A couple of us faculty at UMM are shopping for microscopes — we need to replace a dozen of the tired old student stereoscopes with snazzier models. I’ve sent out several inquiries by email to various vendors, but I left out an important requirement: now I want a car microscope, to keep up with all the YUSsies.
I’ve got a couple of quotes, but you know what else I’ve got? A flood of ads for microscopes. Every web page I visit that has ads is now a parade of microscopes marching down the page. I’m not complaining, it’s better than the “one weird trick” ads and the ads for useless supplements.
When I worked in the pharmaceutical industry in QA/QC labs there was a Zeiss service engineer who would collect redundant microscopes of all makes, service them and give them to local schools. He told me of a case where whilst servicing the microscopes of a public hospital/research institute he saw one of the staff take a microscope in fully functioning condition (Zeiss Standard 16 I think) and drop it into a rubbish skip! Why? It had been purchased for a particular project the grant for which specified that when no longer required, apparatus bought for the project could not be sold, used for other work or given away
You know that adblockers exist PZ, why don’t you use one?
I’m genuinely baffled at why people don’t use adblockers.