What is The Lagrange Point

Tim Ford

01 Jul 2024 — 4 min read

In technical terms? A Lagrange Point is a position in space associated with two stellar bodies in equilibrium with their gravitational forces and orbit.

Take the Earth and the Sun, for example. Between our planet and the star that gives us life, there are five Lagrange Points (and, indeed, there are five such points between any two massive bodies in orbit with each other). This handy diagram from Wikipedia shows it best:

L1 is probably the easiest to explain. This is the point between Earth and the Sun where the gravitational pull is about equal. As you can see, it's closer to the Earth. That's because the Sun is much more massive, and therefore has a larger gravitational pull, so L1 is closer to the Earth to compensate.

I won't go into the rest, but suffice it to say L2 & L3 rely on drawing a straight line along the orbital plane and path, and L4 and L5 are found via an equilateral triangle, again, along the orbital plane and path.

These points can be important for space exploration. We know that stray objects will often come to rest in these places. We also know they're handy for positioning things like research satellites, like the James Webb Telescope, which is positioned at Earth-Sun Lagrange Point L2.

What does any of that have to do with naming a publication after them?

Well, first, this is going to be a bit of geeky publication. Here's what you'll find in the weekly newsletters from The Lagrange Point:

Distant Early Warnings - a summary of upcoming releases in film, TV, comics and video games from Canada. Why Canada? Because I am Canadian, and because I think it's high time we recognized the absolute bevy of geeky things coming out of this country
Crafter's Corner - reviews and blog-style pieces on various hobby projects I have on the go. Expect a wide variety of model kits like gunpla, Hasegawa, Finemolds, Games Workshop and more, along with some wild card projects like fixing up an old art deco piece or such
Rantables - sometimes you have feelings and just need to get them out. I'll be yelling at the clouds about topics like democracy, travel, environmentalism, equality and more, and I hope you find it cathartic
And Lastly, A Word - this is broad, but I'm calling this a kind of "miscellaneous" category. I'd love to put some actual news stories in here, reviews, or even short fiction. If enough people subscribe (and, with later implementation with my Ko-Fi account, become paid subscribers or donors), this could even potentially fund a freelancer budget or fiction budget. Right now, it'll probably be the odd interview-based geek piece, a listicle, or something in that vein

That covers the geeky part of The Lagrange Point as a title. But as a metaphor, the universe can seem chaotic and terrifying at times. There is randomness. Unpredictability. But there are also scientific certainties. Places where we know things to be true, constant, and reliable. That is a Lagrange Point. That is THE Lagrange Point.

I hope this will be a place where you can find some amount of certainty, celebration, camaraderie, and knowledge. Maybe, in time, it can even be something more, like a proper indie news outlet. That may, in time, mean paid subscriber-only content. It may mean donation drives through Ko-Fi. It will never, I promise, mean AI-generated content of any kind.

This will always be written by me (and, in my wildest dreams, paid freelancers).

And who am I?

I'm Tim Ford. For those who don't know me, I'm a journalist and writer from Calgary, Alberta, Canada who now resides in Victoria, BC. My fiction has been published in places like Neo-Opsis Magazine and by EDGE Science Fiction, and my articles have been carried by reputable outlets like the Toronto Star, CBC News, The National Observer, and more. And on the geeky side, you'll find me in the pages of Polygon, Dicebreaker and Reactor Magazine, among others.

If this sounds like an e-newsletter you'd like in your inbox every Monday morning, add your email below. I'll see you at The Lagrange Point.