Accounts controlled by Ciro Santilli Updated +Created
Ciro Santilli controls the following accounts.
With non-trivial activity:
Trivial activity only:
Profiles without URLs (OMG...):
  • Discord: username cirosantilli, previously cirosantilli#8921
Accounts in Chinese websites. These accounts might be banned or altered or offer other limitations, so Ciro only communicates briefly through them. All communication through those channels should obviously be assumed to be compromised:
Accounts in Russian websites:
Dead websites:
Blade server Updated +Created
Figure 1. Source. Good image from Wikimedia Commons. In this one we can see how the blades are put vertically, and you get several of them per horizontal rack space, instead of a tipical single rack server going all the way horizontally.
Video 1.
HP Blade Server by Brian Kirsch (2013)
Source.
In the video we can see that it contains RAM, disk storage, we are told about two CPUs, and networking interfaces, so it is a complete computer on its own. He also explains that unlike typical rack servers, each blade unit does not have its own coolers and power supply related hardware, which goes instead on the chassis.
Les Atomes by Jean Perrin (1913) Updated +Created
Subtle is the Lord by Abraham Pais (1982) mentions that this has a good summary of the atomic theory evidence that was present at the time, and which had become basically indisputable at or soon after that date.
An English translation from 1916 by English chemist Dalziel Llewellyn Hammick on the Internet Archive, also on the public domain: archive.org/details/atoms00hammgoog
Public domain scientific paper by year Updated +Created
Here we list public domain academic papers. They must be public domain in the country of origin, not just the US, which had generally less stringent timings with the 95 year after publication rule rather than life + 70, which often ends up being publication + 110/120. Once these are reached, they may be upload to Wikimedia Commons!
Videos of all key physics experiments Updated +Created
It is unbelievable that you can't find easily on YouTube recreations of many of the key physics/chemistry experiments and of common laboratory techniques.
Experiments, the techniques required to to them, and the history of how they were first achieved, are the heart of the natural sciences. Without them, there is no motivation, no beauty, no nothing.
School gives too much emphasis on the formulas. This is bad. Much more important is to understand how the experiments are done in greater detail.
The videos must be completely reproducible, indicating the exact model of every experimental element used, and how the experiment is setup.
A bit like what Ciro Santilli does in his Stack Overflow contributions but with computers, by indicating precise versions of his operating system, software stack, and hardware whenever they may matter.
It is understandable that some experiments are just to complex and expensive to re-create. As an extreme example, say, a precise description of the Large Hadron Collider anyone? But experiments up to the mid-20th century before "big science"? We should have all of those nailed down.
We should strive to achieve the cheapest most reproducible setup possible with currently available materials: recreating the original historic setup is cute, but not a priority.
Furthermore, it is also desirable to reproduce the original setups whenever possible in addition to having the most convenient modern setup.
Lists of good experiments to cover be found at: the most important physics experiments.
This project is to a large extent a political endeavour.
Someone with enough access to labs has to step up and make a name for themselves through the huge effort of creating a baseline of amazing content without yet being famous.
Until it reaches a point that this person is actively sought to create new material for others, and things snowball out of control. Maybe, if the Gods allow it, that person could be Ciro.
Tutorials with a gazillion photos and short videos are also equally good or even better than videos, see for example Ciro's How to use an Oxford Nanopore MinION to extract DNA from river water and determine which bacteria live in its for an example that goes toward that level of perfection.
The Applied Science does well in that direction.
This project is one step that could be taken towards improving the replication crisis of science. It's a bit what Hackster.io wants to do really. But that website is useless, just use OurBigBook.com and create videos instead :-)
We're maintaining a list of experiments for which we could not find decent videos at: Section "Physics experiment without a decent modern video".
Ciro Santilli visited the teaching labs of a large European university in the early 2020's. They had a few large rooms filled with mostly ready to run versions of several key experiments, many/most from "modern physics", e.g. Stern-Gerlach experiment, Quantum Hall effect, etc.. These included booklets with detailed descriptions of how to operate the apparatus, what you'd expect to see, and the theory behind them. With a fat copyright notice at the bottom. If only such universities aimed to actually serve the public for free rather than hoarding resources to get more tuition fees, university level education would already have been solved a long time ago!
One thing we can more or less easily do is to search for existing freely licensed videos and add them to the corresponding Wikipedia page where missing. This requires knowing how to search for freely licensed videos:
YouTube Updated +Created
Ciro Santilli publishes videos of this not-so-common visual programming experiments on his YouTube channel occasionally: www.youtube.com/c/CiroSantilli. Ciro should however not be lazy and also upload each video produced to Wikimedia Commons, since YouTube does not offer a download option even for videos marked with a Creative Commons license: www.quora.com/Can-I-download-Creative-Commons-licensed-YouTube-videos-to-edit-them-and-use-them/answer/Tarmo-Toikkanen!
This is also where Ciro's downtime converged to in his early 30's, since he long lost patience for stupid video games and television series.
Ciro developed one interesting technique: while scrolling through YouTube's useless recommendations, when he understands what a channel is about, he either immediately:
  • subscribes if it is amazing and then "Don't recommend channel"
  • otherwise just "Don't recommend channel" immediately
This helps to keep this feed clean of boring stuff he already knows about. There is unfortunately an infinite amount of useless videos out there however on the topics of:
  • sports
  • music, mostly idiotic top of the charts
  • news and political commentary
  • food
  • programming tutorials. Meh, got Stack Overflow.
  • stuff that is not in English, and notably languages that Ciro does not even speak!
  • motorcycles
  • ASMR
  • cute animals
  • gaming and movie commentary. Ciro is interested only in a very specific number of video games
  • nature life, e.g. hiking, cycling, or living in isolation, this Ciro enjoys
  • science for kids (popular science)
and no matter how much you say you don't want to hear about them, YouTube juts keeps on sending more.
Things Ciro hates about YouTube:
  • you can't follow or ignore a subject, only indirectly tell the algorithm about that. Once you click a popular cat video, you will be forced to watch cat videos for all eternity.
Bought by Google in 2006.
Video 1.
YouTube: From Concept to Hypergrowth Jawed Karim (2006)
Source. YouTube co-founder explains that the key enabling technology for YouTube was the addition of video capabilities to Macromedia Flash 7.