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Upcoming Sci-fi Audio
Jul 27th, 2010 by Brian

Time to load up the iPod again. Here’s what I got:

Borrowed Time by Keith Hughes

Ness Relevant is living on borrowed time. Molecular implosion, cellular degeneration, and dangerous men are but a few of the perils faced by the friendly and unassuming forensic photographer. His quiet bachelorhood is interrupted when he receives an innocent looking device in the mail from a friend and former college professor. Ness unexpectedly finds himself embroiled in events driven by his friend’s success. This device is the focal point of a struggle that could overturn the whole world should Ness or his friend’s invention fall prey to greedy men. Before his time runs out Ness must travel back to an uncomfortable past to prevent an unthinkable future.

Editing Reality by Micah Dubinko

Editing Reality is both the name of a novel-in-progress and a podcast about the reality of editing. Host Micah Dubinko tackles a new editing topic each week, and puts it into practice against an installment of his novel. If you’re curious about the process of editing fiction, or just in the mood for a satirical story about a mad scientist, a mentally unbalanced gangster, a superhero wannabe, and a gang of cyberpirates, come have a listen.

Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by A Square (Edwin Abbott Abbott)

Math. Geometry. Physics. Violence? Is this the same book I read in school? Yep. One of the joys of rediscovering old books is that they still have the ability to surprise, even shock…

Roadworks by Gerard Readett

Traffic Jam Buster! Come to Brussels, a congestion-free city in 2022, but avoid the day of ‘Roadworks’, when Akila Kama, an African terrorist takes the city and many foreign heads of state hostage. His demands are simple, either the greatest humanitarian aid package is sent to Africa by the nations of the West, or their leaders die. In a city where all rail, road and underground traffic is computerised, Hugh Ryan, a Transport Authority controller, realises that while all traffic inside the city is at a standstill, Wellens, a local crimelord who helped the Africans, has embarked on his own traitorous plans which he hatches with a mole in the Transport Authority.

Singularity by Bill DeSmedt

What if the cataclysmic Tunguska explosion of 1908 was caused, not by a meteor or a comet, but by a microscopic black hole? What if that fantastic object – smaller than an atom, older than the stars, heavier than a mountain – is still down there, orbiting deep inside the earth, slowly consuming the planet? What if only a rookie government agent and an uncannily-insightful consultant stand between a renegade Russian billionaire and his plans to use the black hole to change history – or end it? What if it’s all true?

Singularity is one of my all time favorite books, but I haven’t listened to it in a while.

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So much for NASA
Jul 9th, 2010 by Brian

“When I became the NASA administrator — or before I became the NASA administrator — he [Obama] charged me with three things. One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science … and math and engineering.

– NASA Administrator Charles Bolden

Hmmm… there’s something missing there. Something about – oh yeah, that’s right = SPACE!

Here he is saying that line (and a lot more) on Al Jazeera:

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Desktop Apps Won’t Die
Jul 8th, 2010 by Brian

It’s not a matter of bandwidth, or cost, or reliability, or security. Yet. We’ll get to those problems eventually. But first there’s still a usability problem to solve. Life in the browser has come a long way in a short time, but it still has a long way to go. More and more complicated tasks are moving out of the independent desktop application and becoming tabs in a browser.  Office apps, image and music editing, and even video editing are web apps now. When you use these web apps you have to convince yourself that even though the user experience is much worse, somehow this is better. In exchange for access from anywhere (previously attainable with portable media) we trade consistent desktop integration, such as reliable cutting and pasting (something Microsoft still struggles with on the desktop).

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Identify This Snake
Jun 23rd, 2010 by Brian

Last time it was an angry bird, this time it’s a snake. If you can identify this snake please leave a comment.

Snake in the Garage

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