In the beginning was the Bork: 'Heart of the Earth' exhibit reveals Raspberry Pi in existential crisis
- Reference: 1777284726
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2026/04/27/the_raspberry_pi_turns_up/
- Source link:
Register reader "Chewi" was taking in Edinburgh's rather excellent Dynamic Earth (a science center and planetarium aiming to educate and inform visitors about the history of the planet) and peered through a viewport into the heart of a fake rock, only to find Bork peering back.
[1]
Viewport into rock showing a Raspberry Pi message - click to enlarge
It's unclear what he was supposed to see, but it certainly wasn't a Raspberry Pi OS desktop with a pop-up bleating about removable medium.
The "Removable medium is inserted" message usually appears when something like a USB drive or SD card is inserted into the computer, and the operating system tries to automatically mount it. So perhaps someone has attempted an update, or maybe there has been some nefarious activity behind the scenes. Or behind the stones, as the case may be.
Our reader was otherwise distracted by his family's needs but told us, "Perhaps if I'd had a thorough look around, I might have found evidence of a rogue visitor attempting to crack this rock, so to speak."
[2]Would you like fries with that terminal?
[3]Obsolete Google nag drowns out vital bar information at Swedish concert hall
[4]Windows takes a crash dump after one McDonald's order too many
[5]Showing the Windows 10 desktop was the yeast they could do
Also visible on the desktop is CIRCUITPY, which we reckon is likely [6]CircuitPython , a derivative of the MicroPython programming language geared towards microcontrollers and a useful tool for getting started with Python.
We'd have to agree with our reader that it is a commendable choice by the museum, despite the borkage. Perhaps there is an educational opportunity here to restore the distressed diminutive computer.
[7]
Our reader concluded: "The Raspberry Pi Foundation's mission is to promote the study of computer science to young people, but I suspect this is not quite what they had in mind."
[8]
True. However, given the recent [9]eyewatering price rises of Pi hardware, there's justification for saying "there's gold in them thar rocks", though we would never condone using a hammer and chisel to extract it.
Instead, gaze into the planet's history and know that, right at the beginning of Earth's geological history, there was Bork.
[10]
And we do not doubt that there will also be Bork at the end. ®
Get our [11]Tech Resources
[1] https://regmedia.co.uk/2026/04/21/bork.jpg
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/17/bork_jack_in_the_box/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/16/google_sweden_bork/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/15/windows_mcdonalds_bork/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/08/windows_desktop_bakery/
[6] https://circuitpython.org/
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ae-II-ifw2c4CIwlp2AV9AAAABI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ae-II-ifw2c4CIwlp2AV9AAAABI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/01/raspberry_pi_price_hikes/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ae-II-ifw2c4CIwlp2AV9AAAABI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Bork, and the Word was Bork
In the beginning was the Bork, and the Bork was with God, and the Bork was God.
Let the downvotes be a measure for the amount of ancient fairy tale believers...
Re: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Bork, and the Word was Bork
In the beginning was Tiamat. There was no Bork in the primordial chaos. Bork came along later to try to turn order back into chaos. Billions of years later, it's still trying. Pray that it never succeeds.
Re: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Bork, and the Word was Bork
In the worlds before Bork, primal chaos reigned. Heaven sought order, but the phoenix can fly only when its feathers are grown.
The four worlds formed again and yet again, as endless aeons wheeled and passed.
Time, and the pure essences of heaven, the moisture of the earth, the powers of the sun and the moon, all worked upon a certain rock, old as creation. And it became magically fertile. That first egg was named "thought".
Tathagata Buddha, the father Buddha, said, "With our thoughts, we make the world". Elemental forces caused the egg to hatch. From it then came a stone Bork. The nature of Bork was... irrepressible!
Icon - Beers on a Friday night after watching Monkey on BBC2.
fake rock
...fake rock, only to find Bork peering back
Talking of fake rock, it could have been Bjork peering back.
Re: fake rock
You almost.....>
Rock solid Bork
Solidified runtime.
Re: Rock solid Bork
Or, as Ashford & Simpson knew long time ago: ...Solid as a bork...
Slow news day eh!?
Didn't even mention AI.
Another company admits they suffered a ransoware intrusion at 11.00
Film at 11.01
In normal operation...
... one would look through that viewport and see, glowing in the darkness:
You humans are fucked
Re: In normal operation...
DON'T PANIC
Re: In normal operation...
... one would look through that viewport and see, glowing in the darkness:
You are bugs!
And as a herald to the end of days, the 4 horseman of the apocalypse ride.out - Death, War, Pestilence and on a smaller limping horse, Bork
CIRCUITPY
That would be the name of the virtual USB disk CircuitPython creates when running on a Raspberry Pi Pico and connected to a desktop Pi.
So has the Pico rebooted itself and provoked the pop-up?
It makes sense to use a Pico running CircuitPython to interface to buttons and sensors the exhibit may be using. I find dozens of these pop-ups appearing on my Pi desktop when I return to it after doing remote code development with my Pico.
Re: CIRCUITPY
I had the same theory. CircuitPython would make sense for that. In my experience, it can sometimes reboot itself a couple times on connection which rapidly disconnects and reconnects that drive. The interface code tends not to care about this too much, though if it's a serial connection there's more work to handle it than if it's sending HID events. The OS that is trying to mount and unmount things often likes it less.
Our reader concluded: "The Raspberry Pi Foundation's mission is to promote the study of computer science to young people, but I suspect this is not quite what they had in mind."
It was, however, far more instructive as to the state of computer science than any intentional display would have been.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Bork, and the Word was Bork
John, c1, v1