off grid

Practical Engineering's explanation of the February 2021 Texas winter storm and the resulting power grid outage. It lays out the facts about ERCOT, the grid's isolation, and how generation across fuel types failed in the cold.

Practical Engineering explains why connecting solar and other inverter-based generation to the grid is hard. It covers grid stability, load balancing and the behind-the-scenes engineering challenges of renewables.

Morten Rand-Hendriksen's WordCamp Europe 2017 talk presents CSS Grid Layout as a native two-dimensional layout system that changes how web pages are structured, including responsive layouts independent of source order. It was given as browsers began shipping support.

An Odd Lots podcast episode on why converting empty office buildings into apartments is hard. A managing director at Vanbarton Group walks through the zoning, financing and construction obstacles, mostly in New York.

Climate Town's comedic explainer on carbon offsets and whether companies can buy their way out of climate change. It argues that offsets won't save us, while granting they are not bad in principle.

ChefSteps shows how to make espresso-style coffee in a moka pot, with a bonus latte hack. It is a quick how-to aimed at home brewers.

Morten Rand-Hendriksen argues that CSS Grid changes web layout, showing how to place content in cells independent of HTML source order and reshape layouts with media queries. It makes the case for using Grid now that browsers support it.

Comedian Steve Hughes delivers a stand-up bit on political correctness, offense and health and safety culture, arguing there is no right not to be offended.

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment on the state of the US power grid, why it needs fixing, and the risks of aging infrastructure.

A one-minute Seinfeld clip where Kramer explains that the post office will pay for Jerry's broken stereo because of a tax write-off.

The Office Space scene where Peter is grilled by his bosses for missing the cover sheet on his TPS report.

A performance of Bach's Coffee Cantata (BWV 211) conducted by Ton Koopman, with English subtitles. It is a comic secular cantata about a father and his coffee-loving daughter.

Technology Connections explains how the simple American drip coffee maker works, including the bimetal valve and bubble-pump heating, and compares the original Mr. Coffee with modern machines.

Practical Engineering explains what a black start is: restarting a power grid after total collapse. It shows why most plants need outside power to start and why rebuilding a synchronized grid is delicate and high-stakes.

A short clip from the film Office Space in which Peter explains his typical workday to the Bobs, the consultants.

A two-minute clip of the printer-smashing scene from the film Office Space, set to its rap soundtrack. The uploader assembled it as a cleaner version.

James Hoffmann demonstrates his AeroPress technique with a short recipe: 11g of coffee, 200g of just-boiled water, a 2-minute immersion, then a press. He explains why he skips rinsing, preheating and inverting.

James Hoffmann demonstrates his technique for a clean, sludge-free cup from a French press: stir, break the crust, wait, and carefully pour. It is a four-minute guide.

James Hoffmann demonstrates his recommended technique for brewing coffee with a Hario V60 or other cone-shaped dripper, with notes on water and filter papers.

A short scene from The Office US in which Michael Scott blindly follows his GPS and drives into a lake. The tagline is never trust technology.

The official music video for David Hasselhoff's synthwave track True Survivor, written for the film Kung Fury. It is an 80s-style pop song from the Kickstarter-funded movie.

A full FRONTLINE interview with journalist Julia Ioffe on Putin and alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US election.

James Hoffmann runs caffeine analyzer tests comparing filter versus espresso, extraction over time, steep time, instant coffee and light versus dark roast.

A short clip from The Office US in which Kevin decides talking normally wastes time and starts abbreviating all his words and sentences, confusing his coworkers. It is a sitcom scene from Season 8, Episode 2.

A short clip from The Office US in which Michael Scott gets drawn into an email scam promising riches from the son of a deposed Nigerian king. It plays on pyramid schemes and gullibility.

Wendover Productions examines why carbon offsets so often fail to reduce emissions, covering specific examples and the perverse incentives in offset schemes.

A Last Week Tonight segment explaining carbon offsets, what they claim to do, and how they may worsen climate change. It looks at perverse incentives and questionable projects.

An Adam Ruins Everything segment on the real facts of the McDonald's hot coffee lawsuit, covering the severity of the burns and the corporate PR campaign that painted it as frivolous.

Zack Freedman introduces Gridfinity, his free, open-source modular workshop storage system of 3D-printable bins and baseplates. The video walks through the design, the parametric templates and the many module types that fit parts, tools and accessories.

A 2020 UC San Diego event with Roger Penrose and Stuart Hameroff presenting their Orch OR theory that consciousness arises from quantum processes in brain microtubules, followed by a conversation with Roger Bingham.

A Startup School 2013 session where Paul Graham and Sam Altman hold live office hours with startups including CodeCombat, Flexport and others. The founders pitch and get on-the-spot feedback.

A 54-second clip from the film Office Space in which two coworkers talk about what they would do with a million dollars. The answers contrast blue-collar and white-collar attitudes toward work.

Short Airbus footage of its ATTOL project, in which a test aircraft performed a fully automatic, vision-based take-off at Toulouse-Blagnac. The crew ran eight take-offs over several hours.

The uncensored printer-smashing scene from the 1999 film Office Space.

James Hoffmann explains how decaf coffee is made, how the decaffeination processes differ, and why decaf is roasted and stales differently. He also discusses decaf quality and health questions.

Cognitive scientist George Lakoff lectures on how political debates are framed through language and metaphors tied to values, and on the moral worldviews behind progressive and conservative politics. It was given in 2005 at UC San Diego.

A feature-length documentary on how the City of London and Britain's overseas territories built a global web of offshore secrecy jurisdictions after the empire declined. It traces how this network captured and hid wealth from around the world.

A clip from the BBC series Britain from Above showing UK peak power demand. It shows a grid engineer preparing for the surge as millions put the kettle on when a popular show ends.

Physicist Geoffrey West speaks at an FQXi conference on time about complexity and scaling laws. He covers how metabolism, growth and lifespan scale across organisms and how the same mathematics applies to cities and companies.

Geoffrey Hinton's 2025 Royal Institution Discourse on what AI has learned from biological intelligence and how it might surpass it. He explains neural networks and argues that human language use resembles what backpropagation-trained networks do.