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The Borg To Appear On ‘Enterprise’ - a lot of fans have been wailing and gibbering about this development, but I’m actually quite optimistic. Enterprise has seen quite a lot of average and below-average episodes so far, but I’ve also seen some pretty decent episodes as well, and they’re only halfway through the second season.
This [...]

I recently bought the Back To The Future trilogy DVD set from eBay - it arrived in a slightly bizarre piece of packaging which made me suspect it was pirated, but it turns out that it’s the official Australian version of the DVD set (Region 2 and 4 compatible). Managed to save a few pounds [...]

An illustrated speculative timeline of future technology and social change - one man’s work to create a future universe that covers the next thousand years, all based on real scientific and technological speculation (albeit often tenuous speculation). A fascinating read.
Along with reams of timelines and explantory material, the author has written some very original story/timelines [...]

As much as I love reading Wired, I find it a bit tiresome how they go completely over the top in using overtly techy terms when more normal (and accurate) ones would do. For example on the reviews page, Iain Banks is described as writing ‘post-cyberpunk novels’. Well, that’s interesting, because the last time I [...]

Doug Chiang Studio - home of the Robota art/book/film story. There’s an extremely well done teaser video (Teaser II) for the project there.

The Nano Ring - the Lord of the Rings parody thread has been circulating around the Internet for a while now, but if you’re a fan of Peter F. Hamilton, there’s a great send up of his neverending propensity to make up reams of technical specifications and acronyms in The Nano Ring…

Well, I’m finally back from Utah. I actually got back about five days ago, but I think I can be excused from writing entries here what with jetlag and all the Christmas festivities going on - plus, if you’re bored, you should be reading my Two Weeks on Mars weblog.
Things have been fairly quiet back [...]

A humbling experience - one man’s amusing tale of how he made a fool of himself in front of SF writer Greg Benford.

There are some novels that are truly magnificent, that remain with you for years and at times influence who you are. Most authors, having written such novels, are wise enough to leave their works alone and move on to something else. A few authors will embark on writing a sequel.
A few sequels match or even [...]

A review of a lecture by award-winning SF author Neal Stephenson, on ‘Newton/Leibniz’, together with a review of Miyazaki’s film ‘Spirited Away’.