Fascinating read. Thank you for the link. It's wild to think about how different some people's lives are compared to our own. I couldn't imagine doing that to my child.
This question has a ton of varied answers across the internet. The best bang for your buck is a good set of binoculars and a tripod for them. It's really neat how much you can see with just those... clearing up fuzzy spots with naked eyes by revealing clusters of stars.
From there, if you have found out that you enjoy being outside using the binoculars, can see what you expected... then buy a compact scope
I have two sets of cheap (<$100) binoculars, a cheap refractor from amazon (gskyer, $300), a very nice celestron c8 and a small meade MCT. I bought them in that order as I developed my interests. I use two different eye pieces, both plossals, one with about an inch of eye relief with no eyecup and one with a bit less relief and an eyecup. I use the binoculars more than all the others combined and if I were starting over I would buy a really nice set with a tripod.
For planets and nebulae I use the c8 with an equitorial mount. This is _fantastic_ for general objects in the night sky since once it's aligned it's a single knob to turn to keep up with things as the earth is rotating. For the moon and large planets and tracking things like space craft launching or starlink sats I use the refractor with the standard azimuth tripod. It makes it very easy to manually "point and shoot" objects with irregular travel paths.
Nightwatch has a dedicated eyes & binoculars target page for people who are getting into the hobby. Though as leetrout mentions you really need a tripod or mount to get the best results.
I'll have a look at xasteria. I have thought about creating a companion iPhone app, though my biggest problem was finding a clear night to start out from, with my phone then used to control the Dwarf Mini. There are more good apps out there than I realised when I put this together, but I'd be happy to look at a either a companion or universal app if enough people wanted it.
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