Top 10 Stories For February 2023

Although January’s final headline story, about the HWA removing Thomas Monteleone, gained the most readers last month, close behind were February’s news developments about Gregory Benford’s health and anxiety over the whereabouts of Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki when he was kept from entering the U.S. to attend the NAACP Image Awards ceremony.

Here are File 770’s 10 most-read posts of February 2023 according to the dread Jetpack plugin.

  1. Thomas Monteleone Ousted By Horror Writers Association
  2. Gregory Benford Had a Major Stroke on December 22
  3. Concern After Ekpeki Detained By CBP in LA
  4. The Culture War Comes to MarsCon
  5. When Should Fans Expect the 2023 Hugo Nominations to Open?
  6. Ekpeki Reportedly Returned to Nigeria
  7. Social Media’s Spoutible Challenged Over Sexual Content Policy
  8. Barkley — So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask #73
  9. Pixel Scroll 2/20/23 Three Files, Three Scrolls, Three Thousand Pixels
  10. Samples of Social Media Reaction to Monteleone Before and After HWA Expelled Him

Top 10 Stories for November 2022

Greg Bear’s death on November 19 shocked and saddened an ever-widening number of sff readers as the news spread through social media. Our obituary was read by many. And so was our report of the death of Martin Morse Wooster, a daily File 770 contributor who is deeply missed after losing his life to a hit-and-run driver on November 12.

Here are the ten most-read posts of November 2022 according to Jetpack.

  1. Greg Bear (1951-2022)
  2. Review: The Spare Man
  3. Martin Morse Wooster (1957-2022)
  4. How Many People Are Leaving Twitter?
  5. Rolling Toast to Honor Greg Bear
  6. “12 O’clock High” Legendary Soundtrack Release By Composer Dominic Frontiere
  7. Arisia Inc. Bans Person Based on 2009 Incident
  8. Pixel Scroll 11/19/22 Scroll And Deliver, Your Pixels Or Your Life!
  9. Pixel Scroll 11/24/22 On The Avenue, Second-Fifth Avenue, The Filetographers Will Snap Us, And You’ll Find That You’re In The Pixelgravure
  10. Chengdu Worldcon Update

Top 10 Stories for October 2022

Two contributions by Jonathan Cowie have enjoyed numerous spikes of interest on social media since there were posted this month. The first was about his visit to the SF Museum Exhibition in Kensington, London. The second tells the saga of how a 2012 ESFS Award took 10 years to finally arrive in the hands of the SF2 Concatenation crew (despite having been in England almost the entire time.)

There also has been strong interest in sff author Sergei Lukianenko’s shocking and inhuman comments about Russia’s war against the Ukraine.

Here are the ten most-read posts of October 2022 according to Jetpack.

  1. SF Museum Exhibition
  2. How Long Does It Take an SF Award to Reach Its Recipients?
  3. During Lukianenko’s Appearance on Russia’s RT, Presenter Calls for Drowning Ukrainian Children
  4. Sergei Lukianenko Hails Attacks on Ukrainian Civilian Targets
  5. Pixel Scroll 10/20/22 Pixel Was A Scrollin’ Stone
  6. Pixel Scroll 10/17/22 And Now, The File Is Clear, And So I Scroll The Final Pixel
  7. Pixel Scroll 10/4/22 TANSTAFE! (There Ain’t No Such Thing As Free Elevenses)
  8. Pixel Scroll 10/22/22 In Dyson’s Sphere, Did Noonian Khan, A Scrolly Fuller Dome Decree
  9. Pixel Scroll 10/23/22 The Scrolls Of The Prophets Are Written In The Pixel Files
  10. Pixel Scroll 10/16/22 I Can Scroll Clearly Now The Pixel’s Come, I Can See All Comments Now In This Thread, Gone Are The Strange Trolls That Spoiled My View, It’s Going To Be Bright, Bright, Bright Pixelly Scroll

SCROLL-FREE TOP 11

  1. SF Museum Exhibition
  2. How Long Does It Take an SF Award to Reach Its Recipients?
  3. During Lukianenko’s Appearance on Russia’s RT, Presenter Calls for Drowning Ukrainian Children
  4. Sergei Lukianenko Hails Attacks on Ukrainian Civilian Targets
  5. Bob Madle (1920-2022)
  6. 2022 Saturn Awards Nominations
  7. Sergei Lukianenko Defends Russian Policy Towards Ukraine
  8. Lukyanenko Comments on RT Host Anton Krasovsky’s Controversial Remarks
  9. Barkley — So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask #68: Two 2022 Hugo Award Finalists Walk Into a Bookstore…
  10. Remembering Frank Sinatra
  11. Robert Allen (Bob) Madle (June 2, 1920 — October 8, 2022)

Top 10 Stories for September 2022

The announcement of the Hugos winners ran true to form as the month’s most widely read post. However, several other Worldcon-related news stories also made the Top 10, beginning with the worrying news that death threats had been lodged against two Worldcon program participants who identified themselves in social media – Patrick Tomlinson and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekepeki.

Here are the ten most-read posts of September 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. 2022 Hugo Awards
  2. Chicon 8 Reveals Anonymous Death Threats Were Made Against Two Program Participants
  3. Guest Post: Standlee on the Future of Worldcon Governance
  4. Balticon Chair Apologizes After Author Stephanie Burke Removed From Panels
  5. What Did We Learn About the Chengdu Worldcon During Chicon 8?
  6. Pixel Scroll 9/3/22 I Have Come To Praise Your Furries, Not To Scroll Them
  7. EPH Re-Ratified, Pro-Ukraine and Anti-Lukianenko Resolutions Passed by Chicon 8 Business Meeting
  8. 2022 Dragon Awards
  9. Pixel Scroll 9/9/22 The Risk of Repeating Scroll Titles is Real
  10. Pixel Scroll 9/6/22 All Of The Riverworld Ramblers Are Losing Their Grails

Scroll-Free Top 10

  1. 2022 Hugo Awards
  2. Chicon 8 Reveals Anonymous Death Threats Were Made Against Two Program Participants
  3. Guest Post: Standlee on the Future of Worldcon Governance
  4. Balticon Chair Apologizes After Author Stephanie Burke Removed From Panels
  5. What Did We Learn About the Chengdu Worldcon During Chicon 8?
  6. EPH Re-Ratified, Pro-Ukraine and Anti-Lukianenko Resolutions Passed by Chicon 8 Business Meeting
  7. 2022 Dragon Awards
  8. Barkley — So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask: Chicon 8 Special
  9. BSFS Reports Results of the Code of Conduct Investigation Concerning Balticon 56
  10. Tolkien: An Unexpected Sainthood
  11. Review: Extraordinary Attorney Woo

[Illustration by Teddy Harvia.]

Top 10 Stories for August 2022

Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki was at the top of the news all month long. Early in August some anonymous bloggers drew his ire for discounting his work as a reprint anthologist. Then, two weeks ago it looked like the Hugo finalist’s plans to attend Chicon 8 had been derailed by the lack of a visa. Yesterday he got a second chance – with help from a world of people including two U.S. Senators – and he has been greenlighted to go to Chicago.

Here are the 10 most-read posts of August 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. US Embassy in Nigeria Denies Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki Visa Application; Won’t Get to Attend Worldcon
  2. Anonymous Blog’s Rankings Draw Protest By Hugo Finalist Short Fiction Editor
  3. Alexei Panshin (1940-2022)
  4. Pixel Scroll 8/16/22 Faraway Pixels With Strange-Sounding Scrolls
  5. Will E Pluribus Hugo Survive Re-Ratification?
  6. ASFF Award Name Announcement Raises Protests
  7. Whyte: Comments on the 2022 Hugo Awards Study Committee Report
  8. Pixel Scroll 8/19/22 One Sturgeon, One Spock, One Bierce
  9. Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki Granted Visa to Attend Chicon 8
  10. Pixel Scroll 8/22/22 This Is The Story Of A Scroll, Who Cried Tsundoku And Filed The Whole World

Top 10 Stories for July 2022

Widely respected author and editor Eric Flint died July 17 and his passing was mourned by many in the sff field, contributing to his obituary being the most-read post of July.

Two days later Worldcon members got a partial look at proposed rules changes and other issues that will come up at the Chicon 8 Business meeting when the first draft of the agenda was unveiled. This included a new motion from the Hugo Study Committee designed to head off the “Hugo Voting Threshold Reform Proposal” introduced by Olav Rokne and many co-signers, the subject of another widely-read post.

Here are the 10 most-read posts of July 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. Eric Flint (1947-2022)
  2. Pixel Scroll 7/19/22 A Phlogiston Of Filers
  3. First Chicon 8 Business Meeting Agenda Posted
  4. Pixel Scroll 7/7/22 What We Scroll In The Pixels
  5. Pixel Scroll 7/13/22 Read The Scrolls That They May Teach You, Take The Pixels That They May Reach You
  6. Hugo Voting Threshold Reform Proposal
  7. Pixel Scroll 7/18/22 Scroll With A Pixel Earring
  8. The Last Dangerous Visions Has Release Date
  9. Pixel Scroll 7/10/22 And In The Naked Light, I Saw Ten Thousand Pixels, Maybe More
  10. Pixel Scroll 7/26/22 Pixel 54, Where Are You?

SCROLL-FREE TOP 10

  1. Eric Flint (1947-2022)
  2. First Chicon 8 Business Meeting Agenda Posted
  3. Hugo Voting Threshold Reform Proposal
  4. The Last Dangerous Visions Has Release Date
  5. Seth Macfarlane and “The Orville: New Horizons”
  6. Astra Publishing House Acquires DAW Books
  7. Samanda Jeude (1952-2022)
  8. Tor.com Suffers Unexplained Outages
  9. Robert Lichtman (1942-2022)
  10. A Photographic Memory

Top 10 Posts for May 2022

May was a month unexpectedly filled with sad and controversial news items. The most widely read story told how SFWA removed Mercedes Lackey from the annual Nebula Conference for a code of conduct violation the day after celebrating her as their latest Grand Master.

In the second most-read story, Balticon 56 Chair Yakira Heistand apologized for staff’s mistreatment of Stephanie Burke, an author taken off panels following a CoC complaint by what Heistand calls an “overzealous volunteer” who Burke says spoke to her “with much disrespect” and then “proceeded to yell at me.”

Thoroughly overshadowed was what started out to be the month’s top story. Jon Del Arroz’ attempt to join the Game Manufacturers Association was met with protest from members, resulting in his ouster. And shortly afterwards JDA also was bounced from Twitter (“JDA Out of GAMA, Suspended by Twitter”).

Here are the 10 most-read posts of May 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. Mercedes Lackey Removed from the Nebula Conference
  2. Balticon Chair Apologizes After Author Stephanie Burke Removed From Panels
  3. Mercedes Lackey Publishes Apology
  4. SFWA Asks New Grand Master Mercedes Lackey to Clarify Past Statement on Writing Trans Characters
  5. Pixel Scroll 5/23/22 Cosplaying And Straying In Pixel Scroll Land, To The Sounds Of The Pixel Scroll Band
  6. Several GAMA Members Protest Addition of Jon Del Arroz to Organization
  7. Barkley — So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask: A Column of Unsolicited Opinions #65
  8. Numerous Russian SFF Writers Support Ukraine Invasion in Open Letter
  9. SFWA Members-Only Directory Info Exposed
  10. SFWA Announces the 57th Nebula Award Winners

Top 10 Stories for April 2022

The Hugo Award finalists were the biggest story of the month, and that was good news, especially for Filers Chris Barkley and Cora Buhlert. However, there was some sad news on the other side of the ledger, with Chicon 8 GoH Charles de Lint needing to step down, and centenarian actor Nehemiah Persoff dying, which brought a lot of readers to Steve Vertlieb’s article about his 102nd birthday last August.

Here are the 10 most-read posts of April 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. 2022 Hugo Award Finalists
  2. Pixel Scroll 4/18/22 You Get A File, I’ll Get A Troll, We’ll Head Down To The Pixel Scroll, Honey, Enemy Mine
  3. Pixel Scroll 4/2/22 We Don’t Talk About Pixel (Scroll, Scroll, Scroll)
  4. Charles de Lint Steps Down as Chicon 8 GoH
  5. Celebrating The Wonderful Nehemiah Persoff At 102
  6. Pixel Scroll 4/1/22 This Title Contains A Non-Fungible Tribble
  7. Pixel Scroll 4/5/22 Now That’s A Pixel I’ve Not Scrolled In A Long Time. A Long Time
  8. Pixel Scroll 4/25/22 Mrs. File You’ve Got A Lovely Pixel, Scrolls As Sharp As Her Are Something Rare, But It’s Sad, She Doesn’t Read My Books, I’d Give Her Free Copies, But It’s No Good To Beg
  9. Pixel Scroll 4/26/22 I Don’t Want A Pixel. I Just Wanna Scroll On My Motorcycxel
  10. Pixel Scroll 4/4/22 Just A Pixel Boy, Lots Of Planets Have A South, He Took The Tardis Box Goin’ Anywhere

SCROLL-FREE TOP 11

  1. 2022 Hugo Award Finalists
  2. Charles de Lint Steps Down as Chicon 8 GoH
  3. Celebrating The Wonderful Nehemiah Persoff At 102
  4. 2022 Rondo Awards Nominees
  5. Chengdu Worldcon Publishes Q&As to Explain Their Membership and Admission Structure
  6. 2022 Philip K. Dick Award
  7. Numerous Russian SFF Writers Support Ukraine Invasion in Open Letter
  8. Barkley — So Glad You (Didn’t) Ask: A Column of Unsolicited Opinions #64
  9. R.M.S. Titanic … “A Night To Remember”
  10. 2022 Recommended SF/F List
  11. What the Heinleins Told the 1950 Census

Top 10 Stories for February 2022

Photo by Ruth EJ Booth

The BSFA Awards Shortlist announcement needed only the last few hours of February 28th to become the month’s most-read post. This was also a rare month where the majority of items in the Top 10 are news articles and opinion pieces, outshowing the daily Pixel Scrolls 6-4.

Here are the 10 most-read posts of February 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. 2021 BSFA Awards Shortlist
  2. SF Canada Votes To Require Peter Halasz to Resign
  3. SF Canada Board Statement on Vote to Expel Peter Halasz
  4. Pixel Scroll 2/9/22 I Have Tasted The Pixels In The Scroll Of The Universe, And I Was Not Offended
  5. Mary Robinette Kowal Wins Skylark Award
  6. Pixel Scroll 2/1/22 Pixelled In The Scroll By A Chuck Tingle Pixel Scroll Title
  7. Pixel Scroll 1/31/22 But It Is The Plotted Truth, That Really Drives You Insane! Let’s Scroll The Pixel Again!
  8. Pixel Scroll 2/14/22 Our Files Are Protected By Mutual Assured Pixellation
  9. Religious Aspects of DisCon III’s Opening Ceremonies
  10. Sergei Lukianenko Defends Russian Policy Towards Ukraine

SCROLL-FREE TOP 10

  1. 2021 BSFA Awards Shortlist
  2. SF Canada Votes To Require Peter Halasz to Resign
  3. SF Canada Board Statement on Vote to Expel Peter Halasz
  4. Mary Robinette Kowal Wins Skylark Award
  5. Religious Aspects of DisCon III’s Opening Ceremonies
  6. Sergei Lukianenko Defends Russian Policy Towards Ukraine
  7. Michael Swanwick Resigns International Union of Writers Presidency in Response to Russian Invasion
  8. 2022 World Fantasy Awards Judges Announced
  9. Tolkien: An Unexpected Sainthood
  10. Review of Moonfall

Top 10 Stories for January 2022

Have File 770’s top three stories of the month ever all been good news before? It happened in January.

David Gerrold’s good news about winning the 2022 Robert A. Heinlein Award was widely celebrated – by thousands of fans who read it here, and many more around the world. 

Don Blyly’s announcement that he’s found a new home for Uncle Hugo’s Bookstore – the previous one lost to vandalism in 2020 – has been universally cheered.

And what else can I say but congratulations again to Nehemiah Persoff, who celebrated another birthday last August, his 103rd. Did the Baltimore Jewish Times profile that appeared in December send people Googling for more, and lead another large audience to Steve Vertlieb’s 2021 tribute written for his previous birthday? Don’t know. Something did!

Here are the 10 most-read posts of January 2022 according to Google Analytics.

  1. David Gerrold Wins 2022 Robert A. Heinlein Award
  2. Blyly Finds New Building for Uncle Hugo’s Bookstore
  3. Celebrating The Wonderful Nehemiah Persoff At 102
  4. Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki Calls Out Amazon KDP For Shutting Down His Account
  5. Pixel Scroll 1/14/22 Do Starros Work As Facemasks? What About Tribbles?
  6. Pixel Scroll 1/15/22 Pixelpunk Scrollcore
  7. Pixel Scroll 1/3/22 Barsoomian Rhapsody
  8. Pixel Scroll 1/16/22 I Hereby Dub The Current Dominant Genre (Whatever It May Be) Punky McPunkcore
  9. Pixel Scroll 1/17/22 In Five Years, The Pixel Will Be Obsolete, Said The Salesman
  10. Pixel Scroll 1/27/22 All Ringworlds Great And Small

SCROLL-FREE TOP 10

  1. David Gerrold Wins 2022 Robert A. Heinlein Award
  2. Blyly Finds New Building for Uncle Hugo’s Bookstore
  3. Celebrating The Wonderful Nehemiah Persoff At 102
  4. Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki Calls Out Amazon KDP For Shutting Down His Account
  5. Winnipeg Exploring Bid for 2023 NASFiC
  6. Chicon 8 Hugo Nominations Open Soon; Forms Will Be Solely in English
  7. The Greatest Motion Picture Scores Of All Time
  8. 2022 Philip K. Dick Award Nominees Announced
  9. Ron Goulart (1933-2022)
  10. Arisia 2022 Is Cancelled