The first matches of the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup will be tomorrow (or later today, depending on your time zone), so I figured it was time to start this topic.

Just like with last year's men's World Cup, even though I won't be able to watch all of the matches (especially considering the time zone difference for this tournament), I will definitely watch the matches where team USA will play (worth noting is they won the last two World Cups, so they now have an opportunity to potentially win three in a row, which has never be done by either men's or women's teams for any country), and possibly some played by the co-hosts Australia and New Zealand.

I will make an effort to try watching all matches once the knockout round begins, which will be particularly interesting since this is the first Women's World Cup to have 32 teams participating instead of 24, so this will be the first women's tournament to have a Round of 16 to begin the knockout stage. This new expanded format means there's quite a few teams who are making their very first appearance in a Women's World Cup (some of whom have not yet had even their men's team qualify for the men's World Cup), so it'll be interesting to see how well these less experienced teams will do.
(EDIT: I was mistaken. After some quick research, all previous Women's World Cups with 24 teams did in fact have a Round of 16 to start the knockout round. The expansion to 32 teams means there will be eight groups in the group stage rather than just six groups in previous tournaments.)

And just like I did last year, I will not waste my time with writing up summaries and will instead post links showing highlight videos and match details every day as each match is completed (assuming of course that I can find similar links with the sources I used last year).

I think that covers all the important things for now, so for those of you who will be watching, which teams are you most interested in seeing how they perform?

According to recent discoveries, scientists have been able to determine that the asteroid impact that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs occurred during Spring in the Northern Hemisphere, possibly explaining why other creatures were able to survive the extinction event.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/good-day-die-doom-dinosaurs-161044192.html
https://www.yahoo.com/news/birds-crocodiles-survived-dinosaur-killing-151249289.html

https://www.yahoo.com/news/armored-dinosaur-wielded-tail-resembling-160600828.html
https://news.yahoo.com/dinosaur-species-chile-had-unique-160259691.html
https://news.yahoo.com/scientists-strange-dinosaur-chile-tail-055950974.html
https://news.yahoo.com/newly-discovered-dinosaur-had-slashing-165306843.html
https://news.yahoo.com/armored-dinosaur-had-tail-resembling-122704892.html

A new species of dinosaur was recently discovered in southern Chile. This newly discovered dinosaur is part of the ankylosaur family and is officially called "Stegouros". What makes this species very distinctive is that its tail is lined by a series of wide blades, resembling those war clubs that were used by Aztec warriors.



For those of us here in the LBT fandom, I sure would like to see someone write a fanfic that includes an appearance of one of these strange new dinos. We've seen Spike-tails and Club-tails, but a Blade-tail would definitely be a new one.

On this day 75 years ago, the United States dropped the first atomic weapon on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. It was a truly devastating weapon that undoubtedly changed the world forever.

To this day, there is still debate over whether or not unleashing such a horrible weapon was the right decision. In my opinion, it was tragically necessary not only to avoid the immense casualties that a conventional invasion of Japan was expected to bring, but also to provide a true real world demonstration of the devastating affects such a weapon would have when unleashed upon a major city (for example, according to one TV program I recently watched, the scientists who created the bomb had severely underestimated just how widespread the effects of the radiation would actually be). The fact that those two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki are still the only nuclear weapons ever used against a major target really goes to show how much people since then have thought twice about ever unleashing such immense death and destruction against anyone.

Let's continue to hope and pray that we will never have to witness the use of any nuclear weapons within our lifetimes (especially considering how divided and distrusting the world's major powers have become in recent years).

A few days ago while reading various bits of news, I came across this one:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/200-years-exploring-antarctica-worlds-133747342.html
Apparently, this week marks the bicentennial of when the continent of Antarctica was discovered.

After a quick read on the Wikipedia page for Antarctica, I learned that the very first people to ever see any part of that continent was a Russian expedition on January 27, 1820, which was an ice shelf on the eastern part of the continent. Just three days later, a separate British expedition also had their first sighting of the continent, which was actual land at what we now call the Antarctic Peninsula. The first person to actually walk on the land was American seal hunter John Davis in 1821 (although some historians dispute this and other landings in the following decades, and the earliest absolutely confirmed landing was not until 1895). Considering that Antarctica is the only continent on Earth that never had any native human populations, these people discovering and setting foot on this land might as well have been like going to the Moon.

It's also remarkable to think that Antarctica is the only significant landmass on Earth that is not directly claimed by any nation and has been set aside almost exclusively for scientific research, thanks to the Antarctic Treaty signed in 1959. I'll admit, I've actually got quite a fascination with Antarctica because it happens to be to only continent to have remained largely unaltered by human activity (though global warming obviously threatens to change that), giving us a glimpse at a truly large-scale fully natural part of a planet full of life.

Quite amazing to think that we've known about that incredible place for only two hundred years now.

Tomorrow will be the start of the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup in France. Like last time, there are 24 teams competing, though four of them are in the World Cup for the first time ever. But of course, I'm hoping to see defending champion team USA to win again this year (even though they now have the most championships of all teams at three, there's nothing wrong with seeing them go further and get a fourth win).

I don't have much time these days for long posts, so I'll probably just mention the results of each game every few days. Once the group stage is over and the knockout stage gets started, I'll start getting more detailed about the results. As for which matches I'l actually watch, I'll probably see in the group stage only the three that team USA plays, and depending on how much time I have available, I'd like to see most of the knockout round matches.

Anyone else here interested in watching any of this?

Just hours ago, I came across something very interesting. It's basically an interactive globe that shows what the Earth's continents were like throughout the ages, going from the present day up to as far back as 750 million years ago.

Ancient Earth Globe
(This particular link shows the present day Earth, but you can adjust the settings to look at the Earth in any time period you're interested in.)

I haven't yet had a chance to really explore it, but according to this article where I found out about it, you can even enter addresses to find out what certain specific locations were like in various prehistoric times.

Yesterday, I came across a rather interesting video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThpxKCT6EL0

This guy talks about a certain Bionicle video game that was due to launch way back in 2001, the very first year of the franchise, but was canceled just shortly before its scheduled release. For years, it was quite a mystery among Bionicle fans why that game was canceled. Now, not only do we now have some answers, but also, due to a remarkable find quite recently, a nearly complete version of this game is now available to play. You can download it from here:
http://biomediaproject.com/bmp/blog/the-legend-of-mata-nui-final-build/

I'm a little too busy with other games at this time to try this lost Bionicle game anytime soon, but if anyone here is interested in taking a look at it, please be sure to let me know what you think of it.

Today is the ten year anniversary of when I first joined this forum, the Gang of Five, and quite a lot has happened since then.

At the time (the end of 2007), I had had only a little experience with forums on the Bionicle fansite, BZPower, and even though my online behavior back then was rather newbish, I'm glad that I got little more than just one warning before I was able to learn a few hard lessons about being respectful to other people on the internet. Also, I guess I was a little behind the times, because I never even had an email address until just a few weeks before I made my account here.

Not long after I joined, I quickly started writing my very first fanfiction, a crossover between Land Before Time and Bionicle (I think the links in my signature to both of my stories still work, if you're curious about what I wrote back then). I had been reading LBT fanfiction for about a year by that point, and I had read every official Bionicle book that was available by then, so I felt like I was ready to try writing my own story. It was certainly a unique idea, but neither of the two stories I wrote didn't seem to get much attention. Thankfully, I eventually managed to ask fellow member Pangaea to help me fix errors, make improvements, and other kinds of editing advice. Although it's quite a shame he's no longer an active member here, I really must thank him for helping me to become a better writer and to have confidence to keep on writing.

Throughout my early years here, I not only wrote and completed my very first fanfiction, but also attempted to join in the RPG section. I recall being part of two RPs and starting one of my own (based on a concept inspired by a sci-fi book I had read), but despite my intent to stay fully active, they all eventually faded away. Just as well, as I would later struggle to find time to do additional things like RPs, so as much as I enjoyed those days of fun, I'm glad that the loss of those supposed obligations allowed me to move on to other things.

By the time I had been a member for five years (the end of 2012), things for me had changed quite a bit since the day when I had joined. Bionicle had been discontinued in 2010, there had seemed like no chance at all we would ever seen another LBT movie or episode, my graduation from college meant the end of dedicating a lot of time to working on class and homework assignments, and I was starting to loose interest in the second LBT/Bionicle crossover fanfiction I was writing. I considered resuming my activity over at BZPower (where I had been a member since 2004), but even though I still visit those forums as frequently as I do these forums, My interests eventually went to something new and quite popular at the time; My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Once I had gained interest after reading the discussion topics about it both here and over at BZPower, I not only became interested in the show and eventually was able to watch every episode, but I also soon came across the fanfiction site for it (FiMFiction.net) and quickly found so many interesting stories to read that I pretty much had to make an account there just to keep track of the ones I wanted to eventually read (many of which I still haven't had the time to read to this day). After about a year, I finally decided to cancel all further progress on my LBT/Bionicle story, and turned my writing efforts to a new fanfiction series (which I've titled "LEGO Equestria Girls"), and after writing four main stories and four minor stories over the past four years, I continue to receive positive comments on them and I still have plans to keep going. Part of that success is thanks to the experience I had with my earlier attempts at writing fanfiction I had mentioned before, and although I still have no intentions on ever continuing that old series, I'm very thankful that it gave me the experience and confidence to keep going with my current series, despite how time-consuming it can be at times.

Over the last few years, I haven't been quite as active as I used to back in the early years. Much of my time has been occupied by either fanfiction writing or by playing video games, and as far as I can tell, that'll likely remain the case for some time to come. However, I still make the effort to keep visiting this site every single day, even if I hardly ever post. I'm glad to see some of our more recent members have done a pretty good job of keeping this forum active in the absence of nearly all the older members I remember, though my changed interests means that it's highly unlikely I'll ever again be as active here as I once was back in my earlier years.

The Gang of Five may no longer be the hub of my internet activity, but I definitely respect the significant impact it has had on my life, and I'm glad that I'm still able and willing to keep showing up to show how much I continue to appreciate this site.

Tomorrow will be the day of the total solar eclipse that will pass across the United States from coast to coast.

If you're wondering how much of the eclipse you'll be able to see from where you are, I found a neat little interactive:
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017...interactive-map
Just enter your zip code and it'll tell you the exact minutes of when you'll be able to see the different parts of the eclipse from your location.

(Probably should've thought to start this topic a few days earlier to give people a chance to try out that interactive. Oh well.)