- A sprawling, self-published “psychic transhumanist” web-ring created by Robert Ray Hedges was analyzed as an early case study in SEO-driven meme-engineering, combining children’s-immortality rhetoric with hundreds of inter-linked Blogspot sites.  
- The Austin open-fabrication community debated branding options such as “fabratory,” “faboratory,” “fabuntu,” “superfab,” “Austin AutoFac,” and “The Fabrication Foundation,” while checking domain availability and referencing the global Hackerspaces directory (hackerspaces.org/wiki/List_of_Hacker_Spaces).  
- Work on the Structured Knowledge Database (SKDB) advanced with fenn creating a YAML parts inventory (bench.yaml) and kanzure pushing for CAD model references, Git workflow improvements, and hosting via fennetic.net/skdb.git.  
- KEGG pathway data inconsistencies were highlighted: kanzure found ambiguous compound roles in eco00010 and noted that the API fails to distinguish reactants from products, complicating automated metabolic-model extraction; a 20 GB FTP dump was retrieved but only the ligand.tar.gz subset proved useful.  
- Debian ecosystem metrics were shared—package counts grew from 727 in Debian 2.0 to 3,258 in 3.1, with a 7.5-year maintainer half-life and a forecast of 100 k packages by 2006—along with discussion of gitosis for easier Git hosting.  
- iGEM was criticized as “academic bullshit,” with participants arguing that projects like the melamine-sensor team are rushed for grades or publication and then abandoned without follow-through.  
- LEGO Digital Designer (LDD) was praised for generating build instructions and exact part lists, but participants lamented that LEGO’s real-world part bundles remain expensive and inflexible.  
- A physical book on “forgotten” fluidics technology was located, prompting frustration over the lack of on-campus high-speed book scanners to digitize rare technical literature.  
- The group brainstormed fully automated food systems, citing Bamn’s robotic storefront (bamnfood.com), Wonder Pizza vending machines, and the concept of an “autoramen” cooker, while musing about reviving historical automats inside university engineering buildings for 24/7 hacker sustenance.  
- Real-time citizen science surfaced when the comet Lulin (space.com/spacewatch/090220-comet-lulin.html) was mentioned, prompting an immediate plan for amateur observation.