Hacker Shuts Down Phoenix Lander Website

Overnight, a hacker got into the Mars Phoenix Lander at the University of Arizona and changed the mission page to his signature with a link pointing to some overseas website.

This kind of behavior is totally unacceptable. This website is very popular now, and is providing us with the most up to date information about the Phoenix lander findings. If you remember correctly, the last update was that there may be a possibility of water-ice just barely under the surface of the retrorocket blast zone. I don't know about anyone else, but I have been feverishly checking the mission page to see if that was in fact water-ice or just rock. However, some foreign moron hacked the page, robbing the whole world of real-time mission data we've come to expect.

Hackers like this are just total scum. The thing that makes me mad is that if you are smart enough to hack a website like this, you should at least be smart enough to understand what it's trying to do. And why did you do it? For emails? Spam? Porn advertisements? Come on now, I know you're better than that Mr. Hacker

We all know there's been talk of an alien peeking in a window in Colorado that's very authentic. I didn't want to have to show this, but I have actual alien footage and it's debuting right here at Deep Sky Blog:

I'm an expert. It's authentic.

Phoenix's Retrorockets Unveil Possible Ice

Today's news release from the Phoenix lander is very exciting: in the retrorocket blast zone, near a footpad, scientists believe there may be water-ice chunks uncovered by the blast.

This is quicker than anyone could have imagined and very exciting. The only problem right now is that the image sent back was in black and white, which all CCD cameras inherently are, and we won't have a color image until probably tomorrow after the color is added.

Phil Plait at the Bad Astronomy blog has a great article about why CCD cameras take pictures in bacl and white, and how we essentially "trick" them into creating highly detailed color pictures.

I'm very excited about the possibility of water-ice that close to the surface. I thought the lander would find ice, just not so close to the surface. Perhaps if there's an ice layer, there's liquid water below. And who knows what that could mean. Why water? Phoenix says it best. (Space Science teachers, that links a freebie; use it!)

The digging arm will dig very slowly over the next couple of months, carefully analyzing each bit of soil as it goes ever deeper. We've barely just scratched the surface and already the discoveries are fascinating.

Sorry... No Doomsday in 2012!

I'm glad someone did it. This is a crucial must-read article for anyone who is concerned about December 2012 and the so-called "apocalypse" that is going to occur then. This is a ridiculous rumor started by... who cares...

Check out Universe Today's post on why this won't be happening.

Only the genious' at Universe Today could mathematically disprove a doomsday theory. Very cool, check it out.

FlickrFind: Fall/Late-Summer Milky Way

Fall/Late-Summer Milky Way
Originally uploaded by chipdatajeffb

I'm a sucker for wide-angle milky way photography and this photo is absolutely stunning. Check out the author's Flickr feed for sure!

HA! HA! HAAAA!

I hope the "real" alien looks this authentic!!!

Laughed so hard I cried...!

Real Alien Picture!

Finally, what all astronomer's have been looking for! A real alien looking through a window! Apparently after traveling a few million light years this alien stopped by a notable nut job's window for some "peeping".

Yeah right. It looks almost like someone super imposed E.T. from the Atari over a dark window pane.

The YouTube jockeys are already claiming this as the real thing, but it's quite laughable. What they're actually saying is the "real" thing is an admitted hoax, because this still is the only released footage of this so called "authentic" video.

Check out Phil's post on how easy it is to fake this. Apparently, stupidity is contagious. YouTube has been quarantined.