(0) STATUS REPORT. A few people who follow File 770 through the RSS feed have asked why it’s broken. That’s a side-effect of having Cloudflare set to “Under Attack”, a step made necessary last week when the site was overwhelmed by bot calls on the server. We’ve gone through this before and at some point it always abates. It hasn’t yet.
Meantime, John King Tarpinian has suggested the following as superior to the current test for whether a File 770 user is human.
(1) SCIENCE GUY GETS PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL. Bill Nye the Science Guy was among the people honored today with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Deadline has the story: “Joe Biden To Award Medal Of Freedom: Bono, Denzel Washington, Michael J. Fox And George Stevens Jr. Among Showbiz Recipients”. KIRO’s article focuses on Nye: “Bill Nye among 19 recipients of Presidential Medal of Freedom”.
…Nye gained prominence through his TV show and appearances on the sketch comedy show Almost Live! He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Cornell University and has contributed to scientific advancements, including work on the Mars Rover.
Beyond television, Nye has dedicated himself to science advocacy. He serves as CEO of the Planetary Society and champions space exploration, environmental stewardship, and science literacy. He has also authored several books to further inspire and educate audiences….
(2) CHRISTMAS U CHALLENGE FINALS. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] Last night was the last in the Christmas (alumni) University Challenge. The finals saw SF author Richard Morgan’s Queens’ College Cambridge team face Durham University. It was real tight: both teams had just one scientist and three artists – one artist had graduated in political science (an oxymoronic subject if ever there was). Morgan got off to a great start getting the first starter for 10 question answering with ‘Thomas Payne’. Durham led for the first quarter, then Queens’, but Durham slowly caught up to finally win 125 against Queens’ 120.
In this year’s Christmas University Challenge there was just one SF writer among all of the teams’ members and it was his team that made it through to the finals. Now, I am not saying that this relationship was causal, for if I were then I’d be in The Twilight Zone.
If you are not familiar with Richard Morgan’s work, we have a few reviews over at SF² Concatenation, including: Altered Carbon (which was adapted into a television mini-series), Black Man, Broken Angels Market Forces The Steel Remains and Woken Furies. You can see the Christmas University Challenge finals edition on Youtube: “University Challenge Christmas 2024 – E10 Final”.
(3) A.K.A. ELVIS. If you already happen to be a Robert Crais fan and a reader of his Elvis Cole and Joe Pike novels, like I am, you will enjoy this long memoir about the writer and his series at CrimeReads: “Robert Crais: A Crime Reader’s Guide to the Classics”. (The article doesn’t mention that he is a Clarion graduate, or that in every book he writes one paragraph in the style of Harlan Ellison. Sometimes I even spot it.)
… Then, in 1985, his father died. When Crais went back to Louisiana to help sort things out, he discovered that, after forty-five years of marriage, his mother “had never written a check, paid a bill, used a credit card.” Crais had to teach her how to do all that, “and I was mad, angry, confused. I thought I would write about it, so I could understand it.”
He started a book about a woman who comes to a private detective, desperate to find her missing husband, a man who had always taken care of every detail of her life, and now she was completely unable to cope. Crais modeled the detective a bit after himself, with his own worldview and sense of humor (and taste in shirts), and over the course of the book and its many revelations, the detective helps guide the woman, named Ellen Lang, into a true sense of herself, until, by the end of the book, she can look at the detective, Elvis Cole, and say, “I can do this. I can pull us together….I won’t back up. Not ever.” She’s even the one who shoots the main villain with Cole’s .38, holding the gun just the way Cole’s friend, Joe Pike, showed her.
He named the book The Monkey’s Raincoat, after a Japanese haiku, an agent sent it out, and…it was rejected by nine publishers, before Bantam bought it as a paperback original. It went on to win Anthony and Macavity awards, get nominated for an Edgar, and eventually end up on the list of the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century by the Independent Mystery Book Sellers Association….
(4) UNBEARABLE OVERSIGHT. The BBC reports “Paddington In Peru snubbed by Bafta for new family film award”.
The latest Paddington movie will not be nominated for a new Bafta award for children’s and family films after being left off the category’s longlist.
Paddington in Peru was the top-earning British film of 2024 at the UK box office and was expected to be a frontrunner for the new award, which is intended to “celebrate the very best films appealing to inter-generational audiences”.
However, it has been overlooked by Bafta jury members for best children’s and family film.
Paddington does have a chance of a nomination in another category, though, after being included on the longlist for best British film….
(5) PUBLIC DOMAIN 2025. What has been unbound this year from the shackles of copyright? The Public Domain celebrates the most notable items in its roundup “Happy Public Domain Day 2025!”
…Due to differing copyright laws around the world, there is no one single public domain, but there are three main types of copyright term for historical works which cover most cases. For these three systems, newly entering the public domain today are:
- works by people who died in 1954, for countries with a copyright term of “life plus 70 years” (relevant in UK, most of the EU, and South America);
- works by people who died in 1974, for countries with a term of “life plus 50 years” (relevant to most of Africa and Asia);
- films and books (incl. artworks featured) published in 1929 (relevant solely to the United States).
(6) MEMORY LANE.
[Written by Paul Weimer.]
January 4, 1998 — Babylon 5: In the Beginning
By Paul Weimer:
Babylon 5: In the Beginning
Where it all began, chronologically, although it came out after the 4th season.
The story of Babylon 5: In the Beginning is one that had been told through the first four seasons–the Earth Minbari War and the revelation of who and what Commander Sinclair was…or will be. We’d seen scenes of this (and its framing story set in the future) here and there in the first four seasons, and would see more in the fifth season.
The plot? With a framing story set decades ahead of the actual main line of Babylon 5 during the reign of Londo, In the Beginning takes us from the tragic first contact between the Humans and Minbari (with Arthurian overtones to the whole affair), through the actual conduct of the war, all the way to the “Battle of the Line” and the siege of Earth. Here of course we have one of the pivotal moments in the entire fictional history of the Babylon 5 verse — the capture of pilot Commander Sinclair, and how it ended the war…and started a new era of peace. Or hoped for peace. (It did, of course, rock the very foundations of Minbari society). The story of In the Beginning is…how the Babylon Project came to be. Or, to be clear, In the Beginning tells the story of how we got the setup for the events of the entire series.
You can see the improvements in CGI between the first season and this movie, especially in the spacecraft. While all of that in general has not aged that well, there is a striking improvement over those several years.
In general, the movie has the strengths and weaknesses of the series, and especially the movies of the series, but shows a lot more polish than, say, In the Beginning. Great themes, some excellent dialogue, sometimes some rather stilted scenes. If you have seen Babylon 5 the series, you know what you are in for.
This movie does try and play “bingo” with plot points and revelations, which can make it feel a little soulless at times. And although the non framing bits takes place earlier than the rest of the series, it is not the place to start the series. (Heck, to be sure, I don’t even think The Gathering, the ostensible Pilot, is where you should start Babylon 5).
But back to In the Beginning, the other advantage to the movie is that if you have missed some of the clues in the course of the series, this is where we get the foundations of the Human-Minbari relationship. Which, if you think about it…is one of the major loglines of the entire series. (Or maybe even intended to have been the main logline).
(7) COMICS SECTION.
- Bizarro illustrates the problem of owning a hammer.
- Rhymes with Orange considers writers’ DNA.
- The Non-Adventures of Wonderella has returned from cryogenic sleep.
- Tom Gauld knows how to gift wrap a book.
- Tom Gauld compares New Year’s resolutions.
- And if you haven’t made any resolutions, he’s here to help.
(8) DESIGNING WOMAN. Bruce Sterling admires Laura Kampf’s repurposing of tech and other debris in “Some Public Limits of Everyday Weirdness (2025)”.
…Laura Kampf scavenges, but she’s never simple or thrifty about it. Laura Kampf is a technically advanced European-Union woman who is sometimes sponsored by tool companies. She rescues her materials from a planetary avalanche of first-world industrial debris — there’s nothing much for her to be “thrifty” or “simple” about, because that native junk of late-capitalism arrives in landslides. Sometimes the objects she repurposes are already quite weird when they arrive at her doorstep. Leftover German electronic-espionage cabinets have been a particular Laura Kampf favorite — NATO spyware, transformed into her tool-chests.
Laura Kampf will treat this objet-trouvee junk material with a tender designer’s concern. She will clean it, round and bevel its corners, remove all its splinters, and likely repaint it. This debris will be re-imagined and rebuilt with many dainty, user-friendly touchpoints. Then it’s no longer mere junk, because it becomes laurakampfian. Often her creations look quite 1960s European design-modernist. They look rather Achille Castiglioni, back when the Milanese design maestro was repurposing old tractor seats….
(9) A MAN’S HOME IS HIS CASTLE. I suppose after you’ve been a TV star for 30 years you really should be rich enough for this: “The Simpsons May Actually Be Living in A ‘Palace,’ According to Viral Diagram of Their Home” at Cracked.com.
…Last week, Redditor RocketShipUFO1106 headed to The Simpsons subreddit with a comprehensive, illustrated floor plan of the iconic light-pink abode. Upon first glance, the interior of 742 Evergreen Terrace looks like, well, just that. Boasting several in-show staples — living-room fireplace, two-car garage, iconic orange couch — it’s decked out in all its late ‘80s glory, ready for whatever wacky hijinks Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa or Maggie bring into its four walls.
But as several fans noted, seeing its size and amenities all laid out in yet another form of 2D raised several questions about the iconic cartoon property — namely, how the hell could Homer and Marge afford such a high-end home on a nuclear plant operator’s salary?…
[Thanks to Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Paul Weimer, John A Arkansawyer, Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Steven French, Kathy Sullivan, Teddy Harvia for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Cat Eldridge.]
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@7, I’m definitely the control; I’m too old and set in my ways to change things now…
(Also, FIRST!)
(7) My resolution is “support a local bookshop”!
(0) Um, where’s the “all of the above” to answer with?
(1) Bill Nye, the science guy… getting the Presidential Medal of Freedom, put on… by President Biden. Damn…
(4) “Snubbed”. All the awards are snubbable. Ellen and I just watched two episodes of ST: Strange New Worlds this afternoon… trying to catch up, and the second – not sure what it’s actual name was – Butcher of G’kan. That deserves multiple nominations, but it’s “only” sf… Oh… DO NOT SHOW to friends who have been in actual combat. They do not need a flashback provoked.
(7) Generate a resolution, oh, look, “Support a local bookshop”.. would I ever do that?
(8) I’m having trouble finding pics of her work, and would really like to.
Mark, her YouTube channel has pretty much everything you’ll need.
(0) D. All of the above, as every Snoopy fan knows.
(7) My New Year’s resolution is, “Support an illegal bookshop.” First step: find one.
I have been moving all day. I have replaced all the lost keys (or did I not tell that story here?) I defeated the best efforts of the Tile website and app to prevent my from activating my Tiles recently purchased without first buying new Tiles.
I gave Tile several eyesful of feedback on their stupidly designed website and app.
I kept dropping things.
I am tired, frustrated, annoyed, and yet the Tiles work nicely.
I got Cider to take her Zyrtec with a banana slice rather than a chunk of cheese tonight. (Maybe I didn’t tell that story either. She has a cough, apparently allergy-related.
On the downside, I can cut those pills in half with the pill cutter, but not in four. Vet says that’s okay though.
Oh, my car has a new battery, as well as the new spare key. The battery was noticeably cheaper.
I want nice stuff to show up, mainly because I’m feeling so frazzled.
I’d like to follow some reviewers/critics who cover a lot of SFF, who don’t have a horror/grimdark focus, and who are POC. I’m particularly interested in reviewers who are Black, whether African or Diaspora. I’m especially interested in “insider” reviews of books where I’m an “outsider”, but not just that.
9) Hey, it’s Springfield, not Manhattan or California.
@Lis Carey: You did mention one lost key.
6) Even in the far future, mankind has not learned to leave the minibar alone.
@Jeff Jones–That was the expensive one. The car key that needed to be programmed. But I lost my entire set of backup keys.
(9) Someone on social media pointed this out about a year ago, but even with only one working parent, buying a house and raising three kids was normal in most of the U.S. in 1989. The fact that it now seems absurd tells us only that wages haven’t kept up with the cost of living over the last three and a half decades. In this way, The Simpsons has been a nice little controlled experiment. People who want to whine about young adults these days supposedly being lazy and/or not wanting to work should pay that some attention.
(7) Unless I’m misreading the directions, there’s no possible answer other than “Support a local bookshop.” Consider: no person currently living was verifiably born prior to 1908; while a month may contain 28, 29, 30 or 31 days, nobody has ever worn a shoe bigger than a 37; and finally, no series of 3 digits can add up to anything greater than 27. That so many people commenting at Bluesky have gotten different results is reassuring in one way (compared with other people, maybe I’m not as innumerate as I thought!) and a little disquieting in another.
@Shrinking Violet: I’ve confirmed your math.
Reminds me of that bit in Space Cadet:
@Shrinking Violet: Seconding Andrew (not Werdna) – your math is correct. “Support a local bookshop” is the only possible solution.
2qs: they don’t want you to remember all the offshoring they did in the eighties and nineties.
I’m far from the most numerate person around here, so I’m croggled that people didn’t see as they moved from question to question that there was always only one possible choice. That’s the point of the humor in the cartoon as I saw it. I don’t think even a metric shoe size would yield a different answer. A year in AH versus AD/CE would have you only visit the bookshop. A year of the Reiwa era (Japan) would have you set up one.
0) Datapoint – I’m using Inoreader and have had no interruptions to the RSS feed. While it’s possible a few articles may not have shown up, I have seen the daily Pixel Scrolls.
@Lis Carey: aren’t unplanned expenses NOT so wonderful?
0) The bsky site has an RSS feed that is working as an alternative. It seems to be missing the titles, but better than nothing.