Daily Archives: August 11, 2024

Warner Bros. Scrubs Cartoon Network Website, Erasing Years of History

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Warners Bros. Discovery has not been having a great time recently, and is going through a wave of increasingly desperate cost-cutting initiatives because of it. Several of those movements have felt particularly targeted at the studio’s animated offerings, from its inability to release finished films to selling off its current, past, and would-be successes to other streamers. Its latest indignity comes at the cost of Cartoon Network’s online presence.

Variety reports that Warner completely wiped the Cartoon Network website—previously home to an archive of clips and full episodes of a wide variety of animated series, including the likes of Steven Universe, Teen Titans Go!, We Bare Bears, Adventure Time, and other past and present CN series—leaving nothing and redirecting visitors to a message encouraging them to instead sign up for Max.

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As well as removing free access to series, the Cartoon Network website also hosted years of beloved flash games relating to its shows. While many have been erased over the years through various site redesigns—and archived elsewhere for nostalgic fans—at least some of the current archives are still accessible via international versions of the Cartoon Network website in regions where Max is currently unavailable.

The news comes after Warner recently announced plans to shutter its dedicated streaming service for classic animation, Boomerang.

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Source: Warner Bros. Scrubs Cartoon Network Website, Erasing Years of History

Oxford scientists’ new light-absorbing material can turn everyday objects into solar panels

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Oxford University scientists may have solved one of the greatest hindrances of expanding access to solar energy. Scientists from the university’s physics department have created an ultra-thin layer of material that can be applied to the exterior of objects with sunlight access in place of bulky silicon-based solar panels.

The ultra-thin and flexible film is made by stacking layers of light-absorbing layers of perovskite that are just over one micron thick. The new materials are also 150 times thinner than a traditional silicon wafer and can produce 5 percent more energy efficiency than traditional, single-layer silicon photovoltaics, according to a statement released by Oxford University.

Dr. Shauifeng Hu, a postdoctoral fellow at Oxford’s physics department, says he believes “this approach could enable the photovoltaic devices to achieve far greater efficiencies, exceeding 45 percent.”

This new approach to solar energy technology could also reduce the cost of solar energy. Due to their thinness and flexibility, they can be applied to almost any surface. This reduces the cost of construction and installation and could increase the number of solar energy farms producing more sustainable energy.

This technology, however, is still in the research stage and the university doesn’t mention the long-term stability of the newly designed perovskite panels. Going from 6 to 27 percent solar energy efficiency in five years is an impressive feat but stability has always been limited compared to photovoltaic technology, according to the US Department of Energy. A 2016 study in the science journal Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells also noted that perovskite can provide “efficient, low-cost energy generation” but it also has “poor stability” due its sensitivity to moisture.

Source: Oxford scientists’ new light-absorbing material can turn everyday objects into solar panels