I’ve streamed about 9 hours of Diablo IV yesterday, taking my sorcerer from Level 12 to 21 in the Open Beta. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s shaping up to be a really solid game!

Last month, I recorded a podcast episode on some research by Dr Anthony Fauci reporting on SARS-CoV-2 vaccines in a highly respected medical journal:

→ The Private Citizen 146: Vaccines Were Never Going to Stop the Pandemic

Dr Anthony Fauci, for a long time the man in charge of the US response to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, has now admitted that vaccines have failed to stop the spread of the disease and were never likely to.

Interestingly, LinkedIn was of the opinion that this was misinformation. I understand how this judgement came to pass, but it is obviously total nonsense. So I released another episode, reporting on it:

→ The Private Citizen 147: LinkedIn Says Fauci is Spreading Misinformation

Horribly broken content moderation practices at LinkedIn make the Microsoft-owned social network actively hostile to scientific progress and press freedom, it seems.

I actually pre-recorded the next episode of the podcast a while ago, but haven’t had any time to release it until now. It should be out later today. Please excuse the delays on this!

I’ve been working on a more detailed map for my D&D campaign setting. It is far from finished, but here’s a work in progress:

A few days ago, I recommended the Traveler’s Notebook to my friend Halefa, who was looking for a notebook to use as a D&D campaign journal. She has now bought one and wrote a very in-depth blog post on her setup and plans for the notebook, which is well worth a read:

→ Using a Traveler’s Notebook as TTRPG campaign journal, Halefa.com

I’ve published my second in-depth Star Trek TOS review today, on the episode “Charlie X”:

→ Girls in Space Be Wary, Mission Critical Ops

Around 18:00 CET today, I will try to put a kerbal into the orbit of Kerbin. I will be streaming the mission live on Twitch again. Please be patient if the streams starts late, I am going to try and work out some of the performance issues I’ve been having with the game before I go live.

I’ve put the whole recording of my first Kerbal Space Program 2 stream on Youtube.

After heavy initial problems getting this game to not kill the performance of my computer and being able to stream it, and hours of problems in game getting into orbit and actually decoupling the satellite, I finally achieved success at the end of the stream. It made me so proud!

Today, at 16:00 CET, I will stream the start of the Fab Space Industries Bumblebee mission, where we’re trying to put a satellite into the orbit of Kerbin in Kerbal Space Program 2. Check it out on Twitch.

Ten years after the first Fab Space Program, I’m going back to space. Tomorrow afternoon, Fab Space Industries will launch its first mission in Kerbal Space Program 2. We are aiming for a mission launch around 16:00 CET. The plan is to design an unmanned rocket, do some test flights and finally – hopefully – put a satellite in orbit of Kerbin.

If you want to be a part of this historic occasion, join the Twitch stream at around 16:00 CET and hang out. KSP 2 is still extremely buggy, so there will probably be many hilarious accidents and crashes.

In today’s edition of my weekly column for the German daily newspaper Ostfriesen-Zeitung, I coined what I’d like to call “Adama’s Law”:

Most problems arising from the digitalisation of society only occur due to the networking of the systems involved.

I’ve started a Substack where I’m reviewing every Star Trek episode ever released. I’ve started today with TOS season 1, episode 1: “The Man Trap”. It’s very in-depth and nerdy. Check it out and give me a subscription, if you enjoy this kind of thing.

→ Tequila Sunrise over M-113, Mission Critical Ops

I’ve read many stories today, proclaiming this date to be the one year anniversary of the war in Ukraine or of Russia’s invasion of the country. That is so obviously not true by any criteria one could possibly apply with a sane mind, that it actually quite amazed me that everyone was running with it. It also made me angry. So I had to write and talk about it, even though I’m still not completely recovered from this cold.

Here’s a newsletter issue on the topic:

→ The New Age of Militarism — As the war in Ukraine escalates, common sense withers

…and also a podcast episode:

→ The Private Citizen 145: War Never Changes

Today is not the anniversary of the war in Ukraine. That is just one of the propaganda lies by people who are afraid to stand up for peace and fight against murder and injustice.

Yesterday, Blood Bowl III was released. And since I am a bit under the weather at the moment and find it hard to concentrate on work, I’ve started a new career as my Blood Bowl coach alter ego Jurgen von Klopp, coaching the Burgdorf Barons (team motto: “Finem Mundi Nobilis”). The game is still a bit buggy at the moment, but a lot of fun, nontheless. As Blood Bowl should be. And most importantly, it’s a faithful recreation of Games Workshop’s tabletop rules, including visible dice rolls. You can even skin the dice… very cool!

At the beginning of the month, my latest podcast project, The Private Citizen, turned three years old. It’s quite amazing to me that it’s been going for this long. I am quite happy about this and I’m very happy with the show in general. Even if I’ve lately been lagging behind a bit in releasing episodes, due to reasons that are beyond my control.

Things should start to get better soon, though. I’ve got a few new episodes prepped already and I am quite hopeful that I will be able to get back to recording and releasing tomorrow. Until then, check out the show’s anniversary episode, if you haven’t done so already:

→ The Private Citizen 143: Three Year Anniversary

Today, the podcast turns three years old and I tell the story of how I became a journalist and what I learned in the process.