First-ever black hole photograph opens up galaxy of memes on Chinese internet

Editor’s note: A version of this originally appeared on RADII, a new media platform covering culture, innovation, and life in today’s China.

By now you’ll have no doubt seen the news that a group of scientists — using eight radio observatories on six mountains and four continents — have “seen the unseeable” as the New York Times put it, by capturing a photograph of a black hole, “a cosmic abyss so deep and dense that not even light can escape it.”

Announced simultaneously in cities around the world, including Shanghai, the Event Horizon Telescope image of M87 is a supermassive deal. On Weibo, it was immediately likened to donuts and the Eye of Sauron.

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