastics.

I found one research article from 2020 titled "Assessing Rodent Gnawing of Elastomers Containing Soybean Oil Derivatives". It did not find statistically significant difference in rodents gnawing when soy oil derivates were added to plastics. Maybe they have found a way to remove the tasty components.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c05868

sumea commented on How to improve your WFH lighting to reduce eye strain rustle.ca/posts/articles/... · Posted by u/jahfer

Karrot_Kream · 7 months ago

A lot of the guidelines that are used to light a scene for a camera are also quite useful for lighting a room for yourself, just with less light needed as the human eye has a much higher dynamic range than a camera sensor:

* Use diffuse light. This usually means multiple light sources bouncing and diffusing light off surfaces (ceilings, walls, etc) or diffusers.

* Minimize shadows. Shadows lead to contrast which can lead to eye strain. Use multiple, maybe directional, light sources to illuminate shadows.

* Minimize highlights. Windows without blinds let in lots of light which leads to contrast and can lead to eye strain. Curtains and blinds are great ways to diffuse light.

* Uniform color temperature. Try to make sure all your lights have the same color temperature. Small variations are okay but large color temperature variations lead to color contrast which also tends to be hard on eye strain.

* Select your color temperature based on needs and feeling. A lot of people prefer warmer color temperature lights and cool temperature lights are known to be more stressful for folks with anxiety-related conditions, but if your work requires accurate color representation, or you find yourself mentally trying to compensate for color temperature, then change the temperature to what you find most productive yet relaxing.

* Wall color. Remember that "white" light that reflects off colored surfaces will take on a hue similar to the reflected surfaces. Walls of different colors can cause challenges for uniform color temperature, and warm colored walls can take cold lights and turn them warm.

A side effect, of course, is that your room will become a lot more photogenic. It's no coincidence since photogenic rooms are often just easiest on the eye to look at.

"Golden Hour" is considered a great time for photogenic events, photographs, and videos. "Golden Hour" lighting tends to be diffuse, not too strong, and warm toned. Humans tend to really like this style of lighting and if you do too, you might want to recreate some of these properties in your office.

sumea · 7 months ago

I am quite sensitive to glare. I have tried many setups in my windowless office with low ceiling height and have found linear up-down pendant lights the best option. Up-light is more important as it bounces soft light from ceiling. When I want to work in dimmer environment in the evenings, I switch off the down-light.

I also try to buy lightning fixtures that are designed anti-glare although they are more expensive. You can also make pendant lights yourself with led strips and aluminium profiles.

Your eyesight and glasses also matter a lot. My glasses are quite worn with lots of scratches. They definitely make issues worse.