Week 5: Things you can learn about on the internet. Or simply enjoy them.

Today internet is all around us. Can you imagine a day without it? (Yes, I know you can, but making it real is very hard - I know what I’m saying, this year during holidays I put myself in a weeklong internet-rehab). We use it everywhere. At work, home, just after waking up, moments before falling asleep. We even take our English classes sitting before computers connected to the internet.

Listening to one episode of one of my favorite podcasts (about podcasts later) Radiolab (I cannot recall which one) I have heard that daily amount of information that people are absorbing these days is dozens of times bigger than one for people living a hundred years ago (I cannot remember exactly, but it is really a great difference - today we are everyday bombarded with information which people from the beginning of previous century would hear in a month). Very frightening for me is that this information often isn’t that much valuable. That most of things we hear, see or find on the internet are just a regular junk.

Much of this invaluable information comes from the internet - popular pages with dummy pictures, YouTube with its stupid videos or sensational, useless news. I don't like it and I don't like to realize how much time I waste vainly browsing the internet either.
But as we now have to, and in future will have to use the internet (because of its ubiquity) I like to use it to make things that can turn out to be useful. And I want to share some of them with you - I hope you will like them! At least some of them:)

1. Webcams
There are millions of public webcams out there on the internet. They are mostly very boring, but I like to watch them in the background - as a substitute for TV. In the meantime I can do something productive, just enjoying the view or find something more about things I can see. Of course you cannot always explore the topic, e.g. when you find a webcam in a cat hotel or in Icelandic sports hall (although you could try to find out what sport it is - probably some kind of training golf field?) or Croatian old town (can bring back memories from vacation:) + you can try to search its history) or printing factory or an always empty hotel lounge looking like it was build few meters below ground (couldn't find a link to this one). But... From time to time you can find something really interesting. You can watch the Earth rotating (did you know about pendulum? If not - you should read about it!). You can admire Polish wildlife (are you familiar with polish Żubr and its history? Do you know that they're not Polish?) - I recommend this one for long winter evenings. You can also wait for a pitch drop to drop (bottom of the page here or http://www.theninthwatch.com). I found this one about 1,5-2 years ago. Recently it became a little bit viral, so now you can watch it in HD or like it on Facebook. Pitch is a solid polymer. The experiment started about 80 years ago when Professor Thomas Parnell of the University of Queensland wanted to prove his students that pitch although it appears to be solid is in fact very-high-viscosity fluid. He had to wait for the first drop for 11 years. The most interesting fact about this experiment is that no one ever saw the drop! Even when they used cameras to record it - the cameras broke just before the most important moment. If you want to learn more about the whole pitch drop experiment – check the wiki or an official experiment page.

2. Google Maps
While wandering on google maps you can also find amazing places. For example: the black spot on a desert which is an iron ore mine - you can try to follow the train track back to the harbor on the shore (or just click here) - it's also all black from the dust. You can also climb the mount Fuji using the street view or walk with penguins through Antarctica.

3. Podcasts
I just love them. It is very easy to find them on the internet. You can listen to them while using the internet but I prefer to download them onto my phone and then listen to them on my way to/from work. My favorite ones are 99% invisible about very interesting things that happen in our surroundings and RadioLab about science.

Do you know any interesting webcams? Have you ever spotted anything unusual on google maps? Do you listen to podcasts on the internet?
What do you think about my efforts to take advantage of internet while wandering it? Do you also do this? Do you have your own tested methods? Or maybe you think it doesn’t make any sense?

P.S. While searching the internet you should always try to avoid the weird part of it and not to reach its end.