today's #othernetworks entry: Hellschreiber, from 1929. what an impressively simple, elegant, practically error-free way to transmit text: the method essentially allows you to send pictures of letters (using a 7x7 bitmap grid) rather than transmitting codes.

https://post.lurk.org/system/media_attachments/files/111/166/938/145/213/721/original/642bec9982563fbb.jpg 

 with the usual relief and happiness to be back working on #othernetworks today, I wrote an entry on Project West Ford which honestly is one of the most bizarre networks I've come across...which is saying a lot. Developed by the MIT Lincoln Laboratory as a strategy to maintain radio comms in the event of a nuclear attack from Russia, Project West Ford was a belt of 480 million copper dipole needles that created an artificial ionosphere around the earth. It lasted between 1963 and 1966 and space debris from the project is probably still orbiting earth...

https://post.lurk.org/system/media_attachments/files/111/160/930/253/765/270/original/b5833080ff1480d6.jpeg 

 "The impaired ability of many neurotypicals to accurately gauge the emotional states of people with autism...turns out to drive many failures of reciprocity that have long been blamed solely on autistic 'impairments'" https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/autism-human-connection-and-the-double-empathy-problem/