Here's an absolutely lovely bit of ranty, frustrated-scientist humor from The Guardian's Dean Burnett, that doubles as a smart explainer on the difference between true skepticism and scientifically vacant conspiracy theory. (Especially w/r/t media coverage.)

How far from the Lunar Module did the Apollo 11 astronauts wander after touching down on the surface of the Moon? Five meters? Twenty? How far did their "small steps" actually carry them?

The 1969 moon landing was one of humanity's most impressive achievements, but there was always a chance that things could go terribly wrong. But if the worst happened, and Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were commended to the void of space, Nixon had a stirring speech prepared, one that celebrated the spirit of…

This just in: The moon landings were not faked. This may not seem like news to you, but to readers of two Bangladeshi newspapers, it's the subject of a surprise apology. Blame a lack of fact-checkers... and fake news sources.

The 40th anniversary of the first Moon landing is right around the corner, and former io9 researcher Andrew Liptak is documenting this momentous event in a series of posts on his blog. Today he's got a detailed backstory on the missions that led up to that amazing first human step on the Moon. He writes:

In honor of Moon, opening today, we went kinda loony (get it?) coming up with our favorite lunar scenes in film and TV. (We restricted the list to our own planet's moon; sorry, Saturn and Endor fans.) Watch them here.

The documentary In The Shadow Of The Moon comes out on DVD in a month, and is well worth picking up. Today we take moon landings for granted, but it's been 35 years since Gene Cernan was the last man on the moon (note for you trivia nuts), and we haven't come close to going back. In the intervening years, we've…