Stuff has caught fire at McMurdo multiple times - if it's not exterior, stuff inside the building is certainly flammable. McMurdo actually has their own 6-person fire department specifically because it's such a hazard.
At the South Pole station, all winter-overs take a weeklong firefighting training course with the Denver Fire Dept., since they don't have the luxury of a dedicated team.
Really interesting read - I just accepted a position with the US Antarctic Program as senior computer technician at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station this upcoming summer season, and I'll be spending a good amount of time at McMurdo in transit on the way to and from the Pole.
The research I've done on what to expect in Antarctica (and stories I heard during the interview process) are really, really interesting.
While McMurdo is the largest permanent base on the continent it's still incredibly isolated and self sufficient - and the polar station / field camps, an order of magnitude more so. Literally the closest thing we currently have to a permenant Mars colony. The USAP doesn't let anyone stay on ice longer than a year to prevent potential mental health issues.
If there's anyone else here involved (or previously involved) with the USAP here, I'd love to connect.
Google just started sending this around to publishers looking for feedback and suggestions.
It works by allowing people to pay a monthly amount ($5, $10, etc) which is then used to purchase ad space on the Google Ad Exchange, showing either a blank box or a thank-you message when a Contributor user visits a page containing Google ads.
The money Contributors pay into the system goes into the pool that is paid out to the owners of the websites they visit, like other advertising revenue.
I've been planning to get everything off the shared hosting accounts for awhile. Is Digital Ocean a better deal than, say, AWS for hosting dynamic websites?
This is a great idea - unfortunately, some of the servers I need to back up are feature-poor shared hosting accounts where it would be difficult or impossible to run a script that serves this purpose locally.
TickChek.com is a side-project I launched in collaboration with my university's wildlife laboratory to offer tick testing for Lyme and other diseases. We've grossed over $4k in out best months this last year.
I built a pretty thorough tax calculator tool at http://www.tax-rates.org/income-tax-calculator. Building it was a great experience, and I monetize it with ads and affiliate links during the tax season. It was certainly worth the time put in, and I am currently exploring options for expanding it into a paid app.
Seems like this would work great for a single server, but it's alot of work to set up a backup system like this for multiple servers (including shared hosting accounts with limited / no shell access).
Most insurance companies don't cover tick testing, unfortunately. We've never had any problems sending ticks through the mail though. People usually send 'em in sandwich bags inside normal envelopes, alive or dead.
My dad got Lyme on the Appalachian Trail five years ago, and still has symptom flare-ups regularly. Lyme has a habit of converting anybody affected by it into an activist, which probably stems from the controversy over diagnosis and treatment of things like chronic Lyme.
Earlier this year I founded TickChek.com, a startup that offers PCR-based laboratory tick testing that can determine whether or not a tick that bit you carries Borrelia (the Lyme disease bacteria) or other tick borne disease vectors with 99.99% accuracy. We've tested hundreds of ticks so far, and most of our customers use our lab results to help decide whether antibiotics or full blood testing is necessary.
Most people aren't aware of tick testing as an option for determining their risk of contracting Lyme, and we're going to be working hard to spread awareness before next year' tick season.