- Hal Finney, early Bitcoin developer and cypherpunk, was declared legally dead on 28 Aug 2014 and is now undergoing full cryopreservation at Alcor; the standby team restored circulation immediately after legal death and is proceeding with cryoprotectant perfusion before cooling to −196 °C for long-term storage.  
- Channel consensus rated Alcor as the most credible cryonics provider, while voicing concern that the field has been operating in “cargo-cult mode” since the 2000s.  
- A DIY “muscle-memory” glove reported in IEEE Spectrum was discussed: wearing the glove for only a few hours enabled a user to learn 61 notes of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” with minimal conscious effort, suggesting new avenues for accelerated motor-skill acquisition.  
- Panasonic’s 3E 2-in-1 education tablet was highlighted as an open STEM tool, bundling a detachable microscope lens, 3-axis accelerometer, and environmental sensors (light, sound, temperature) for classroom experimentation.  
- New open-source tools mentioned include Terraform.io for infrastructure-as-code and Oozby, a Ruby-based alternative to OpenSCAD for parametric CAD design.  
- Abaqus finite-element software was praised for its Python scripting and plugin architecture, with examples ranging from automotive bolt analysis to PCB thermal/structural simulations.  
- The Science paper “Genomic surveillance elucidates Ebola virus origin and transmission during the 2014 outbreak” was circulated; its open-access PDF was mirrored at diyhpl.us/~bryan/papers2, and participants noted that several co-authors had died, underscoring the real-world risks faced by field virologists.