Maybe this is why climate change is happing so fast in Svalbard…the archipelago is actually at what appears to be the equator, according to a group of experts meeting this week.
More than 200 true believers are sharing their secrets at Britain’s first Flat Earth Convention in Birmingham. While the idea of all things revolving around Svalbard is cool, the real polar phenomena is Antarctica where, according to presenters 1) there’s a 150-foot-high wall of ice around the rim manned by NASA guards to keep people from climbing it and falling off the edge or 2) a “Pac-Man effect” immediately whisks travelers who reach the edge of the edge to the opposite site due to a space-time distortion, which is why continuous east-west travel is possible. Alas, we have only this image to show The Truth That’s Out There because there are no such photos from space – which anti-spherists say is because the space program is hoax and a conspiracy to keep NASA funded…

Speaking of Svalbard in 2D, in honor of the International Board Games Day the local library took part on Saturday (and, wow, given the ski marathon and ideal weather during one of the last snowmobiling days of the season, the timing was terrible) what you’re looking at to the right is a 53-tile map for a derivative of the massive hit “A Feast For Odin” (the designer refers to it as an extension of a resource/combat RPG universe. The local map is described as an “expansion” project from Canada’s Baffin island: “the form itself was based on the actual Svalbard archipelago, although severely distorted and with some Island moved, shrinked and even made up to fit in the board.” The “bonuses” on the Svalbard map – “salted meat,” “fur,” wood/ore” among them (the latter seems a bit strange since Svalbard has no trees and isn’t notable for iron/gold/whatever) are apparently ideal for “hunting game, snaring and whaling.” Income potential is high, but it takes longer to get rich than other islands. Anyhow, there’s a lot more, so check out the author’s site if you want to enter that world.