I know that title may take a moment to parse, but what it means is that the podcast 365 Days of Astronomy just won the Parsec, an annual award for podcasts! My congrats to everyone involved: Nancy Atkinson (who wrote about this at Universe Today), Pamela Gay, George Hrab (who did the musical theme and accepted the award at Dragon*Con) and everyone else who contributed.
365 Days is a user-driven ‘cast: people signed up for different days of the year, recorded a podcast about astronomy, and then uploaded it to the site. So the content is totally by the audience, which is very cool, and a great way to build a dedicated community to support astronomy. I’m really glad this unique venture — a project of the International Year of Astronomy — got the recognition it deserves!
And 365 Days still has quite a few days to go, so you should put it in your iTunes subscriptions or your RSS feed or whatever it takes so that you can listen in every diurnal rotation of the Earth.
September 8th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
So it has nothing to do with the Kessel Run, then?
September 8th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
J.H.: HA! I came just for this!
September 8th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
super luminal !!!!
1 Parsec = 3.26163626 light years, i.e. 1,191 days.
September 8th, 2009 at 9:39 pm
Huzzah!
September 8th, 2009 at 9:53 pm
maybe I missed your sarcasm, Terry Whelan, but how is a parsec measured in days?
September 8th, 2009 at 10:02 pm
I was delighted to hold that very Parsec in my own trembling hands at D*C. I handed it over to Ms. Information, though, lest I get too attached. She gave it to Pamela when she got to the Skeptrack room. I’ve produced 3 episodes so far, and have 2 more to come (in December). It’s been a great honor to lend a hand to the effort.
BTW, Kestrels don’t run, they fly! ;^)
September 9th, 2009 at 2:48 am
I was so glad when I heard that 365 won a Parsec! I only wish I could have been there…. me and my darn being a Director and running other things at the same time!
September 9th, 2009 at 8:11 am
Arg! You missed the better pun: “I know that title will take a sec’ to parse.”
September 9th, 2009 at 8:29 am
Since a parsec is defined by the earth’s orbit, I think 365 days is a rather fitting winner.
September 9th, 2009 at 10:00 pm
Oh I am so honored!
I’d like to thank the flying spaghetti monster, my family, and the wonderful crew behind the IYA 365 days of astronomy podcast – without whom none of this would have been possible.
Thank you all so much!
…I guess my trophy is coming in the mail then?
September 10th, 2009 at 7:22 am
I feel compelled to post something here, though I don’t know what to say except “congratulations!”
BTW, @Crux, distance is proportional to time, the proportionality factor being the speed of light. The time it takes for light to travel 1 parsec is 1,191 days, as Terry said. (Disclaimer: I haven’t actually checked the math, but it sounds right.)
September 10th, 2009 at 7:54 am
P.S. tried to edit my comment after checking the math, but I guess I took too long…
Anyway, using the definition of the parsec (648000/pi AU) and the speed of light from Allen’s Astrophysical Constants (4th edition) , I get 1191.2948 days, verifying Terry’s calculation.
Translating to light years is problematical since there are several definitions of the year (sidereal, Julian, tropical, anomalistic, etc.), each with a corresponding light year.