Pixel Scroll 8/20/17 A Pithy Pixel Portion Produced Promptly

(1) IT’S ALWAYS NEWS TO SOMEONE. Some Filers have already traveled hundreds of miles to get in position to see the eclipse tomorrow, however, there might be somebody who’s just heard it’s about to happen. These NASA resources will help the latecomers prepare:

  • NASA Eclipse Facts
  • NASA Eclipse Path (this is an interactive national map showing eclipse times at each location)
  • NASA Eclipse State Maps: Eclipse State Maps (includes viewable and printable maps showing the eclipse pathway and times)

(2) ART OF DARKNESS. In advance of the eclipse, Steve Duin of The Oregonian finds a thematically appropriate piece of unpublished sf art — “Alex Schomburg and ‘The Day the Sun Died'”.

The family discovered “The Day the Sun Died” several years ago, matted and tucked inside a 9×11 manila envelope. The artwork, in gouache, was apparently meant to illustrate a novel by Daniel F. Galouye, but the editors of Imagination Science Fiction selected a different cover.

 

(3) HAMIT WINS. Francis Hamit’s screenplay for Christopher Marlowe won the award for Best Screenplay at the New Renaissance Film Festival in London today. Shown here is one of the film’s Executive Producers, Stuart Malcolm Honey, who accepted the award on Hamit’s behalf.

Stuart Malcolm Honey

(4) THIRD ROCK. At NPR, Amal El-Mohtar reviews N.K. Jemisin: “In ‘The Stone Sky,’ Some Worlds Need To Burn”.

But the fact that The Stone Sky sticks the landing of this astonishing trilogy with timeliness and rigor is the smallest, simplest thing I have to say about it. The gratitude and love I feel for these books, and for what The Stone Sky adds to the triptych, is staggering….

(5) MEMORY. Decades-old memories can be a hazard. In 2015 Douglas Knipe posted a great gallery of photos from Noreascon 2 (1980) with almost 50 authors, plus shots of the Hugo ceremony. But not unlike this week’s unveiling of the digital photos from the Jay Kay Klein collection, it has a tremendous number of mistaken identifications, leading to a considerable amount of unintentional humor. For example, a photo of Craig Miller accepting the Hugo for Alien is misidentified as George R.R. Martin with his novelette Hugo, while a few pictures later the unrecognized (“?”) person receiving a Hugo from Harlan Ellison is the real George R.R. Martin.

(6) HEAD OF THE GLASS. At Nerds of a Feather, Charles Payseur has come up with an entertaining motif for their short fiction reviews: “The Monthly Round – A Taster’s Guide to Speculative Short Fiction, 07/2017”. The reviews include the kind of remarks a connoisseur would make about a “tasting flight” of assorted beers.

“Waiting on a Bright Moon” by JY Yang (Tor dot com)

Notes: Conflict mingles in the form of a carbonated fizz, giving this drink a shine that cannot hide a complex and mature flavor, and packs a surprising punch.

Pairs with: Belgian Ale

Review: Tian’s life is defined by duty and distance, and as an ansible singer she is part of a power that allows her empire access to the far reaches of the galaxy. As the story opens, though, bubbling tensions are beginning to boil and the relative safety of being an ansible is shattered as corruption, magic, and murder all meet to devastating effect. The story looks very closely at the ways that Tian has been pushed into living as a literal resource for the Empire, used for her talent but denied the open expression of her identity, stripped of her chance to be someone important because of who she loves. And even then, the story shows that as the Empire allows her a sort of space to be herself, it’s defined by distance, by denial. She isn’t allowed to be with the person she loves, isn’t allowed a physical expression of her desire, is instead pushed into being ignorant and, save for the beauty of the song she shares over lightyears, alone. Until a different woman enters her life with magic of her own and the power to break through the walls keeping Tian isolated and repressed. It’s an opening up even as it comes at a time of growing fear, uncertainty, and danger. They both end up becoming a part of a resistance that pushes them to the breaking point and maybe beyond, each of them willing to risk everything once they realize that they never really had anything, just the lies and illusions of securing and contentment they were fed by the powers that be. The story is violent and fast while still maintaining a definite weight around the very small and intimate actions Tian makes. And even amid the galaxy-altering conflict the story doesn’t lose sight of Tian and her desires, holding to the hope that they won’t be consumed by the ravenous jaws of war.

(7) SPINNING. Bleeding Cool succeeded in getting an interview with Alisa Norris: “We Talk To The Supergirl Cosplayer ‘Along For The Ride’ At The White Nationalist Rally In Charlottesville”. It’s not a very sophisticated exchange:

…Alisa was clearly getting more annoyed and certain tropes seemed to start emerging. She told me:

“There were a couple of KKK members out of thousands. The lying press is labeling every person there a ‘Nazi’.”

I stated that the swastika flags didn’t help. She told me:

“Most flags were American or confederate or white nationalist flags… Of course they only show the swastika… Nazi Germany is dead and doesn’t even have anything to do with what happening today. It was stupid of those protestors to fly swastikas.”

(8) ROCKET MAN. Aaron Pound gives his thoughts about the effectiveness of the rules changes in “2017 Hugo Award Longlist” at Dreaming About Other Worlds.

This was the first year in which the E Pluribus Hugo voting system for nominations was implemented, and it seems to have worked as well as one could possibly hope to expect. The change in the voting rules, coupled with their waning ability to whip their adherents into a frenzy after being shellacked in the voting in 2015 and 2016, resulted in the Sad Puppies kind of slinking away after not even putting a token effort into putting together a voting slate. The Rabid Puppies continued their Quixotic quest, but changed tactics, putting forward only one or two candidates in each category in order to try to get someone on the ballot via “bullet voting”, and that seems to have had mixed results. They managed to get eleven finalists on the ballot, while five more appear on the longlist. They could have had five more finalists, but Rabid Puppy leader Theodore Beale is apparently really terrible at understanding the eligibility rules, so those five potential finalists were all disqualified as ineligible. The Rabid Puppies were able to get no more than one finalist per category.

(9) LEWIS OBIT. Comedian Jerry Lewis died today; the Daily Mail collected the celebrity tributes from Twitter: “‘The world is a lot less funnier today’: Jim Carrey, William Shatner and George Takei lead stars in paying tribute to comedy icon Jerry Lewis after his passing at age 91”.

William Shatner and George Takei were among the numerous celebrities to pay tribute to comedy legend Jerry Lewis, who died Sunday at the age of 91.

‘Condolences to the family of Jerry Lewis. The world is a lot less funnier today,’ Shatner, 86, tweeted on Sunday morning.

‘We have lost a great comedian and even greater heart,’ Takei, 80, tweeted. ‘Thank you for the laughs and the feels, Jerry Lewis.’

Lewis even did a genre movie – Visit To A Small Planet (1960). His legacy also includes more than $2.5 billion raised for the Muscular Dystrophy Association through the annual Labor Day telethon. I remember being at a Worldcon (Chicon 2000?) where, in one of the rooms not taken by the con, MDA was hosting a viewing and fundraiser.

(10) TODAY IN HISTORY

  • August 20, 1973 — Twentieth Century Fox Studio executive Alan Ladd Jr. blessed George Lucas with a small contract to first develop a shooting script and then direct Star Wars for the silver screen.
  • August 20, 1995Amanda & The Alien, based on a story by Robert Silverberg, aired on TV.

(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOYS

  • Born August 20, 1890 – H. P. Lovecraft
  • Born August 20, 1943 — Sylvester McCoy, the 7th Doctor. (He also played the wizard Radagast the Brown in Peter Jackson’s film adaptations of The Hobbit.

(12) COMIC SECTION. John King Tarpinian got a laugh from Off the Mark.

(13) SJW CREDENTIAL DOMINO EFFECT.

(14) CHANGE IN RANKING FOR BEST NOVEL. The Best Novel Hugo voting stats have been updated to reflect the change in fifth and sixth places.

(15) SWEEP. Mimi Mondal’s article in Scroll.in, “Women science fiction writers won big at the Hugo awards this year. Here are five you should read”, is illustrated with great photos by K. Tempest Bradford.

The 2017 Hugo Awards were announced on August 11 at the World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon) in Helsinki. It has already made headlines for women writers and editors winning all twelve of the individual Hugos, as well as the John W Campbell award. The women writers are a significant part of the team awards as well.

This clean sweep is a first, although women have been dominating the international science fiction and fantasy awards for years now. It is also a triumph, especially for the Hugos, which have been plagued since 2015 by a malicious right-wing voting bloc called the Sad Puppies, who sabotage the nominations every year and oppose any kind of “diversity” in the genre.

(16) TURN DOWN THE LIGHTS, THE PARTY’S OVER. The Worldcon 75 social media crew takes a victory lap: “The Road to Worldcon 75”.

To my own astonishment, this tweet gained a lot of traction, being retweeted by over 100 people during the course of a few days. It was my first taste of Worldcon 75 Social Media awesomeness and resulted in me being assigned to work as a Social Media (SoMe) staffer.

I’ve since then been working Worldcon 75-Social Media almost all of my waking hours for 2 years, save for a few breaks, work, and other cons. I did expect to work a lot, but in the end I worked a lot more than initially expected, just because it was such a wonderful experience, and unexpectedly rewarding. I love interacting with people online, and working customer service. Another benefit of working Social Media is that it gave me an overview of the all the different corners of the convention and included working closely with all the other divisions, meeting with and chatting with lovely staffers from all over the world. It’s the best position I could ever have hoped for.

(17) WSFS ROUNDUP. Michael Lee also chimed in with a “Worldcon 75 WSFS Division Post-Con Report”. Here’s a chance to read about something besides the Hugos —

Site Selection

We had done Site Selection for the Kansas City Worldcon, and we new Dublin was unopposed, so much was easier there. I was happy that Johan Anglemark signed on as a Site Selection admin as I wanted to see someone Nordic in the division, and he did an outstanding job.

Despite some mild trolling I participated in of some people opposed to electronic site selection, we never seriously considered it. I’m convinced that generally the current method works for now, and given the political opposition I think there are  other ways to improve the process. Note that emailing signed scanned ballots to someone else to print out and hand carry is allowed.

Electronic validation of voters against the registration database is something that worked and can be improved for future Worldcon site selection. Carrying around all of that Personally Identifiable Information on paper at Kansas City was nerve wracking, and something that could be improved without changing the overall traditions of a paper based site selection. I gather we didn’t save Dublin as much time after receiving the data as we hoped, but that may be something that future Worldcons could improve.

We accepted Dublin’s Advance Supporting Membership rate without sufficient consideration; which had differing amounts in Euro and USD. This was an error, as people would want to shop for the rate that was cheaper when they mailed items in, and our credit card banking was in Euro. Currency rates are complicated, especially for mail in ballots.

(18) VIRTUAL REALITY THEME PARK. The latest progress report on Utah’s Evermore Park, now under construction.

In VR we have been able to virtually walk around our park and understand many of the intricate details that frankly just a few years ago was not possible. 3D renderings on a 2D screen is not the same as walking around in what looks and feels like real space. We were able to fix many aspects of the park prior to the expense of physical construction. For example, one of our buildings was much to small, yet in 2D there was no way assess scale, but standing in front of the building (just like you would in the real world) showed us that it had scale issue and we were able to make adjustments with our architects prior to breaking ground. We were also able to use VR to understand and refine our garden/landscape design and sightlines, etc., making many adjustments. In the next week we will be launching our new website that will provide many new and exciting details about Evermore, including a closer look at the park and our Festival/Shows, Themed Parties and Garden Adventures.

(19) CHANNEL SURFING. British TV science fiction is quite the thing in 1962. Galactic Journey has the story — “[August 20, 1962] A Galaxy of Choices (British TV: The Andromeda Breakthrough)”.

Science fiction on British television used to be one of those once-in-a-blue-moon events.  When it happened, what we got could often be very good.  Certainly Nigel Kneale’s Quatermass series was compelling viewing, which drew in a large audience from the general population with millions tuning in each week to find out the fate of the infected astronauts.

The impact of Quatermass cannot be over stated, the name having taken root in the British public’s imagination.  And, now we have a sequel to A for Andromeda, which I reported on last year, to carry the torch for science fiction on British TV, which also looks like it will enter public’s lexicon.  With the additional transmission of the anthology show, Out of this World, we seem to be entering a golden age of science fiction on television.

(20) DEFENDERS. Today, TV shows air in beautiful living color. Camestros Felapton gives his opinion about one of the newest: “Review: The Defenders (Netflix) – minimal spoilers”.

Imagine Pixar’s Inside Out but for grown-ups – each character represents one of the four key emotions: Guilt, Petulance, Sarcasm and Luke Cage. Luke Cage is an emotion now or at least he should be – some sort of combination of every positive association with masculinity you might want, with a deeply smooth voice and an excellent soundtrack.

(21) A VAGRANT THOUGHT. I gather The Philadelphia Story was on TCM today….

(22) NOW, VOYAGER. An overview of our furthest spacecraft on their 40th anniversary: “Voyagers: Inside the world’s greatest space mission”.

Remarkably, both Voyager spacecraft are still working. Whenever Voyager 1 sends back a signal, it is from the furthest distance any human-made object has travelled from Earth.

Voyager 1 left the solar system in 2013 and is (at the time of writing) 20 billion kilometres (12 billion miles) away. Voyager 2, on a different trajectory, is 17 billion kilometres (10.5 billion miles) away. Maybe it’s easier to imagine it like this: it takes a radio signal, travelling at the speed of light, 38 hours to travel from the Earth to Voyager 1 and back. And it’s some 30 hours for Voyager 2. (For their latest position, visit the Voyager home page.)

Chip Hitchcock adds, “Amusing note: the receiver station they mention using is the direct successor to the one that picked up the pictures of Armstrong setting foot on the moon, as vaguely remembered in The Dish.”

(23) IMAGINE THAT. Another sci-fi trope bites the dust – the BBC says most hackers aren’t sophisticated.

The ways in which young people become involved in this sort of activity were recently detailed in a report by the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA). The average age of those arrested for malicious hacking activities was just 17 – the offences included vandalising websites, stealing data and breaking in to private computers.

Because our world is so much more connected than ever before, and those connections are often woefully insecure, it’s relatively easy to find ways of exploiting computer systems illegally. And ransomware in general is increasingly successful. In 2016, criminals made an average of $1,077 with every attack. For the BBC’s Cyber-hacks series, Click’s Spencer Kelly discovered how cyber-criminals can acquire off-the-shelf ransomware using only a search engine.

As Woodward points out, the easiest thing to do is “just cast it out there” – whether it’s ransomware, spyware or spam – and see what comes back. Many people are often surprised by the amount of spam they receive, especially because so many of the scams are so obviously illegitimate. But the reason you still get emails from a Nigerian prince offering cash out of the blue is because people continue to fall for such stories. Not huge numbers, but a few. And that’s all it takes to make a profit.

(24) BOARD OUT OF THEIR MINDS. Metro.uk has obviously played these: “Your favourite retro games renamed with the titles they really deserve”. Like the famous game of insincere apologies —

If board games were honest Credit: Smoosh.com

[Thanks to JJ, David Doering, Chip Hitchcock, Cat Eldridge, Andrew Porter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day David Doering.]

109 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 8/20/17 A Pithy Pixel Portion Produced Promptly

  1. There was another Jerry Lewis genre movie: Way… Way Out (1966), concerning lunar colonists. I saw this on TV 40 years ago and don’t know whether I should feel embarrassed to say so.

  2. I remember watching “Visit to a Small Planet” when I was a young fellow watching a black and white TV – I liked it. I seem to recall that Jerry Lewis also featured in a Wonder Woman issue – the character based on him had been accidentally overdosed with painkiller, allowing him to act as the hero “Jerkucles.”

  3. Meredith & PJ Evans: You caught it — appertain yourself your favorite beverage!

  4. (11) Amusingly, in addition to being McCoy’s birthday, his co-star Sophie Aldred (Ace) was also born today, as was the Doctor’s nemesis during that era, Anthony Ainley, who played the Master.

  5. @gottacook–I can beat that. I saw it in the theater when it came out. And at the time, parts of it were slightly scandalous
    and naughty. At least to a 12 year old boy in small town Iowa.
    Very nudge, nudge, wink, wink.
    I looked up 1966 movies on IMDB and it was amazing how many titles I recognized. And just how many movies I saw back then.
    “Dr. Goldfoot and the Love Bomb”
    “Fantastic Voyage”
    “The Ghost and Mr. Chicken”
    They just don’t make them like that anymore.

  6. (1) Sitting in a hotel room in Albany, Oregon with just over 12 hours to go until totality. Hoping for clear skies.

    My last attempt to view a total solar eclipse was March 7, 1970 in Savannah, GA. Because of clouds, we could see the sun on and off as totality approached, but clouds blocked the sun completely from about 2 minutes before to 2 minutes after. We saw the darkness and heard the animals react, but we didn’t see the corona or anything else in the sky besides clouds.

    Very much hoping to avoid a repeat!

  7. Most flags were American or confederate or white nationalist flags

    The cluelessness of a person who thinks that this is a defense against people using the label “Nazi” to describe the group that person is part of is truly astounding.

  8. (16) The Worldcon 75 social media crew takes a victory lap

    I suppose it was too much to hope that there would be even a smidgeon of awareness in that post. <sigh>

  9. (7) SPINNING.
    Consequences.

    (8) ROCKET MAN.
    Yes, EPH works to prevent slates dominating the final ballot & I’m happy that efforts made by Worldcon members in the last few years have brought this about.

    But.

    We still have the Stix Hiscock problem of griefer works making the final ballot. These sort of works:
    1. Devalue the prestige of the Hugo award
    2. Deny worthy finalists their due recognition.

    (15) SWEEP.
    “This clean sweep is a first, although women have been dominating the international science fiction and fantasy awards for years now.”

    Slight hyperbole. But I guess even a few years qualifies as “years”.

  10. (1) Regarding the eclipse, I’d like to give a quick reminder to everyone that the sun can cause serious eye damage, even during near-totality. And it can do it much quicker than you might think. I’d expect this crowd is mostly smart enough to already know that, but I haven’t seen a lot of the media coverage mentioning this critical little detail, so, better safe than sorry.

    If you can’t get reliable eclipse-viewing glasses (or even if you can) you should note that a household colander makes a lovely pinhole camera. In fact, its multiple holes make a very nice multiple-image effect. (But don’t look directly at the sun, still. Let the images appear on another surface. You’ll be astounded at how easy and effective this trick is.)

    Seriously, don’t risk your eyesight, folks, please.

    (21) The fact that all writers are women now should mean that much fewer of them will beat their wives. Unintended consequences… 😀

  11. I think W75 did good on the social media I followed (twitter). It was at their own webplatform they sucked.

  12. (1) I just can’t resist bragging because I live smack in the middle of the eclipse’s path of totality. Totality at my house should last about 2 min 39 sec. Neener neener. 😉 Now I’m just praying for no clouds — forecast is mostly sunny and only 8% chance of rain!

  13. P.S. (15) ooooo, now I’m cringing. SOO many errors in that article. It’s great to get the exposure, but it would be even greater to see more accurate reportage!

  14. 24) If you don’t use auctions and if you put money on free parking, Monopoly can often be excruciatingly boring and slow. Or at least, so I have found. But I think we filers have discussed Monopoly before. Sorry is another game that suffers from mechanisms that allow people from behind to catch up, but at the expense of extending the game.

    19) And a year later, British TV would get Doctor Who…

  15. (15) and Contrarius:

    Sure, I found errors in the article, but they’re all rather minor and concerns minutiae of numbers. As a quick presentation of the Hugo awards and some of the winners this year, I found it above the norm.

    (16) and @JJ:

    I suppose it was too much to hope that there would be even a smidgeon of awareness in that post. <sigh>

    Splendid way to deflate someone’s well deserved feeling of egoboo.

  16. I finally cleared the backlog of 2017 books I wanted to review. Out of 6 2017 books I read over the past 3 weeks, I mega recommend the Stone Sky and Borne; I also enjoyed Massacre of Mankind and Raven Stratagem.

    (Wow, that’s me recommending three books out of four by men. This never happens. Good job today, men!)

    1) I’m envious of anyone getting to view the eclipse, but to be fair I haven’t seen the sun all day today. Yes, I am pretending that a raincloud eclipse is exciting. Shh.

    20) I feel like the more that gets added to this team, the less likely it is that I will ever get around to watching Jessica Jones as I promised myself I would do, like, 2 years ago. To be fair, I’ve seen almost no Marvel films either (though I will always make time for Guardians of the Galaxy despite its shortcomings), so this is hardly an unexpected failure.

  17. Unlike the Olympics, I wouldn’t mind seeing an eclipse.

    That said, I guess I’d watch the climbing events in 2020, although I have some deep reservations about the cack-handed way it’s being implemented.

    Edit @Arifel: I will happily accept your praise today on behalf of all men 😉

  18. For anyone who’d like a verified purchase of Teddy’s magnum opus, A Throne of Bones, today’s the day! It’s free on Amazon 🙂 I won’t do a disservice to our resident deal-finder’s good name by referring to this in the usual parlance.

  19. Waiting for our solar eclipse which will be week before worldcon, next year.

  20. @Oneiros: so often, these special deals don’t make it across the Atlantic to these fair shores… but this one has….

    Hmm.

    I need a new project – shall I read and critique as I go? (Everyone, please say no.)

  21. @Steve Wright I can’t deny I enjoy a good hate read from time to time but I couldn’t even get halfway through this author’s contribution to Best Related Work and that was pretty short. I wouldn’t wish 900 pages of the dude on my worst enemy.

  22. I can hate watch (heck, that’s half of the joy of Skiffy and Fanty’s Torture Cinema segment)…but hate read? I’ve never managed it with fiction and am trying to cure myself of it for non fiction (c.f. Puppy blogs). I keep slipping back though.

  23. @Steve Wright: I can’t in good conscience encourage you to read it. I’m going to give the first few chapters a go and just see if it’s as bad as I fear, though. If I feel up to it I may quote some of the highlights 😉

  24. @James. Yeah, just saw that. Damn.

    Oddly, I read a bunch of Aldiss’ non-fiction (Hell’s Cartographers, Billion Year Spree) before I read any of his fiction.

  25. When we were kids, waaaay back in the 50s, or maybe 60s, my siblings and I had a copy of Jerry Lewis in a comic book I think was called Camp Whack-a-Boy or something like that. We just kept reading it over and over again, my mom shaking her head over it and wondering what was so funny.
    And the nutty professor! LOL. Good memories.

  26. Reports are that Brian Aldiss died in his sleep on Friday/Saturday night, after celebrating his 92nd birthday. He will be missed.

  27. (1) The sun just cleared the horizon here in Albany, Oregon, and there is not a trace of a cloud anywhere in the sky! First contact is at 9:05 AM, which is 2 hrs and 20 minutes from now. Totality is at 10:17 AM and will last just 1 minute and 57 seconds.

    I met someone yesterday who was wondering why wearing a colander on your head would protect you from the eclipse. I don’t think he believed me when I told him you don’t look through it. It’s really hard to believe that those little circles of light in the shadow it casts are really solar images. That’s much easier to convince people of once the eclipse is underway and those circles turn into crescents.

  28. Ah, man. I admit I haven’t read much of Aldiss’ fiction — possibly not any — but I still remember fondly a bunch of anthologies he edited back in the 70s — Space Opera, Galactic Empires I & II, etc.

  29. Note that buying Teddy’s work for nothing attracts (in the UK at least) a £1 reward which can be spent on Videos. So you could pay nothing and get something worthwhile as a result.

  30. @ Joe H

    R.I.P., Brian Aldiss.

    Yeah, those anthologies were among the best theme-based collections that I’ve ever read. Other Aldiss faves: Hothouse, Non-Stop, Malacia Tapestry, and Barefoot In The Head. By the way, I’m getting the impression that Barefoot is becoming a cult fave among some musicians (it is the title for three albums and I’ve heard favorable talk amongst others).

  31. I’ve said it before, but one thing that makes me sad is that most of the anthologies I remember reading in my childhood will probably never make it to eBook format because the rights issues (including for the intros & interstitial material) would be a nightmare to sort out.

    Fortunately, I actually have most of them on my shelf in physical copy these days.

  32. (9) Jerry Lewis as originally slated to appear in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, (“The Outrageous Okona”), but he had a scheduling conflict so Joe Piscopo was used instead.

  33. @Karl-Johan Norén –

    (15) and Contrarius:

    Sure, I found errors in the article, but they’re all rather minor and concerns minutiae of numbers.

    Not true at all. I agree that the errors made are not the end of the world, but there are several factual errors that show the reporter hasn’t read the books, isn’t familiar with Hugo history, and has not done her research on the recent puppy kerfuffle. She should be embarrassed.

    A few examples:

    1. ” It is also a triumph, especially for the Hugos, which have been plagued since 2015 by a malicious right-wing voting bloc called the Sad Puppies, who sabotage the nominations every year and oppose any kind of “diversity” in the genre.”
    — Not true. First, the most malicious and persistent plague has been the Rabids, not the Sads. Yes, they’re both obnoxious, but let’s not rewrite history.
    — Second, no, they don’t oppose “any kind of diversity in the genre”. They simply have dual goals of keeping white men on top and eschewing both “high-brow literary” sff and/or sff that actually says something about the human condition in favor of shoot-em-ups/rocket-ship stories that don’t require much mental effort.

    2. ” In 2017, she won the award again for its sequel The Obelisk Gate, becoming the first author to win it twice in a row.”
    — Not true. That would be Orson Scott Card, in 86 and 87 — and the feat was repeated by LMB in 91 and 92. Jemisin is the third, not the first.

    3. (Ada Palmer) — “A novel that takes place on Earth in the 25th century with a radically different past”
    — Not true. The novel takes place on our Earth with our own past. There is no sign of it being any sort of alt-history.

    And so on.

  34. @5: At least Miller and Martin both had hair; Knipe misidentifies someone with hair (possibly Bob Shaw’s accepter?) as Alexis Gilliland, which takes some doing.

    @9: Lewis also had a genre role on Broadway as the Devil (“Mr. Applegate”) in Damn Yankees. The BBC obit said it made him the highest-paid Broadway performer in history.

    @Xtifr: probably too late, but I’ve seen print stories (not just web) that there are fraudulent eclipse glasses out there; some quick-buck artists have apparently been slapping ISO-whatsis on whatever they come up with. (Wikipedia reference.) I’m probably going to watch a webcast, and not even in the NESFA clubhouse (I don’t have the hour r/t time this afternoon); after being at >>90% in 1970 (in the middle of SATs, yet), Boston’s ~60% isn’t much. I’m just hoping my partner’s bus driver keeps their eyes on the road….

    @Camestros: you should think when to rejoice. Boston is mostly recovered from the insane idea that it could host an Olympics, but I was wondering how hard two people in their 70’s would find it to get out of town if they’d won.

    @James Moar: damn. I found Aldiss’s fiction difficult-to-impenetrable, but his writing-about was interesting and he was always pleasant in person.

  35. I’ve had it in the back of my mind for a while that I should re-read the Helliconia Trilogy at some point. I read and enjoyed it in my youth but I suspect I would get more out of it as an adult.

  36. Hmm I finished A Man of Shadows earlier so I have a tough choice: do I start The Stone Sky or A Throne of Bones? 😉

    (I’m probably going to start The Stone Sky)

  37. 24) Some of those are very apt! But I disagree with the article’s claim that board games are passe; people just play different ones now. (Although I have a friend who regularly competes in Scrabble tournaments, which is way out of my league!) A few of my favorites, in no particular order:

    – Civilization, the original game, not the computer game or the other board game based on the computer game. The biggest problem with it is that if you want to play all the way thru, you have to set aside an entire day and take food breaks (and figure out how to keep the SJW credentials from playing Gravity with the pieces while you’re away from the table).

    – Talisman, which I have been known to describe (only partly tongue-in-cheek) as “D&D with all the boring bits taken out”. There are a bunch of expansions for this game, which IMO vary in desirability. Dungeon is good, Timescape doesn’t really mesh with the feel of the game, Village is good, City is optional, and DO NOT get the Dragon expansion because it renders all Craft characters useless and seriously unbalances the game. This is a good game for an afternoon with 4-6 players.

    – North American Rails (this is an expanded version of the original Empire Builder, and I like it a little better than the original). This game provides a good balance of skill and luck, as players try to build tracks across North America and deliver goods for payoffs. It can be played in 3-4 hours with a group of experienced players; allow more time for players who are just learning. There’s also a 2-player option, which is something not all board games have. There are a bunch of other games in this series: Eurorails, Nippon Rails, British Rails, Australia Rails, Russian Rails, India Rails. Iron Dragon was an attempt to add a fantasy element; a lot of people like it, but I played it once and decided not to buy it.

    @ Arifel: Channeling @manwhohasitall today? 🙂

    @ NickPheas: Nothing for nothing and your vids for free? (Well, for less anyhow.)

  38. I read The Throne of Bones by Brian McNaughton — kind of an NC-17 version of Clark Ashton Smith and/or some of Lovecraft’s more ghoul-heavy Dreamlands stories. I also read The Dragonbone Chair (SPOILER: The chair is a throne made of bones. From a dragon). And I’m interested in Lou Anders’ Thrones & Bones series. That should probably satisfy my throne-of-bone related needs for the foreseeable future.

  39. @ Chip Hitchcock: the person with more hair than Alexis Gilliland (not difficult!) is British fan artist Jim Barker.

    I am the unidentified person receiving an award from “Ian Ballantine” higher up the page, except it was Philip Jose Farmer. This was Peter Nicholls’s Hugo for the first edition of The SF Encyclopedia.

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