Wed. 05/04 - Margaret Thatcher's Empire Strikes Back

Cool Stuff Daily

Reggie Risseeuw and Marques Pfaff

Society & Culture, News, Tech News, Science

4.6 • 739 Ratings

🗓️ 4 May 2022

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Did Margaret Thatcher play a role in the origins of Star Wars Day? Plus, why human hibernation for long-distance space travel might not actually be worth it. And a redone Bob Dylan recording on an all-new analog medium, coming this Friday. Sponsors: Novo, Sign up for a free business checking account and get access to over $5,000 in perks and discounts at novo.co/kottke Outer, Get $300 off and free shipping at liveouter.com/kottke Links: May the 4th Be With You: A Cultural History (Star Wars) A Brief History of Star Wars Day (MovieWeb) May the Fourth: What is Star Wars Day and when did it start? (USA Today) May the Fourth kicks off with a new Obi-Wan Kenobi trailer (A/V Club) "Meet Me in Mustafar" (Blue Milk Run, Bandcamp) On May the 4th, let's remember the time NPR had a 'Star Wars' radio drama (NPR) Star Wars: A New Hope Radio Drama - Nigel's Edit (Nigel Langes, YouTube) May the Fourth, Rex Manning Day, and 10 More Made-Up Movie and TV Holidays (LifeHacker) May The Force Be With You / May the 4th Be With You (Know Your Meme) Here's Why Hibernation in Space May Not Be Possible For Humans After All (ScienceAlert) Hibernate for a trip to Mars, the bear way (European Space Agency) Team Behind First Black Hole Image Set to Announce 'Groundbreaking' Milky Way Discovery (Gizmodo) Bob Dylan to Release New Version of “Subterranean Homesick Blues” (Consequence of Sound) "Suburban Homesick Blues" (Mount Righteous, YouTube) Jackson Bird on Twitter See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:27.9	Ionos.uk. It's Wednesday, May the 4th, 2022. I'm Jackson Bird today. Did Margaret Thatcher play a role in the origins of Star Wars Day?
0:45.9	Plus, why human hibernation for long-distance space travel might not actually be worth it. And a redone Bob Dylan recording on an all-new analog medium coming this Friday.
0:59.6	Here's some cool stuff for your ride home.
1:05.0	Well, today, May the 4th is Star Wars Day.
1:09.6	Because may the Force be with you? I probably don't need to explain that.
1:13.6	Over the last decade or so, Star Wars Day has become a bigger and ever more mainstream deal. It is, as Lifehacker described it, quote, a made-up holiday now celebrated with at least as much passion as many real ones, like Labor Day, it's really
1:28.6	the sales that get people's motors running, end quote. I mean, I'd argue that most holidays are
1:34.4	made up at some point, but yes, the commodification of the day is really what has cemented it
1:40.3	as a perennial standard, graduating from the depths of online fan boards to actually
1:46.0	IP owner-sanctioned celebrations. But apart from Disney acquiring Star Wars back in 2012,
1:52.0	and the mouse never turning away from an opportunity to squeeze more money out of a franchise,
1:57.0	how was it that Star Wars Day became such a big deal? How did it first begin? I have a
2:03.8	particularly vested interest in this because today is also my birthday, and it is a strange
2:09.8	experience to live most of your life with your birthday, just being any other ordinary day of the
2:15.8	year, to suddenly sharing your birthday with a holiday.
2:19.3	Like, there are people born on Christmas or Halloween who have always shared their birthday with a holiday,
2:24.3	and then there are people born on normal non-holiday days,
2:27.3	but all of us born on May 4th, or perhaps to a lesser extent, on other newer holidays,
	...

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