iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Jacob Gillette

Frank Strong @frankstrong.bsky.social · 25/09/2025

I need help getting this CRAZY censorship story out! Last week, admins in Leander ISD emailed teachers telling them to “pause” use of 40 books relating to “DEI” that had previously been curriculum or choice reading activities. Included on the list? To Kill a Mockingbird. #bookbans #booksky

Email to 6th-grade teachers in Leander ISD that reads:

Dear 6th Grade ELA Team,
I want to share an Important update regarding some of the texts in our book club and
whole-class reading collections. In response to new legislation outlined in Senate Bill 12 (89th
Legislature), we have conducted a review of titles currently used in secondary ELA instruction.
Because SB 12 prohibits specific types of content, several of our resources now require
additional review.
Effective immediately, please pause the use of the identified texts (linked below) in
instruction and assignments until further notice. This step is necessary to ensure our
curriculum remains in full compliance with the law.
I want to emphasize that these books are not being permanently removed. They are simply on
hold while we seek additional guidance from TASB and TEA regarding the implications of SB 12
for instructional resources. Once we receive that guidance, we will provide clear updates about
next steps. Additionally, if these books are included in your own personal classroom library, we
request that you remove them since personal classroom libraries are considered instructional
resources.
I know this timing is far from ideal and may present challenges, especially given the thoughtful
preparation you have invested in building engaging reading experiences for students. Please
know that our commitment to offering students a wide range of meaningful opportunities for
choice reading and discussion remains unchanged.
Thank you for your flexibility, professionalism, and continued dedication to our students as we
navigate this process together.
6th grade ELAR Resources
With appreciation,

List of 40 books removed from classes. Includes To Kill a Mockingbird, The House on Mango Street, The Fire Next Time, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass and, weirdly, Les Miserables.

20322213

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 10/08/2025

So much going on in this picture! A brand new supernova in the galaxy NGC7331, 12 total galaxies between about 40-404 million light years away, and with the inclusion of Stephan’s quintet…even a touch of Christmas. #astrophotography #astronomy #supernova #galaxies #itsawonderfullife

The full shot! Data collected over two nights, with 42 5min subs for a total of 3.5 hours of stacked data.

The largest galaxy you can see, in the upper right, is NGC7331. It is located about 45 million light years away and the light from a supernova there just arrived in our skies a couple weeks ago.

To the lower right is Stephan’s Quintet, a group of interacting galaxies, mostly located about 300 million light years away. This group is famous as the conversing angels in the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life”.

Overall I count 12 separate galaxies in this picture, meaning there is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 3-5 trillion stars. The furthest galaxy away is listed as about 404 million light years away.

Galaxy NGC7331. The red arrow points at supernova 2025rbs. This supernova first appeared on July 14th, 2025 and it is the brightest one currently visible in the Earth’s sky. It is a Type 1A supernova, which occur when a white dwarf consumes material from a companion red giant, until it reaches a critical mass and explodes. As these only occur at very specific masses, they are always the same luminosity (brightness), and function as “standard candles” in astronomy, meaning they can be used to accurately measure distances in the universe.

What’s neat is that every other star in the whole picture is from the Milky Way. This supernova is in fact the only discrete object we can see that is from outside our galaxy…and it’s so bright that it outshines the core of its own galaxy. Super cool.

Several other galaxies are also circled. They are all about 300 million light years away, except the littlest one to the right, which is about 404 million light years away, making it the furthest object I’ve caught to date (that I know of anyway. I love when I go to capture an image and unexpected galaxies show up in the background.

And here is Stephan’s quintet! I am definitely going to try to get a better close up of this when it reaches its peak in a couple months. Pretty fun though. The galaxies are actively pulling each other apart and you can see this in the spinning of the two merging at the top and the faint drawn out tail of the one below it to the left. There is also a sixth galaxy, to the lower left of the image that we see top down.

And a final side by side of the shot from “It’s a Wonderful Life” and Webb’s impressive image. At least I beat out the 1946 photo by a bit!

1193

Reposted by Jacob Gillette

Eloise Powers @elnopower.bsky.social · 31/07/2025

Hmmm 🤔

01412

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 06/06/2025

About 1700 light years away lies the North America nebula (NGC 7000). My photo is of the Cygnus Wall section, an ~20 light year across area of strong star formation. This is an emission nebula, where light from forming stars ionizes the surrounding gas causing it to glow #astronomy #astrophotography

The North America nebula (NGC 7000). Observed in the constellation Cygnus, about 1500 light years from Earth, this photo is of a what is called the Cygnus Wall, an area of particularly strong star formation. This nebula is an emission nebula, where light from forming stars ionizes the surrounding gas causing it to glow. The entire nebula is about 100 light years across, with the Cygnus Wall being about 20 light years long.

My scope will only cover a small portion of the full nebula in a single frame. I’m pretty happy with this photo though Sky conditions were actually pretty poor on Monday night with the Canadian wildfires, but I avoided the worst of it by about a day thankfully. This photo is composed of 28x500 sec exposures, for a total integration time of approx 3.8 hours. My camera is a cooled Astro camera (ASI 2600MC AIR) with a telescope focal length of 1960mm @ F7.8

0275

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 17/03/2025

@dylanodonnell.bsky.social I thought you might appreciate my outie meme self-burn! Simplest pic I’ve taken in three years and this lunar eclipse shot might be one of my best/favorites.

121

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 15/03/2025

Total Lunar Eclipse best single shot! Zero edits! Straight from our DSLR. I had the advantage of 1960mm of focal length, but very low atmospheric turbulence sure helped! More to come later, but I’m pretty happy with this single half-second exposure. #astronomy #lunareclipse #astrophotography

218720

Reposted by Jacob Gillette

The Serfs (youtube.com/theserfstv) @theserfstv.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

Can a headline alone be eligible for a Pulitzer?

I knew one day I’d have to watch powerful men burn the world down – I just didn’t expect them to be such losers

7447756216921

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

The amazing thing about a total solar eclipse is how cosmically rare they probably are.The moon and the sun appear in the sky as virtual twins, overlapping perfectly.This results from the sun being both 400x larger and 400x further away from the earth than the moon. #astrophotography #astronomy

Only minutes away from totality during the April 8, 2024 solar eclipse.

The “diamond ring” effect appears as the sun disappears behind the limb of the moon

“Baily’s beads” can be seen as the last vestiges of the solar disk peak through the lowest valleys and craters on the left lim of the moon. A solar flare is visible on the lower right

The full solar eclipse as seen from Burlington VT, April 8, 2024. Photos were shot from the parking lot of Burton Snowboards. We started the night before in Rochester, NY with nothing but a forecast for 100% clouds. My family and I packed up and left at 3am and traveled to as far as we thought might give us an open sky. The weather was perfect, the sky was perfect and we had a great time. If you ever get the chance to see a total solar eclipse, go for it. It is truly an unforgettable experience.

5645

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 07/01/2025

Half moon shot from a while back. Celestron edgeHD 11 for the 🔭 W/ a 2x Barlow and DSLR. #astronomy #lunar #astrophotography

2523

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Along the lower edge of the constellation Leo, 1/3 the way between its brightest stars Denebola and Regulus, lies Leo’s Triplet. This compact galaxy cluster is ~35 million light years away. It contains galaxies M65, M66, and NGC3628, also known as the Hamburger Galaxy. #astrophotography, #astronomy

I’m particularly proud of this pic. I was aiming to get all three in the same file of view and (mostly) succeeded! The first use of my ASI 2600MC AIR! This new cooled, guided, computerized astrophotography camera is absolutely amazing. This final picture has a total of 41 minutes of data, collected as 30 sec subs.

Messier object #65 was discovered by Charles Messier in 1780. It is an intermediate spiral galaxy with about 200 billion stars. There is little gas left over in this galaxy, and the ratio of old to young stars is high, with little recent star formation.

Messier object #66 is the most distorted galaxy of the three. Its arms deformed and elongated, likely due to a past interaction with NGC 3628. M66 also appears as #18 in Halton Arp’s Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies.

NGC 3628, also known as “The Hamburger Galaxy” was discovered by William Hershel in 1784. This unbarred, spiral galaxy is seen edge-on. A strong band of dust sits on its outer edges, cutting the disk in two.

180

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

My best Jupiter photo so far, taken Nov 2023. I’m still hopeful I can get a better shot this year before we move too far past opposition, but the clouds have been uncooperative thus far. #Jupiter #astrophotography #Astronomy

Jupiter at Opposition Nov. 2023. Opposition is when the planet is “opposite” the sun, meaning as the sun sets, the planet rises, and vice-versa. This occurs as the orbit of planet and the Earth are at their closest point. The moon is Io I believe.

0101

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

The mountains where Apollo landed between two seas, and the great scarring of the Southern Highlands. A couple fun moon pictures I took awhile back. #lunar #astronomy #astrophotography #moon

060

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

Fun improvement over my previous Orion Nebula shot. The last one was a single 1.5 minute shot. This one has a total exposure time of about 15 minutes. Much better detail in the nebulae, including some dark nebula detail, which I’ve never caught before. #astrophotography #astronomy

1100

Jacob Gillette @ekobaseobservatory.bsky.social · 15/12/2024

My photo of The Whirlpool Galaxy M51 and its Dwarf Galaxy companion NGC 5195. Approx. 30 million light years away, the Whirlpool Galaxy is a “Grand Design” Spiral Galaxy, defined by its two curving arms, rich with new star formation. The two galaxies are connected by a tidal bridge of gas and dust.

030