1. The substantial work of Kenneth Libbrecht "Snow Crystals" [1] was released in October 2019, and recently popularized by Quanta [2]. Once again, the Quanta article buys in to egocentric optimism, and fails to produce a critical book review (my opinion: what they should be doing here). Yet this article does discuss relatively original and timely research. Also, awesome video header [3]! 2. The book is very long at 500+ pages, but if nothing else at least read the first chapter for history from Kepler to Ukichiro Nakaya. Nakaya, a contemporary of Tomonaga, was the first scientist to chart a temperature-dependent phase diagram for snow crystals, see figures 1.24, 1.25, 1.12 (copied on quanta as "A Wintry Mix"). 3. Figures 3.3 and 3.4 explain discrepancy in adsorption; however, they also contradict the phase diagram figure 1.12. The author even admits that this formation paradox remains incompletely resolved, so still an open question of science. Chapter 3-4 contains in-depth science worth more serious critical reading. 3b. Quanta figure "Growing Snowflakes" is extremely confusing, and excessively over-simplifed. The use of "face" and "edge" is flat out _Wrong_. This is not a good summary of chapters 3-4. 4. Chapter 5 "A Progression of Snow Crystal Models" is an exciting prospect; though, somewhat of a disappointment in execution, especially considering diligent history of Chapter 1. 4b. The "Packard Snowflake" *is not* the earliest relevant C.A. model of dendrite growth. Unfortunately Packard 1986 [4] does not cite Ulam 1962 [5]; though, OEIS does, see [6-8]. Ulam mentions that Holladay already knew of 2^n extinctions as early as 1960 [8]! 4c. A151723 includes a picture [9] that shows the structure of a sectored plate, and features the same 2^n extinctions. This picture is drawn over the half-hexagon tiling. From a mathematical perspective, half-hex is a better analog to 2^n C.A. than the Koch Snowflake. 4d. A similar comparison between Chair tiling and another growth C.A. is available at [10]. After this, it is possible to show that Code 686 C.A. in fact *builds* the chair tiling[11]. It follows in some sense that 686 ~ trilobite and crab. (Did C.G.S. know this?) 4e. We do not know if a variation of the C.A. from A151723 can be used to build the Socolar-Taylor tiling, or any of its variants [12]. This is a worthwhile open question. 5. Even before Holladay & Ulam, L. Pauling began to develop the "ice-type model" in 1935 [13]. Why isn't this cited? 5b. Pursuant to 4b. to 4e. a perspective combining matching-rule tiling theory and cellular automata *is not being presented* in Libbrecht's "Progression of snow crystal models". Does the author have a reason for such an exclusion? 5c. Hypothetical: In a matching-rule tiling theory for describing snow crystals, obviously the binding energies would change with thermodynamic conditions, but also, the matching-rules could change over temperature, pressure, vapour saturation, etc. 6. Chapters 6-9 are out of my price range, but describe incredible experiments. Thankfully lots of pictures and videos are available for purpose of data analysis. 7. Chapter 10, WOO-HOO! Libbrecht speaks: "Keeping an eye out for interesting crystals is a fine pursuit whenever you happen to be outside during a light snowfall. You could be riding the chair lift at your local ski area, taking a stroll through the winter woods, or just waiting in your car somewhere. If the snow is falling all around you, why not have a look from time to time to see what you can find?" 7b. Couldn't agree more, great advice Kenneth! Here are some specimens I collected at about 9800 feet elevation in the Rocky Mountains on Christmas morning: https://0x0.st/zDFW.jpg 7c. The photographs were rushed, but do show plates, sectored plates, stellar dendrites, and simple stars. From the existence of these structures, I think we can infer temperature of formation in the magic range around -15c, and decently high vapour saturation. 7d. Similar structures persisted at least 1000 feet above the height of base camp; though, I did not collect photo evidence. 8. HATE WARNING: The website "snowflakevictory.com" is not actually a website about physical snowflakes. It is a political site for the impeached Donald Trump, and uses the word "snowflake" as derogatory slang [14]. 8b. I supposed that domain name registration is solely a question of money ($$$) at this point. However, if decisions were being made by more fair criteria, I would think that snowflakevictory.com would simply redirect to Kenneth Libbrecht's awesome website: http://www.snowcrystals.com/ Any thoughts on 4e., 5c., or snowflake calculations in general? Anyone else getting decent snowflake pictures this season? Happy new-flakes, --Brad [1] https://arxiv.org/abs/1910.06389 [2] https://www.quantamagazine.org/toward-a-grand-unified-theory-of-snowflakes-2... [3] https://d2r55xnwy6nx47.cloudfront.net/uploads/2019/12/SnowStructure_2880x162... [4] http://www.scipress.org/e-library/sof/pdf/0095.PDF [5] https://oeis.org/A002858/a002858.pdf [6] https://oeis.org/A002858 [7] https://oeis.org/A151723 [8] https://oeis.org/A322662 [9] https://oeis.org/A151723/a151723.png [10] https://oeis.org/A147562/a147562_1.png [11] https://demonstrations.wolfram.com/Code686BuildsTheChairTiling/ [12] https://demonstrations.wolfram.com/LimitPeriodicTilings/ [13] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice-type_model [14] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowflake_(slang)