Best Of MetaFilter

Teegeeack AV Club Secretary has compiled a useful collection of Twitter alternatives for keeping up with Ukraine news.

Les blés by _.Yann Cœuru ._ (cc by)

There's something called "the resource curse," or resource trap ... Eyebrows McGee with a fascinating bit of musing on Russia and Ukraine and the hinterlands and yeoman farmers, and resource extraction, wealth concentration, state benefits, education, and how they are bound together ... and why all this might be more important than usual right now. Confused? You won't be!

"The 30-minute Russian animated film Tale of Tales has been more than once voted the greatest animated film of all time. Here it is with English subtitles ..." So lovely. And several great links in the comments.

• News, updates, analyses centered on Ukraine / Russia / Europe
• Foreign volunteers in Ukraine
• Ukraine: We have feelings (for personal thoughts)
• President Zelenskyy
• Logistics of Russia's Invasion of Ukraine
• Historical origins of the Ukrainian conflict
• How to Help

Danger by Whistling in the Dark (cc by-sa)

This is how Michael Jackson (not that one) and James Blunt (that one) helped prevent a war.

Metafilter's own garius comments with interesting details in the thread about his article Pristina: An Airport Too Far, revealing a 1999 incident in Kosovo that almost brought NATO into open conflict with Russia.

DP2M3705 Tomato from the Dacha Garden by carlfbagge (cc by-nc-nd)

Why are so many tomato varieties and cultivars from Russia? in Ask Metafilter

Photo by Vincent J Musi

She fed me cookies and coffee in her lab in Siberia

Photoslob talks about meeting Lyudmila Trut, and other numerous adventures, while working on a story about domestication in animals for National Geographic in a great comment in the How We Really Tamed the Dog thread about how Russian researchers bred a new tame fox species in just 60 years.

Maria Frostic - Main Iceberg Lagoon by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (cc by)

How fake is fake in nature documentaries? sciatrix on why scientists stage photos of their mice, and ChuraChura reveals that butterflies love pee.

What should I watch, from a huge archive of Russian films? gusottertrout recommends some movies: "One of the great pleasures of watching Soviet cinema is seeing the differences in attitude towards common film tropes."

The real work of fake tears - pseudostrabismus tells us what it takes to film a movie scene with two actors crying: "Frankly it's a wonder actors can cry at all."

Where do tv chyrons come from? Jahaza explains who decides which words appear on screen during news broadcasts.

"Out of Nowhere" by Ray Kelly

So MANY great photo posts this month: a rare view of Victorian Women of Color; "Through Our Eyes" asked 100 homeless people in Spartanburg, South Carolina to take pictures of their lives; Vintage aerial photos of rural America; Was Diane Arbus the Most Radical Photographer of the 20th Century?; Six degrees of Copenhagen by Jens Juul; WaterWigs project by Tim Tadder; Restricted Areas series by Russian photographer Danila Tkachenko; freaky and cute Secret Friends; photographs by Degas; using drones to portray scenes of inequality in South Africa; Famous landmarks photographed from the "wrong" direction.