SUNSET: 
SkyScanner 100 vs. 4.5-inch StarBlast
How does the little $100 scope stack up against its venerable bigger brother?
The Joy of Small Instruments
No photograph can compare with the experience of viewing Saturn directly — something that's possible with even the smallest telescopes.
Cosmic Relief with David Grinspoon
Bring on the Exo-Earths!
Kepler’s most surprising announcement would be that it has not found any Earth-sized planets.
Cosmic Relief with David Grinspoon
Legal Aliens
Will the city of Denver establish a commission to handle diplomacy with aliens?
Guest Blog: In Defence of GPS
A reader expounds the virtues of electronic navigation — for automobiles and telescopes.
Has Your Observing Site Gotten Brighter?
Measurements with a Sky Quality Meter indicate that none of the author's observing sites has gotten significantly brighter over the last 5 years.
Tunnel Vision Navigation
The key to maintaining your integrity and sanity in the computer age is to make sure that electronics are your servant, not your master.
A Road Map to the North America Nebula
Hanging high overhead on autmun evenings, the North America Nebula is the season's best — assuming that you have dark skies to enjoy it and a good roadmap to help you interpret it.
Blinded by the Light
Flashlights create a little bubble of excellent visibility, at the cost of hiding the wider world.
Backcountry Stargazing Again
It's hard to find a legal wilderness campsite in the U.S. Northeast that has a decent view of the night sky. But when you do, it's well worth the effort.
Cosmic Relief with David Grinspoon
Familiar Forms on Fried and Frozen Worlds
Recent discoveries on Titan and Venus show us that nature doesn’t need water to make features that remind us of home.
Stargazing versus Hiking
It's not easy to reconcile the demands of strenuous backpacking by day and intensive stargazing at night.
Corrected Light-Pollution Atlas
New work indicates that the venerable and highly respected World Atlas of Aritifical Night Sky Brightness was systematically distorted by snow cover when the underlying satellite data was obtained.
Have You Seen TWAN?
The World at Night website features the world's finest photos of earthly scenes set against the background of the night sky.
Hobby Q&A
How far away can we detect exoplanets? How many stars are visible to the unaided eye? Read Hobby Q&A to find answers to these and other questions.
Mount Wilson: Old and New
Mount Wilson is home to two of the world's greatest old telescopes, and also to some cutting-edge technology.
RTMC 2010, Part II
Amateur telescope making still plays a central role in our hobby.
RTMC 2010: the 42-inch CDK
The Corrected Dall-Kirkham design makes it possible to view through a huge telescope with your feet planted solidly on the ground.
Palomar Observatory
Palomar Observatory is still alive and well 62 years after the famous 200-inch Hale Telescope became operational.
RTMC 2010, Part I
For the first time in its history, the Riverside Telescope Maker's Conference was held at new Moon instead of on Memorial Day weekend. That allowed some wonderful views of galaxies under surprisingly dark skies.
