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🔗 Human rights 🔗 China 🔗 Islam 🔗 Central Asia 🔗 Correction and Detention Facilities 🔗 2010s

The Xinjiang internment camps are internment camps operated by the government of Xinjiang and the Chinese Communist Party Provincial Standing Committee. Human Rights Watch says that they have been used to indoctrinate Uyghurs since 2017 as part of a "Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism", a policy announced in 2014 after the May 2014 Ürümqi attack. Xinjiang internment camps have been described as "the most extreme example of China's inhumane policies against Uighurs". They were established as what are officially called vocational education and training centers by the government of the People's Republic of China. According to researcher Adrian Zenz, mass internments peaked in 2018 and have abated somewhat since then, with officials shifting focus towards forced labor programs. Since then, the Chinese government has claimed the centers have been closed. Individuals in the camps have been shifted into the formal penal system, with remaining camps being converted into prisons or factories using forced labor.

The camps were established in 2017 by the administration of CCP general secretary Xi Jinping. Between 2017 and 2021 operations were led by CCP Politburo member and Xinjiang Party secretary Chen Quanguo. The camps are reportedly operated outside the Chinese legal system; many Uyghurs have reportedly been interned without trial and no charges have been levied against them (held in administrative detention). Local authorities are reportedly holding hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs in these camps as well as members of other ethnic minority groups in China, for the stated purpose of countering extremism and terrorism and promoting social integration.

In July 2019, UN ambassadors of 37 countries, predominantly in Africa and Asia, signed a joint letter to the United Nations Human Rights Council defending China's policies in Xinjiang while 22 countries, mostly in North America and Europe, opposed them. In October 2020, 16 countries that defended China's policies in 2019 did not do so.

The internment of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in the camps constituted the largest-scale arbitrary detention of ethnic and religious minorities since World War II. In 2020, it was estimated that Chinese authorities may have detained up to 1.8 million people, mostly Uyghurs but also including Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and other ethnic Turkic Muslims, Christians, as well as some foreign citizens including Kazakhstanis, in these secretive internment camps located throughout the region. In September 2020, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) reported in its Xinjiang Data Project that construction of camps continued despite government claims that their function was winding down. There have been comparisons between the Xinjiang camps and the Cultural Revolution.

🔗 United States 🔗 France 🔗 Germany 🔗 Economics 🔗 New York City 🔗 Business 🔗 United Kingdom 🔗 Trains 🔗 Hungary 🔗 Austria 🔗 United States/Massachusetts 🔗 Chicago 🔗 European history 🔗 Vienna 🔗 United States/Massachusetts - Boston 🔗 Ireland 🔗 Former countries 🔗 United States/U.S. history 🔗 Former countries/Austria-Hungary 🔗 Austria/Austria-Hungary

The Panic of 1873 was a financial crisis that triggered an economic depression in Europe and North America that lasted from 1873 to 1877, continuing until 1879 in the French Third Republic and in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In Britain, the panic started two decades of economic stagnation known as the "Long Depression" that weakened the country's economic leadership. In the United States, the period of economic stagnation was known as the "Great Depression" until the events of 1929 and the early 1930s set a new standard.

The Panic of 1873 and the subsequent depression had several underlying causes, of which economic historians debate the relative importance. American inflation, rampant speculative investments (overwhelmingly in railroads), the demonetization of silver in Germany and the United States, ripples from economic dislocation in Europe resulting from the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), and major property losses in the Great Chicago Fire (1871) and the Great Boston Fire (1872) all contributed to a massive strain on bank reserves, which in New York City plummeted from $50 million to $17 million between September and October 1873. The first symptoms of the crisis were financial failures in Vienna, the capital of Austria-Hungary, which spread to most of Europe and to North America by 1873.

🔗 Anthropology 🔗 Fungi 🔗 Mythology 🔗 Occult 🔗 Anthropology/Oral tradition

A fairy ring, also known as fairy circle, elf circle, elf ring or pixie ring, is a naturally occurring ring or arc of mushrooms. They are found mainly in forested areas, but also appear in grasslands or rangelands. Fairy rings are detectable by sporocarps (fungal spore pods) in rings or arcs, as well as by a necrotic zone (dead grass), or a ring of dark green grass. Fungus mycelium is present in the ring or arc underneath. The rings may grow to over 10 metres (33 ft) in diameter, and they become stable over time as the fungus grows and seeks food underground.

Fairy rings are the subject of much folklore and myth worldwide, particularly in Western Europe. They are alternately seen as hazardous or dangerous places linked with witches or the Devil, or as a sign of good fortune.

🔗 Transport 🔗 Ships

A bow windshield, also known as a wind deflector, is a round and smooth structure mounted on the bow of a ship that improves a vessel's aerodynamic characteristics, allowing for greater fuel efficiency and a reduction of carbon emissions. The technology is limited to container ships, though is predicted to become more popular due to greater international emphasis on environmentalism.

🔗 Electronic music 🔗 Albums

ʅ͡(̸̢̛̼)̸͚͛:̴͓̑:̸͎̂ ҉ ͡ ͞ ͞ ͞ ҉● ࿀ ● ࿀ ● ҉⃝ ⃝͢ ͞ ͘ ͞⃝̕ ͢ ̛ ⃝ ̸ ̡ ͢⃝̧ ͡ ͡ ̀ ̧ ̢⃝͜ ҉ ͞ ͞ ⃝͞ ͘ ͞ ͡⃝ ⃝҉҈҉҈҉҈҉҈҉҈҉ :̶̢͙͆(̷̮͂)̵̳̊( ҈͜͢ͅ l̡ ̡͌ Ɵʅ͡(̸̢, also known as Wingdings, is the debut studio album by the English musician Kieran Hebden under the alias ⣎⡇ꉺლ༽இ•̛)ྀ◞ ༎ຶ ༽ৣৢ؞ৢ؞ؖ ꉺლ, known colloquially as "Wingdings". It was surprise released by Text Records as a limited vinyl on June 12, 2026, before being released on streaming services on July 3, 2026.

🔗 Video games 🔗 Internet culture 🔗 Fictional characters 🔗 Software 🔗 Software/Computing 🔗 Musical Instruments 🔗 Electronic music 🔗 Japan 🔗 Japan/Science and technology 🔗 Video games/Sega 🔗 Anime and manga 🔗 Women in Music 🔗 Video games/Video game characters 🔗 Japan/Music

Hatsune Miku (Japanese: 初音ミク, [hatsɯ̥ne miꜜkɯ]), officially code-named CV01, is a Vocaloid voicebank and software application developed by Crypton Future Media. Her voice is generated using vocal sound samples provided by Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita. The software is personified by an official mascot character depicted as a 16-year-old girl with turquoise twintails. Marketed as a virtual idol, Miku has performed at live virtual concerts as an animated projection.

Released in August 2007, Hatsune Miku was the second product built on Yamaha Corporation's Vocaloid 2 engine and the first Japanese voicebank for the platform. Subsequent updates have expanded her functionality across Vocaloid 3, Vocaloid 4, and Vocaloid 6 technology, alongside Crypton's proprietary Piapro Studio editor.

The name of the character comes from merging the Japanese words for first (初, hatsu), sound (音, ne), and future (ミク, miku), thus meaning "the first sound of the future", which, along with her code name, refers to her position as the first of Crypton's "Character Vocal Series" (abbreviated "CV Series"), preceding Kagamine Rin/Len (code-named CV02) and Megurine Luka (code-named CV03). The number 01 can be seen on her left shoulder in official artwork.

🔗 Germany 🔗 Writing systems 🔗 Typography 🔗 Graphic design

The Antiqua–Fraktur dispute was a typographical dispute in 19th- and early 20th-century Germany.

In most European countries, blackletter typefaces like the German Fraktur were displaced by the creation of the Antiqua typefaces in the 15th and 16th centuries. However, in Germany and Austria, the two styles of printing coexisted until the first half of the 20th century.

During that time, both styles gained ideological connotations in Germany, which led to long and heated disputes on what was the "correct" typeface to use. The eventual outcome was that the Antiqua-style typefaces prevailed when the Nazi Party chose to put an end to the use of Fraktur in favor of "normal typeface" (German: Normalschrifterlaß).

🔗 New York City 🔗 Philately

The pneumatic tube mail was a postal system operating in New York City from 1897 to 1953 using pneumatic tubes. Similar systems had arisen in the mid-19th century in London, via the London Pneumatic Despatch Company; in Manchester and other British cities; and in Paris via the Paris pneumatic post. Following the creation of the first American pneumatic mail system in Philadelphia in 1893, New York City's system was begun, initially only between the old General Post Office on Park Row and the Produce Exchange on Bowling Green, a distance of 3,750 feet (1,140 m).

Eventually the network stretched up both sides of Manhattan Island all the way to Manhattanville on the West Side and "Triborough" in East Harlem, forming a loop running a few feet below street level. Travel time from the General Post Office to Harlem was 20 minutes. A crosstown line connected the two parallel lines between the new General Post Office on the West Side and Grand Central Terminal on the east, and took four minutes for mail to traverse. Using the Brooklyn Bridge, a spur line also ran from Church Street in lower Manhattan to the General Post Office in Brooklyn, taking four minutes. Operators of the system were called "Rocketeers".

Though 10 cities were funded for pneumatic mail, the New York operation was the most developed. By 1907 contracts were issued in five other cities (Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis), but not in four cities (Baltimore, Cincinnati, Kansas City, San Francisco). The system was discontinued in 1953.

🔗 Mexico 🔗 Geology 🔗 Caves

Cave of the Crystals (Spanish: Cueva de los cristales), also known as Naica Cave (Spanish: Cueva de Naica) or the Giant Crystal Cave, is a cave connected to the Naica Mine at a depth of 300 metres (980 ft), in Naica, Chihuahua, Mexico. It takes the form of a chamber within the limestone host rock of the mine, and is about 109 metres (358 ft) long with a volume of 5,000 to 6,000 cubic metres (180,000 to 210,000 ft³).

The chamber contains giant selenite crystals (gypsum, CaSO₄ · 2 H₂O), some of the largest natural crystals ever found. The largest is 11.40 metres (37.4 ft), with a volume of about 5 cubic metres (180 ft³), and an estimated mass of 12 tonnes. When not flooded, the cave is extremely hot, with air temperatures reaching up to 58 °C (136 °F) with 90 to 99 percent humidity. This is comparable to temperature records in Death Valley, but with much wetter air that results in a much higher wet bulb temperature; this prevents cooling via sweating. The cave is relatively unexplored because of these factors. Without proper protection, people can only endure approximately ten minutes of exposure at a time.

The cave was discovered in April 2000 by brothers Juan and Pedro Sánchez while drilling in the mine. As of October 2015, the mine had reflooded and the cavern filled once more with the water rich in minerals required for the crystals to grow.

A group of scientists in the Naica Project have been studying these caverns.

🔗 Computing 🔗 Computing/Early computers

Mailüfterl is a nickname for the Austrian Binär dezimaler Volltransistor-Rechenautomat (binary-decimal fully transistorized computing automaton), an early transistorized computer. Other early transistorized computers included TRADIC, Harwell CADET and TX-0.

Mailüfterl was built from May 1956 to May 1958 at the Vienna University of Technology by Heinz Zemanek.

Heinz Zemanek had come to an agreement with Konrad Zuse, whose company Zuse KG would finance the work of Rudolf Bodo, who helped build the Mailüfterl, also that all circuit diagrams of the Z22 were supplied to Bodo and Zemanek, and that after the Mailüfterl project Bodo should work for the Zuse KG to help build the transistorized Z23.

The first program, computation of the prime 5,073,548,261, was executed in May 1958. Completion of the software continued until 1961. The nickname was coined by Zemanek: "Even if it cannot match the rapid calculation speed of American models called 'Whirlwind' or 'Typhoon', it will be enough for a 'Wiener Mailüfterl'" (Viennese May breeze).

The computer has 3,000 transistors, 5,000 diodes, 1,000 assembly platelets, 100,000 solder joints, 15,000 resistors, 5,000 capacitors and about 20,000 metres (66,000 ft) of wire. It is 4 meters (13 ft) wide, 2.5 meters (8.2 ft) high, and 50 centimeters (20 in) deep. The machine was comparable in calculating power to what were then considered small vacuum-tube computers. Calculations and representation of values worked using the BCD system.

Zemanek later said about his project that it was a "semi-illegal" undertaking of an assistant professor, which he and a group of students realized without official authorization, and hence without financial support, from the university. In 1954 he traveled to Philips in the Netherlands, where he asked for a donation in kind. Transistors, invented seven years before and just beginning to be available commercially, were very difficult to obtain in quantity at any price, but Zemanek received a commitment for 1,000 rather slow hearing-aid transistors, and Philips finally shipped a total of 4,000 high-quality transistors to the Austrians.