Venus Transit Finished 220
KjetilK writes "Venus is just about to cross the solar disc.
Direct from the control room in the Frogner Park in Oslo, I'm pleased to inform you that we have a great webcast, and as far as we know, it is the only webcast that still stands upright... Slashdotters, do your worst! ;-) A Venus transit is one of the most unique astronomical events in our time, in fact, no living person has witnessed it before today. And today, more people have seen it from the park where I'm sitting that in the rest of human history. Also, it had tremendous importance for the development of science, as it gave the first absolute measurements of distances in the solar system. Especially in 1769, a transit made science take huge leaps forward. And BTW, New Zealand and Australia were 'discovered' in the process" Some nice photos from the UK, photos from vt-2004.org, and if you missed it, it'll be eight short years till you can try again.
Way to go! (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, that was the case when submitted, but the editors thought it was best to wait until its over before putting it on the frontpage.
So the way it works is... when someone asks to slashdot a webcast, wait til its over to put it on the front page, but when an anonymous poster points to an IP (not a domain), slashdot the hell outta it [slashdot.org].
Re:pics i took (Score:5, Insightful)
Living people have indeed witnessed Venus transits (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, this actually isn't true.
Plenty of living people have witnessed Venus transits before today.
What is true is that nobody now living has ever personally witnessed a Venus transit, since the last one occurred over 100 years ago, and everyone who witnessed it is now dead.
solar disc? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Another article (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:unique events (Score:4, Insightful)
I think you will find that the frequency of Really Interesting Events hasn't changed.
What has changed, however, is the amount of publicity they get. Thanks to facilities like this one, more people know about them. At one time only people who read specialist literature knew about various comets, oppositions, and so on.
...laura
8-year joke prediction (Score:5, Insightful)