You’ve Got It, More Links For you Genre Folks! (Part Two)
I’m almost through all of my links. One more post after this. There’s just a lot of interesting stuff in here. I’m saving a few items for deeper discussion. Still, here is part two of the links! The Anthology Builder. Everyone else has talked about it, but here I am to bring it up again. Possibly one of the coolest ideas ever. Think about all the things you wish the record companies would let you do in your local Walmart with artist tracks and apply that to short stories. That’s what AB does. You can build your own anthology! Apparently, according to this article provided by Futurismic, sperm actually can affect the psychological behavior of a female. At least that’s so in fruit flies. I wonder if it does anything to female humans… Stargate is real! No, not really, but if you look at the image provided in this article at Futurismic you’ll start to wonder. Apparently some physics students are trying to accelerate two particles at high speeds, collide them, and create new particles that haven’t been seen before. It sounds like science fiction doesn’t it? I wonder if they’ll accidentally discover wormholes. Dusk Before Dawn talks about why Asimov’s three laws will be almost impossible to implement. I have to agree that at this point his laws would be beyond our capabilities. TimesOnline lists the 50 greatest British authors since 1945. George Orwell happens to be number two. Represent. (Courtesy of SF Signal) Rumor has it that Richard Matheson, the author of I Am Legend, has sold the rights to a sequel to the film adaptation with Will Smith. Needless to say it’s not hard to see why. The film has raked in over 220 million dollars, which puts it well above its budget. Hopefully the sequel will be good too. (Courtesy of SF Signal) What about strange machine animals? Look no further than Nantes in France. These bizarre machine creatures have sprung up there. Truly brilliant design I must say. Looks like that was a hell of a project to work for. (Courtesy of SF Signal) Curious what sf/f authors have popped up in the movies? Well, look no further than here. Well, maybe look further, as it does miss some things (namely the fact that Arthur Conan Doyle was in Shanghai Knights), but it’s really interesting nonetheless. (Courtesy of SF Signal) Not sure if I mentioned this before, but here is a brilliant website that helps clear up all that confusing mess about the ten dimensions. Meaning, it’s sort of like complex science for us folks who don’t really want to deal with long words and such. A dictionary of symbolism, for those of you interested in that sort of stuff. A medieval sword resource, with lots of pictures and information about swords from those crazy days. This is probably the coolest thing done with dinosaurs that I have ever seen. Imagine seeing dinosaurs moving as if they were real, but not CG or any of that. Massive puppets with realistic movements! Well, bulletproof vests didn’t give us Robocop, but research by some nanotech folks just might. This article talks about how scientists may have figured out how to create a nano-vest that can stop bullets and repel their force! By the way, in a few years we won’t have to argue about how we get stem cells. So, to all those of you who are complaining about our current methods, here is the wave of the future. They’ve figured out how to use human skin cells to get just about any cell type they want. With growing concern with China’s space program, which has just demonstrated that they have the capability to knock satellites out of the sky, the U.S. is working on a program of their own to take care of those threats that might exist out there now or in the future. It’s dubbed the ‘Falcon’. It’s a super-sonic craft that can deliver a hell of a payload to any location on the planet in minutes. No doubt it’s expensive. Beam Me Up talks about ten books that should be movies. I would argue that Asimov’s Foundation would be near impossible to make into a good movie, but I can see a lot of the others working out. On the other side is AV Club’s list of 20 good books that were turned into bad movies. I don’t agree on Bicentennial Man, because I enjoyed the movie. I never read the book though. It’s an interesting list nonetheless. I don’t agree with their assessment of Stardust either. Here is a huge list of places you can get free books. Some of them are book-swap places and others are e-book sites. I assume all are legit. SFWA has a great checklist for critiquing science fiction. Give it a read and keep it saved somewhere. A chronological bibliography of science fiction history, criticism, and theory. I love it! That’s my Christmas wishlist for the rest of my life by the way. The great thing about Google is that you can find all sorts of amazing free stuff on there. Like this book about Bernard Shaw on Google Books. 30+ tools for the amateur writer. The name explains it all. The grand list of overused science fiction cliches. I’m sure there is some version of this out there for fantasy too. Top 15 best movie sequels at The List Universe. There are a lot of science fiction and fantasy nods in there. Meat, the hilarious science fiction play by Terry Bisson! I love it. I think I linked to a theatrical production of it at one point. It’s brilliant! Remoting Future is a brilliant website that uses a bunch of web clocks counting down the various futures of science fiction worlds (Dune and Blade Runner) and even real world ‘futures’ (Y2K). Some of the clocks have passed, obviously, and are simply counting the other direction now, but it’s really interesting to see what futures just
You’ve Got It, More Links For you Genre Folks! (Part One)
This is a huge bunch of links, so you’re in for a bit of a treat, I think. I’m unloading all the links I’ve acquired in the last few weeks both on my laptop and my desktop. I’m going to split it up between several posts. Here goes: Red Meat, an interesting little web comic, has a hilarious strip about God, L. Ron Hubbard, and Philip K. Dick. Read it, it’ll tickle your fancy. (Courtesy of SF Signal) There’s been talk going around of a convention focusing on young adult science fiction and fantasy. You can check it out here. My thoughts? I’m so in. I would love to be a part of this. Planetocopia. What is it? A truly bizarre project that tries to recreate Earth’s that might have existed visually. What would the Earth look like if the poles were tilted? There are various other planets no there too, some real and some science fiction. Truly interesting project. Need a list of old European terms for nobility and titles? Well, here you go. Or, perhaps you’re wanting some real historical perspectives on actual mad men and women that once lived and terrorized people? Here’s a link to an e-book that talks about medieval life and the 100 years war. Also, a pictorial glossary of armor terms (primarily medieval). Dave’s Mythological Creatures and Places is a nice website that gives you quite a bit of information on those subjects. Worldbuilding, of course, is a fantasy writer’s best friend. Most of you have seen this already, but here are Patricia C. Wrede’s worldbuilding questions. Also, Rutgers has an awesome collection of stuff to help develop the background of your fictional world. And, Seventh Sanctum has some articles too. Project Gutenberg. Need free stuff to read? Here’s the place to go. Lots of old books that are now public domain! The Top 50 Dystopian Movies of All Time. (Courtesy of SF Signal) The Washington Post lists some great scifi for people that don’t like scifi. I think the list is a little antiquated, but in some ways it makes sense. Seems that Anne McCaffery has sold the rights to The Dragonriders of Pern to Hollywood. Maybe we’ll have ourselves some movies! 20 things you didn’t know about aliens! Brilliant list by the way! (Courtesy of SF Signal I think) Every so often someone comes up with a really cool invention that makes something else look even cooler. And here it is. You know those cool sliding doors on Lamborghini’s? Well how about doors that actually fold into the car? No more worrying about parking too close and banging your door on the car next to you! Pullman is writing another book in the same world as the His Dark Materials books. That’s good news for his fans. The moon, apparently, is actually 30 million years younger and more Earth-like. Read about it here. Guess what? The One Ring to Rule Them All actually works. Okay, well not really, but scientists at the University of Maryland have figured out how to cloak very small particles. Sound cool? That’s because it is! This company is apparently working on making hydrogen fuel cells a commercial reality. I’m keeping on eye on them for sure. Anyone think it’s a good investment for the future? By the way, this device now allows me to see you in the shower. Not that I’d use it for that. Actually, it seems to work somewhat like radar, only using an irradiate beam like a portable x-ray machine. So, I probably wouldn’t see much more than bones. The Amish probably don’t know this, but they’ve been referenced a lot in science fiction. Find out where at this link! Want to make your own steampunk candle? Well, it’s not all that hard! Go here to find out how! A. R. Yngve talks about fads and fashions in science fiction. It’s funny, so read it! Justine Larbalestier talks about re-writing. Futurismic brings us the lovely news that oil has hit $100 a barrel, which is a record. Of course, this means that oil companies are lining their pockets with record profits and doing nothing to develop alternate fuel sources. Then again, why would they? They’re rich while the rest of us have to deal with oil prices that are a load of bull. The 100 Year Letter Project! Send an electronic letter to the children of the future! It’s really interesting. Look at things people are already sending. The Universal Digital Library with a million books! Lots of free reading in there. Need something funny? How about this dramatic prairie dog? I laughed my butt off. It’s not funny without the music, but with the music, it’s a riot. Or maybe you’d like to see Bush talking about his plans to fight off the zombies? For something beautiful, check out this video of Bjork’s song “All Is Full Of Love”. I know, it’s Bjork, but watch the video. Heck, turn off the music if you don’t like her and just watch. It’s really amazing what they did for this music video. I can’t remember where I got this, but the lolcat bible. The best way to describe this is if humans didn’t exist, and cats took over the world, what would the Bible look like? Here’s a list of ten cliches to avoid in science fiction. (Courtesy of SF Signal, I think) How much is your blog worth? Mine is apparently worth $25,968.84. Anyone want to buy it? I’m willing to sell for half that! This is ancient news, but Tobias S. Buckell released the cover for his new novel Sly Mongoose set in the same universe as Crystal Rain and Ragamuffin. Needless to say, I’m stoked to read the book! The List Universe has this top ten things you didn’t know the ancients had. Heated indoor swimming pools? Yeah, they had them first.
Readership Isn’t As Bad As You Think
I found this New Yorker article through SF Signal and I find that I have no choice but to make corrections on the article’s argument about the decline of readership in America. The article is trying to make it seem as though millions upon millions of people are just up and giving up on reading. The truth is, this is not really true. If anything, they’ve given you statistics that suggest that reading is simply at a standstill in this country rather than declining rapidly. The article is an example of why mathematics is so insanely important in the world. Take a statistics class, just an intro course, and you’ll immediately understand why all statistics such as the ones given in this article should be taken with a grain of salt and met with skepticism.First is this argument: In 1982, 56.9 per cent of Americans had read a work of creative literature in the previous twelve months. The proportion fell to fifty-four per cent in 1992, and to 46.7 per cent in 2002. The interesting thing about these statistics is that they don’t mention that there are significant changes in population between each of those years. So, I’ve gone and done the research they should have done and brought you the reality of these statistics:1982231,664,458 People x 56.9% (New Yorker) = 131,817,076 Readers1992254,994,517 People x 54% (New Yorker) = 137,697,039 (+6 million readers)2002290,000,000 People x 46.7% (New Yorker) = 135,430,000 (-2 million readers, + 4 million) What have we learned here? Well, those percentages suggest a big drop in readership, but really when you look at it, the drop is relatively insignificant. When you throw percentages out there people are inclined to look at them at face value, but when you actually do the research you learn the following: readership isn’t declining rapidly, but rather it is staying relatively stable, suggestive of a point in time in which the publishing industry and readers have hit a stalemate in production. You also learn here that the problem isn’t that readership is going away, it’s that it isn’t increasing likely due to a lack of new readers (children or perhaps adults who have come back to a time when they feel they could read). Fix those problems and you’ll see reading increase. You also have to take into account that these polls don’t reflect online reading. Newspapers aren’t dying. They are replacing themselves with online versions. It’s more convenient to read the paper online than to wait for the paperboy to deliver it. Books, I’m afraid, will eventually reach this point too. This saddens me because I happen to love books and think they are mankind’s greatest achievement (in conjunction with the written word). Sales also suggest that people are still buying a lot of books, which puts more reading material into homes (though they may not ever read it, but that’s besides the point). The next argument actually rings “bullhonky” to me. It says this: The Book Industry Study Group estimates that sales fell from 8.27 books per person in 2001 to 7.93 in 2006. According to the Department of Labor, American households spent an average of a hundred and sixty-three dollars on reading in 1995 and a hundred and twenty-six dollars in 2005. I looked up some figures to combat the first sentence (all my sources will be linked at the bottom of this). According to Bowker, 135,000 books were published in 2001, pulling in a whopping 24.564 billion dollars. Bowker also reports that 291,920 books were published in 2006 for a total of 35.7 billion. Now, if we do the math it doesn’t make any sense that people would be buying a smaller portion of books (not even a full point mind you) and sales would still be going up by 11 billion dollars. The only way this would make sense is if the cost of books were to go up astronomically. Since books haven’t increased more than a few dollars in the last 10 years, on average, and more books are being produced each year, it doesn’t make sense that people are buying fewer books. The statistics and sales refute this notion, unless I’m missing something. What would make this argument make sense is the following: what percentage of people actual buy books? Not read, buy. I buy a lot more books than I read simply because I don’t read 24/7 and there are plenty of people who buy little coffee table books and never pick them up. So, who actually buys them? From that I could actually see the correlation between average books per person and sales. If a whole lot of people are buying books, more so than in 2001, then it would make sense that sales might go up some. But that information is never given, so we’re left with a terribly skewed number.The next sentence says that American households spend a good portion less on books than they did before. What they’re suggesting is that we’re not buying more books. But that statistic doesn’t take into account the previous statistic or the rise in chain book stores and those infamous 3 for 2, buy one get one 50% off, etc. deals. If more people are buying books on a deal, well, then you’ll see a change in the amount of money spent.Now to where it contradicts itself. Okay, so from this bit we know that less books are being bought (not much less, but less), and we know that people are spending less money. None of this makes sense when you look at the sales. If sales have increased, and people are spending less, then that must mean that a lot more people are buying books. But if they’re spending less because they are buying through deals, then they also must be buying more books than the statistic is suggesting to make up for the reduction in price. The point is that this is mind boggling because the statistic answers no questions whatsoever.
Upcoming Things and Links
Well there are some important things coming up soon here, and I’ll have some fun links for everyone too.First, I have an interview from Dana Copithorne in the works. I sent her my questions not too long ago. Sorry for the delay, but I not only was stuck right in the middle of the fall quarter, but I also didn’t want to send a bunch of typical questions. I came up with some good ones I think.Second, I’ll have a review for The Longevity Thesis by Jennifer Rahn soon. I’m catching up on all my reading over the holiday.Third, I’m thinking of releasing the first chapter of The Lies of Venicia, in its relatively unedited form, for everyone to read. Is anyone interested? It won’t read like complete garbage, but there might be little tidbits in it that will get changed at some later date, depending where the story goes, but for the most part it will stay the same. Now to links: Grasping for the Wind has this awesome link to a Youtube video where a guy shoots books he, I assume, doesn’t like with various police guns (he’s a police officer). I’m not sure if he really hates these books, but it’s somewhat entertaining to see what happens to these various books when they are shot with police-grade weaponry. Futurismic brings you cats that glow in the dark (yes, seriously). I’ve seen this article elsewhere. They apparently genetically altered these cats so they glow under ultra-violet radiation. The full official article is here. Apparently sex has already taken place in space. Yes, that’s a serious statement. US and Russian astronauts basically got to go up to space and have sex for science. I’m sure the lines for that job were rather long. The results? The Missionary Position…doesn’t work. Yeah. Who knew? Dinosaurs have mummies too! Paleontologists discovered ‘mummified’ skin in Montana. This discovery adds a whole lot to the whole dinosaur discussion! Read the article and look at the two pictures! Magnaverse has a really cool info-article-post-thingy, whatever you want to call it, that talks about parallel worlds in science fiction and fantasy. Check it out! Elizabeth Bear has a list of 15 things you should know or be aware of when you’ve finally made it (whether that be published or whatever). You can read it at Subterranean Press here. Apparently we missed Voyage 1 when it crossed the little zone called the ‘termination shock’: There, the solar wind – made of charged particles from the Sun – suddenly falters as it feels pressure from gas in the interstellar medium lying outside the solar system. Well, scientists didn’t miss Voyager 2’s trip through this zone. Nope. We were paying attention this time (I’m going to rant on this later, trust me). And apparently since the barrier fluctuates–wobbling if you will–so we got a glimpse of Voyager 2 passing through this zone a bunch of times. To add, apparently what was expected to happen during this event was a little off, and scientists are a bit puzzled. Read the full article here. The Thinking Blog has a video of what could be the next, more efficient energy source produced by wind! Wind could be used to cause the vibration of a band that could then produce cheap, efficient energy, or at least somewhat efficient. The little model the man in the video made could run a radio, a clock, and even some small LED lights. Pretty cool huh? Solaris Books have announced that they are going to produce a steampunk anthology called Extraordinary Engines: Airships, automatons and aether! Extraordinary Engines is a brand new anthology of all-original stories from some of the genre’s foremost writers. Featuring an eclectic range of Steampunk-inspired stories by such luminaries as Daniel Abraham, Kage Baker, Stephen Baxter, Beth Bernobich, Eric Brown, Keith Brooke, Paul Di Filippo, Hal Duncan, Jeffrey Ford, Jay Lake, Margo Lanagan, James Lovegrove, Ian R. MacLeod, Michael Moorcock, James Morrow, Kim Newman, Robert Reed, Chris Roberson, Adam Roberts, Lucius Shepard. Brian Stableford, Jeff VanderMeer and Marly Youmans (Subject to change). All stories are original to this collection. Sounds cool doesn’t it? I’m excited about it! Artificial stem cells cure sickle cell in mice. That’s the title of the article at DailyTech. Scientists created healthy bone marrow cells by taking bad cells and snipping out all the sickle cell material and putting in healthy material. Then they take the bone marrow cells, throw it into the marrow of a mouse with sickle cell and let it go to work creating healthy red blood cells. That’s the short, rather uneducated version. Read the full article! How hard is it to find planets with plant-life? Well, in the near future it might not be so hard, assuming they exist. Futurismic has this article about new research in space research that postulates that spectral-analysis could help find planets with plant-life! So far the technology isn’t quite there yet, but some scientists have found out atmospheric contests of some gas giants around other stars. Here’s a clue: the atmospheric content is semi-related to something you put on foot to make it taste good. You can also read this article at UniverseToday and this related article. Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist has beautiful pictures of art prints for George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. Check them out here. New Scientist has this article about a five story tall structure that focuses moonlight into a single beam over a small area. It might have medical applications, but really this is a fascinating waste of money and time. I mean that in a good way. It’s cool, but really sort of crazy. Prologues are evil and this article at The Toasted Scimitar explains why. Well, the article really just talks about prologues in fantasy and how fantasy redefined the meaning of prologue. Did you know that sitting down helps make you gain weight? The enzymes that control fat burning apparently just shut off when you sit
Lies: Pullman’s Persecutors
I find this subject to be fascinating really. It seems that a lot of the things being spread right now by, unfortunately, a small sect of religious nuts about Pullman’s The Golden Compass, in light of the recent film adaptation, have been flat out lies. It actually amazes me how gullible people are to believe a lot of the things being said. Here’s an example: In the words of the author, “I want to kill God in the minds of Children…. I want them to decide against God and the Kingdom of Heaven.” I got this quote from here, but you can see it everywhere in this Google search. What? When and where did he say this? As the original link points out, the author, as far as we know, never actually said this. There’s no proof. No citation, not nothing. It was spread through an email as propaganda against the author and the movie. The way it seems to me is that these people, rather than allowing their children to make their own decisions, are attempting to cloud their children from reality. This is just as bad as what they propose Pullman is doing (even though he isn’t). Kids are not idiots. I think adults have this illusion that children can’t understand matters that are adult. We think of them as these fragile creatures, when really they are not stupid or fragile. Kids can handle a lot, if you give them the opportunity to do so. If you read this snopes article, you’ll get an even more elaborate idea of how crazy the propaganda really is. I particularly liked the part where the author of some email or post said they had found a synopsis of The Golden Compass that said the story talked about castration and female circumcision. Where exactly is this magic synopsis? It doesn’t exist. It’s made up. A load of bologna. I tried to find it, using the powerful Google, and came up with nothing consequential. I haven’t finished the book, but I don’t remember there being castration or female circumcision in it.Sadly…people believe this crap. Anyone know of any other similar propaganda schemes against literature? I’m curious what other books were lambasted with such comments.
I’m Lazy Today
That’s not true. Actually, I’m far from lazy. The problem with today is that there’s so much going on out in the world of SF & F that I can’t really ignore it anymore. I subscribe to 170+ blogs and, well, when I see things being repeated over various blogs and the like I have to mention things here. First off, I did a review of The Complete Guide to Writing Science Fiction Volume One by Edge/Tesseract/Dragon Moon that you should all check out here. I also reviewed Neo-Opsis Issue #12, which can be found here. Both are good reads, the latter rather surprisingly (I may be subscribing to that one if nothing beats it out of the top spot). Now for a series of links of interest: This has been all over the blogosphere and I figure if ten or more of the blogs I read regularly mention this then it must be something worth bringing out here. I’ve already mentioned I’m not much into reading online, but for those of you that don’t mind, Solaris has released Chris Roberson’s novel Three Unbroken online. They’ll be publishing a new chapter every week. The press release can be found here. I got the information from Fantasy Book Critic, just so you all know, but it’s all over the net. Futurismic put up this article that discusses the future of thermoelectrics. Basically, this means generating electricity by using heat. An example would using your body heat to power your iPod or other mp3 player. Well, they may have figured it out. That’s a good thing. SF Bookworm has been running a huge series of articles on how to store and care for your books. For some of us who consider ourselves collectors, this is a great series. But I think a lot of us don’t have the means they are suggesting to fully care for books the right way. We can still learn some things like how to keep bugs off your books, etc. Scalzi rants (effectively mind you) about Dragon Magazine’s re-opening to submissions with very bad requirements: giving up all rights to your work for a crappy pay rate. Read his rant, it’s good, and valid. Futurismic has another interesting article about e-democracy, a concept we’re probably not very familiar with here in America. However, in the lovely UK they have a government electronic petition site, which, while not very effective for producing good results, is still a step in the ‘right’ direction. (I put that in quotes because some would argue it’s not the right direction, an argument I could agree with to some extent. This is really only the tip of the iceberg though. I have links saved on my laptop and on my personal computer at home, so expect more links in the next few weeks.