Asked and answered
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 | Babylon 5, books, scifi | No Comments
Just ordered the new Asked and Answered (part 1) book, containing an organized archive of J. Michael Straczynski’s communication with the fans on the Internet, regarding the creation of the Babylon 5 TV series.
And now …. we wait …..
So much for freedom and Democracy in France …. hmmm !
Sunday, May 10th, 2009 | general | No Comments
An employee of the French broadcaster TF1 was fired for writing to a member of Parliament …
see this SlashDot article
So he got fired for having an opinion and writing to his MP from his *private* email, not even from his work.
what comes next ?
Looking at Hugo Awards nominees 2009
Tuesday, May 5th, 2009 | cons, events, scifi | 2 Comments
This year I decided to become a supporting member of the Worldcon/Anticipation that takes place in August in Montreal, Canada.
With a (supporting) membership of the Worldcon comes the right to vote on the Hugo Awards, the science fiction fans’ own awards.
Not just that, this year a big part of the nominee’s works are made available to the voters, so last week I downloaded the “Hugo Voter’s package 2009″, a zipped file of about 180 MB.
The file contains 4 novels, several novellas, short stories , a graphic novel (as far as I can see, have not opened that file yet), and other contributions, in order to facilitate an enlighttened voting process.
Now I am very happy that I got myself an eBook reader - it would be far too tiring reading that much on the iPod Touch. Still I am not tied to the computer screen, but can read anywhere I want - the Sofa or lazy chair is a good place.
I started reading “Saturn’s Children” by Charles Stross, partly because I expect to see him at a small local con (Fantasticon) in Copenhagen this year.
With 4 novels and all the other material I have a quite sufficient amount of reading to do before the Worldcon, even if I am not going to Montreal. I would like to go to a Worldcon once, especially if it takes place somewhere in (Northern) Europe.
New record for Gamma Ray Bursts
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 | astronomy, science | No Comments
On April 23th the most powerful gamma ray burst ever recorded was detected by the Swift telescope. More about can be found here at NASA’s site.
With that type of bursts we look back in time, this time more than 13000 million years, this belongs to the earliest generations of stars in the known Universe. Impressive.
Doctor Who Easter Special - super short - spoiler free
Saturday, April 11th, 2009 | Doctor Who, film and tv, scifi | No Comments
I have just been watching the first of the 2009 “Doctor Who Specials”.
I enjoyed the story quite a lot, and had some really good laughs at the more comedic elements. hilarity in a nutshell.
This is one of the things I love with Doctor Who : It tells a good story without taking itself too seriously.
Science and imagination
Monday, April 6th, 2009 | blog, science | No Comments
I just stumbled over an article in the “Bad Astronomy” blog, a reply to someone claiming that science is devoid of imagination.
I particularly like the “boiled down” version of the reply :
“Without imagination, science is a dictionary”
since without imagination science (and technology would never have brought us anywhere, certainly we would not be discussing the topic on the Internet.
Off topic : Teaching Tai Chi Chuan.
Sunday, February 15th, 2009 | off topic | 2 Comments
I did an exam as a Tai Chi teacher this week end - and passed.
The local master of the art in The Hague has made courses for people who want th teach Tai Chi in his name. This means a 2 year long workshop (a day once a month) with a fair amount of self practise.
Since he wants his teachers to uphold a high level, he is quite demanding of his teachers. The is compensated by him being quite the entertainer - even when he is teaching seriously.
He is now in his mid 50’s and knows that, in order for the knowledge he has to be available, he needs people, other than his family, to continue the tradition.
Since I am recovering from an injured shoulder, the movements do not look perfect, but that is apparently compensated by showing knowledge of the techniques in stead.
The first time the exam was held I had just had the injury, so I could not participate. Now the recovery is good enough to pass the exam.
Actually I have been teaching for a while, unoficially, but now I have become “certified”.
It never ends …
In order to stay ahead of the students, the teacher must learn even more, so I will be somewhat busy learning more Tai Chi still. The first level contains modern forms, and the next will be (older) - more difficult - traditional forms.
So much to learn, so little time…
Iran Launches a satellite into orbit.
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 | space, technology | No Comments
Today Iran is a member of a very exclusive group of countries - those who have launched satellites into space.
The then Soviet Union launched the world’s first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, in October 1957. The United States followed with the successful launch of Explorer 1 in January 1958.
France, Japan, China, the United Kingdom, India and Israel followed later .
The satellite is called “Omid” which means “Hope” in Persian, and carries experimental control systems, communications equipment, and a small remote sensing payload, according to Iranian news reports.
I do find it a bit worrying that a nation with a stated hostile intent towards USA and Israel in particular, and the West in general, now has the capability to deliver whatever type of weapons they have (their secrecy about the nuclear installations, anyone ?) to any place in the world.
It remains, however, quite a feat from a nation to do what they have done, so we must have some respect for their technical abilities. Let us hope that they will learn the lesson of the Cold War - and that they will not start a “hot one”.
Find more information on Spaceflight Now
The Next Doctor DVD
Sunday, February 1st, 2009 | Doctor Who, film and tv, scifi | No Comments
Watching “The Next Doctor” DVD this week end.
“The Next Doctor” is not about the next Doctor, as one could have assumed from the title. I enjoyed most of it, but I think we have had enough of Cybermen (and Daleks, for that matter) in the last four years of Doctor Who. I do look forward to Steven Moffat taking over, since he has indicated that we will have less of the “old” enemies of The Doctor, and more new adventures.
I enjoyed the story quite a bit, even more so the extra, a one hour long recording from “Doctor Who at the Prom” with a nice show with Murray Gold’s music scores for the series, and appearances of a whole bunch of the “baddies” form the new series. It was a *lot* of fun seeing the reactions of the children in the audience, some of them just enjoying the show, and others looked like they wished there would be a sofa to hide behind.
7/10. on the Lurker’s scale
The Next Doctor
Thursday, January 29th, 2009 | Doctor Who, film and tv, scifi | No Comments
Since I was away from here, I missed the Christmas Special of Doctor Who, “The Next Doctor”.
Having missed, I ordered the DVD from Amazon - it has arrived, now for some fun in the week end.
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