Television by Matt McGann '00
MIT on TV.
Tonight’s episode of MythBusters on the Discovery Channel will show the Archimedes Death Ray episode, done in conjunction with students from MIT’s 2.009: Product Engineering Processes. Definitely worth checking out (MythBusters is an awesome show!).
This isn’t the first time MIT students have done cool stuff on the Discovery Channel. A few years ago, my housemate and some others starred in “Crop Circles: Mystery in the Fields,” which included such classics as the “Winnebago of Science” and the “Flammschmeisser.”
And, of course, you can catch Ankur ’03 on Beauty and the Geek 2 tomorrow night at 9pm on the WB.
Hey! I guess I saw the Crop circle thingy…..
Was their someone like Dev/Dave///one with a bit long hairs…I guess he was of Indian origin or something. I dont remember much of that…but I am sure I saw it.
Cheers!
dang, them chicks was hottt!!!!!!
juuuuuust kidding (or am i?)
Oh, the crop circles…
Ankur’s actually on TV right now. (It seems that on Wednesdays, they air the previous week’s show… which is good because I missed it.) It’s really ridiculously awful, and Ankur doesn’t get a lot of face time… at least not so far.
A few months ago, when I was still researching universities in the US and considering where to apply, I watched “Crop Circles: Mystery in the Fields”. I had spent the whole day reading stuff on the MIT website, and watching the MIT Crop Circles project on the same evening was an interesting coincidence. I thought making crop circles was a great way to spend your college years
In fact, this show was the small thing that finally made me decide MIT is my number one.
I just saw MythBusters and was surprised someone didn’t make mention of it.
The Crop Circles show was on the other day, and that cracked me up (even though I had seen it earlier in life and thought, “Wow, wouldn’t it be cool to go to MIT to do stuff like that”). The only way they could’ve made the name Flammschmeisser any cooler is by figuring out how to add an umlaut.
And I’m thoroughly enjoying Beauty and the Geek. Even though I’d say I’m a geek… dang. I’m not _that_ bad.
The guy with the Rubix cube is amazing though. I bow down to that.
Ah, Rubik’s cubes. People do those at my school. We have contests, too. None of us can do it behind our backs, though several of us can do it in under a minute hehe
Matt’s roomate here. Arka – yup, there was a Dev (and he is Indian)
Virzhiniya – You made my day!! I’m glad you saw the show as one of the cool opportunites that MIT folks randomly stumble upon. Cause that’s all it was, we were in the right place (MIT) at the right time (punting problem sets)
As a side note, I’m so sad we didn’t get royalties from that show. I can’t believe they are still re-running it! (it was taped in spring/summer ’02)
It was actually on Discovery Channel that I first heard of MIT. On “Scrapheap Challenge”, the old, British series, there was this MIT student called Chen, who was talking about this competition they’d had on who could make the tallest tower out of an A4 sheet of paper. The true test was that the tower had to be able to support a full Coke can on top of it, without support. The winner (I think it was Chen) had a tower somewhere in the range of 2m(6.5 feet), +-10cm.
And my first thought was “I want to go to MIT and learn how to do that!”. Since then I’ve of course found much better reasons for wanting to go to MIT, but that was my first introduction to MIT.
Michael
yes! i saw both the episodes: mythbusters and crop circles: mystery in the fields..
they were awesome..i mean going to college, and doing cool stuff like this? i mean i would love to do it!
Wow! thats really great….
Once I saw a program on bike technology in “Extreme Machines” Discovery Channel….and their was some one speaking from MIT. MIT is so well rounded….it now adds to my conviction to get their. MIT is cool….just see the activities…..from Cool Crop circles to great other fun science…..MIT is #1…
Cheers
Hey well i missed the episode but I read how that MIT project dispproved what mythbusters said, now that was funny- I told a few of my friends about that at school, and we shared some laughs. Yea well its late at night for me, and its the first time in awhile I’ve been on here- Senior year exams with AP courses is tough :( The show I like to watch on occasion is modern marvels, its either on the histroy channel or discovery, I forgot which- anywho laters
~Matt Bayer~
we’re on the trimester system here, we dont have our second trimester exams until 1 more month :D
unfortunately, my grades dropped massively JUST in time for mid-years to pick them up!! :( seriously, i got like 4 bad test grades the week before mid-year grades got finalized… boo hoo. ;D
personally, i like Teen Titans and IGPX (both cartoons). i dont get discovery channel :( … btw, anybody see the thing in the Tech Review a/b how the internet is broken??
new IGPX episode saturday @ 10:30 on cartoon network!!!!!!
Unfortunately, I don’t think Ankur has good chances of making it to the final round, considering his partner didn’t even recognize John Kerry.