iPads in spa-a-a-a-ce!
Rockin' the Vomit Comet for science
The next time you take your iPad into space, remember that it has a screen-rotation lock next to its volume-control rocker switch. You may need it.
As any fanboi toting Apple's magical and revolutionary device knows, the iPad's accelerometer allows it to reorient its display so that down is always down, no matter in which orientation it's rotated.
For reasons possibly related to chocolate, cheese, or cuckoo clocks, a Swiss television show by the name of Einstein was curious as to whether the iPad's display-rotation skills would work in zero gravity. So they took a ride in the affectionately named Vomit Comet to find out:
Our thanks to PadGadget for pointing out this triumph of the scientific method. ®
COMMENTS
Brownian motion
But due to convection the warmer air will still disperse, just in all directions.
Latest news from Cupertino
Apple have announced that zero-G is now banished from the apps store. Any apps that could be used in a zero-G environment now contravene apps store rules and will be removed. A spokesman added that as a result of this ruling "bouncing breasts" apps would be reinstated subject to a demonstration that that bouncing was consistent with a non-zero-G environment.
True Zero-G
Ok, since this appears to be a point of confusion:
If you're going to say that freefall != zero-G, then sending an iPad on any random space mission will not suffice (as suggested by someone else). You will need to send it on the next interplanetary space mission (ie to the Moon, Mars, etc)
What most people refer to as Zero-G is experienced when in orbit around a planet. Well guess what? That's freefall. Gravity acts on orbiting objects in the same way it act on earthbound object, just less so. If there was no gravity in orbit, objects such as satellites, the Moon, space stations etc would not orbit, they'd shoot off in to space. What keeps an object in orbit is its forward motion is enough to keep it "falling" around the earth, that is to say the object is falling under the effect of gravity, but its going "forwards" (for want of a better term) so quickly that it keeps missing the horizon. To make an orbiting object return to earth, all they need to do, is make it slow down.
So actually guys, in the generally accepted use of the term "Zero-G", it is equivalent to freefall.
In Space...
.... no-one can hear developers screaming when their apps are banned :(
