@Rainmaker1973

Independent science communicator and content creator

Domain Expertise:

PhysicsAstronomyScience Communication

Detected Biases:

Pro-science advocacyCriticism of social media algorithms and misinformation

85%

Average Truthfulness

Post Analyzed

Who Is This Person?

Massimo, the operator of @Rainmaker1973, has been actively posting on Twitter (now X) for over 11 years, starting around November 2014. The account focuses on science communication, sharing daily facts, threads, and updates on topics like physics, astronomy, and black holes. Recent activities as of November 2025 include a post confirming Stephen Hawking's 1971 theorem on black hole surface area expansion, discussions on account visibility issues, algorithm biases, and appeals for subscriptions to support ongoing content creation. The account has faced challenges with reduced visibility and engagement since 2023, including periods of deboosting, which Massimo attributes to platform algorithms or mass reporting. Despite this, follower growth has been steady and rapid in recent months, with posts emphasizing non-stop daily posting even during personal hardships like hospital stays.

How Credible Are They?

85%

Baseline Score

High credibility as a science communicator, with consistent, source-backed posts that prioritize education over sensationalism. The unverified status and self-reported platform issues slightly temper overall trust, but lack of controversies or fact-check failures supports reliability. Influence is niche but genuine within STEM communities, though cross-platform absence limits broader verification.

Assessment by Grok AI

What's Their Track Record?

The account demonstrates strong historical accuracy by frequently citing sources, encouraging fact-checking, and sharing verified scientific developments (e.g., Hawking's theorem confirmation). No major fact-checks, corrections, or debunkings against the account were found; instead, posts defend against misinformation and criticize unverified claims by others. Occasional controversies involve platform-related complaints about deboosting and algorithm favoritism, but these appear self-reported without external validation of wrongdoing. Over 11 years, the track record shows reliable, educational content with minimal errors.

What Have We Analyzed?

Recent posts and claims we've fact-checked from this author

Post by @Rainmaker1973

@Rainmaker1973 · 4d ago

90%

Credible

New researsh shows ice is slippery because of electrical charges — not pressure and friction. For almost 200 years, the prevailing explanation for ice’s slipperiness was that friction or pressure from a skate, boot, or tire melted a microscopic film of water on the surface, creating a lubricating layer. A new study from Saarland University has overturned that long-standing idea. Instead, the true cause lies in the electric fields generated by molecular dipoles. When any object contacts ice, the partial charges in its own molecules interact with the highly ordered dipole arrangement of water molecules in the ice crystal. This electrostatic tug-of-war loosens the topmost layer of the ice lattice, transforming it into a thin, disordered, quasi-liquid film—without any need for heat or significant pressure. Remarkably, this self-lubrication mechanism works even at temperatures approaching absolute zero, where thermal energy is virtually absent and conventional pressure-melting or frictional heating theories completely break down. In those extreme conditions, ice remains slippery simply because its surface molecules are electrically vulnerable. The discovery fundamentally rewrites our understanding of one of nature’s most familiar phenomena. Beyond settling a centuries-old debate, it has immediate practical implications: from designing better winter tires and non-slip surfaces that actually work on ice, to engineering superior skis, ice skates, and even advanced nanomaterials that perform reliably in cryogenic environments. By revealing the dominant role of intermolecular electric forces, the research opens entirely new avenues for controlling friction and adhesion at the molecular scale—potentially transforming fields from winter sports equipment to aerospace and nanotechnology. ["Cold Self-Lubrication of Sliding Ice", Physical Review Letters, 2025]

9 Facts

1 Opinion

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