BMU episode 402 now online....FINALLY!!!

Well here we are with Beam Me Up episode 402.

Lets get on to getting on! after my opening monologue I play the full version of Barenaked Ladies song "The Big Bang"

My first story is the conclusion of Cory Doctorows short story "By his things yea shall know him"

From the Beam Me Up blog,

A  precocious 16 year old builds a prosthetic hand on his home computer and 3D printer and gave it to a neighbor's child who had been born without a complete hand.  

NASA plans to work with a pair of twins in a year long study. 

And the second story is Becoming Martian by Doug Hilton

Enjoy, sorry for the delay.

Review: Pirate Cinema Cory Doctorow

Pirate Cinema has won the Libertarian Science Fiction Society's Prometheus Award!

Cory has taken fair use and spun it on it's head.  In a not to distant future or a parallel present the entertainment giants control all entertainment works and any non licenced  use is met with massive fines and penalties.  Trent (Cecil) is thrown into the maelstrom by practicing his love of remixing videos of his favorite actor, but even Trent can not envision the machination put into play or his part in them....

Doctorow has played with this theme in a limited fashion before, but Pirate Cinema is his tour de force of the entertainment industry gone mad.......

Cory plays the small personal interactions and rounds out his characters while at the same time building a truly alarming larger than life "shark" even Benchley would be proud of. 

You should not be fooled by the Creative Commons designation of this novel.  Pirate Cinema is a fast read and one that is not easily put down.  Definitely well worth the read.   Available as a Creative Commons download which has the non derivative not for profit designation.  

http://craphound.com/pc/download/   Link for down load of a free e-copy 

http://craphound.com/pc/buy-the-book/ If you wish to purchase a pay-for e-copy

Paul Cole

WRFR lp/fm community radio Rockland Maine usa

Beam Me Up podcast/ blog  

Asimov Get Plaque in Fhilly Maybe

A plaque commemorating Isaac Asimov championed by science fiction author Michael Swanwick  in his hometown of Philadelphia, it seems is gaining support.

There's a movement afoot to put up a plaque where Isaac Asimov lived while he was working (and writing seminal Foundation and Robot stories) at the Naval Yard during WWII. Asimov, in a weird twist, hated Philadelphia while he lived here,  but came back for the conventions year after year.  Now, according to author Swanwick,  it's time to Philadelphia to give back to him. The petition seems to have stalled at 364, 136 short of its goal.   How is it, I wonder, possible that there are not even 500 people in Philly who are even passing fans of the master and can't spare the time it takes to sign a credit card receipt?  Come ON!

Mr Swanwick and Mr Doctorow, I know I am not anywhere near you gents in science fiction field.  However I have been a fan for well over 40 years and Asimov, you could say, set the foundation on which I built my appreciation of the genre.    Philly may be Swanwick's home base, but they are not showing any of the love for the good doctor or for Swanwick's efforts.  The plaque would be a waste of time, willing to be that even if it were installed, it would not garner a second glance.

Pearls before swine perhaps.

I know I might be cutting off my nose to spite my face, but I have to say it.    Maybe the efforts would be appreciated elsewhere?      

Beam Me Up Episode 286 - Doctorow & Bangs

This week on Beam Me Up episode 286 I start playing This must be the Place by new author Elliot Bangs. In part one of this masterful tale we are introduced to Lauren Wells and the main character Andria who through a year develop a something akin to a relationship but so strange that even Andria has to question he sanity. Part one sets the stage this week.

But first a story from Cory Doctorow called Authorized Domain which Cory takes us into the near future where the digital certificate is not something to fool with!

Between stories I take a look at some of the reviews and articles from the past couple of weeks.

NASA would like to have a "Tractor Beam". The problem is that no one has of yet ever built a tractor beam or even agreed on what constitutes a tractor beam,

Issue 161 of the Australian Flash SF online magazine Antipodean is now ready for downloading.

Photographer Peter Chang used an array of Canon 5D Mark IIs and motion control sliders to capture both indoors and outdoors time-lapse scenes in 3D, and it contains stunning visuals!

In an effort to eradicate mosquito borne illnesses researchers report initial success from the first test release into the wild of mutant mosquitoes. Their job....to pass on a lethal gene to their offspring that kills them before reaching maturity.

Facebook plans to build three giant server halls covering an area the size of 11 football fields 60 miles south of the Arctic circle in Sweden.

But first I review the bluray disk version of the movie Paul!

BMU on Craphound

Hey, here's something that always manages to jazz me up... Craphound mentioned the Beam Me Up podcast recently. I played Cory's story Ghosts in My Head on episode 255 (I really like the way it came out. If you haven't listened yet, check it out ) and he returned the favor by hosting the link on Craphound which is his private blog where Boing Boing is the full out weird podcast.

If you haven't caught this week's program, take a trip over to www.beammeuppodcast.com and check out episode 255.

Review Tesseracts Eleven edited by Cory Doctorow & Holly Philips

Tesseracts Eleven

edited by Cory Doctorow & Holly Philips

EDGE science fiction & fantasy publishing

trade paperback 325 pp

Tesseracts Eleven is touted as bringing “the series to a new height, with a delightful blend of past and present writers, each with a unique vision of the future.” Mix in the talents of the editors Cory Doctorow a science fiction novelists, blogger etc and Holly Philips an editor for Canada's On Spec magazine and a author in her own right and you get the impression that you just might have an interesting collection of stories in your hand. The twist? Each story is by a Canadian author which gives a distinct “flavor” to the whole collection. The collection contains 24 top notch stories. In Cory's introduction he gives us his spin on Canadian fiction. “there's on thing ahat Canadian stories get right more than American stories.....we're good at looking at figuring out what makes other cultures tick.” And if you take nothing else away after reading this collection, it should be better insight into what makes other people tick.

That being said, what is my impression about the Tesseracts Eleven? First off, put away the “science fiction” moniker. In my mind these stories are not science fiction in the truest sense. But before you start throwing stones, let me say that the boarders are stretched here. This collection is a stunning example of speculative fiction. Stories like “ In Which Joe and Laurie Save Rock N' Roll” by Madeline Ashby can be taken as straight on Science Fiction, and in a strong sense so could Andrew Gray's “Tofino” which puts a wonderful spin on post apocalypse stories. But now your saying, well these ARE science fiction...and yes you have caught me out. But putting a science fiction label on this collection doesn't do it justice. “The Object of Worship” by Claude Lalumiere defies classification but is wonderful all the same. Or Jerome Stueart's “Bear With Me” which introduces us to weyr bear and a wonderful love story. So Tesseracts Eleven swings back and forth over the Science Fiction center line. Each swing pulls you back and forth on a wonderful ride. It's a “must read” recommendation from me.

Tesseracts Eleven can be purchased from the Edge Online catalog

or from Amazon

Indian science fiction -- past and present

From Tehelka Magazine, Vol 4, Issue 47, Dated Dec 08 , 2007 Cory Doctorow in Boing Boing is a link to a facinating article about the roots of Science fiction writing science fiction writing in Indian languages.

From the article:

DNA-ALTERING experiments, moody robots, strange mutations from failed cloning projects, wonder machines and nano-gadgetry, and, of course, aliens playing peek-a-boo with humans — science fiction writing in Indian languages has this all and more.

Click here for the complete article

BMU 77 podcast is up- we look at a galactic slugfest, the moonrush, gravity-free evolution,, talk with Shaun Saunders, listen to Doctorow and more!

BMU's latest podcast lets you: take sides on the wager on who won the great galactic barroom brawl three billion years ago, and who got the dark matter kicked out of them; find out why moon mining is suddenly where the smart money is rushing, how the Chinese may have effectively preempted other nations in gaining exclusive economic use of the moon and beyond--all the way to the limits of 'the heavens'!; why NASA must open its secret UFO files to a journalist; what organism is proven to evolve in nongravity environments; Australian novelist/psychologist Shaun Anthony Saunders on the making of Mallcity 14 (the book), and his and BMU's thoughts on the social challenges likely to crop up on longterm space voyages, when the stress of competing for expensive, continually updating material status symbols -- something endemic to Terran human socio-economics today -- is suddenly removed. And Cory Doctorow on wikipedia and other e-resources for today's internetia.

Totalitarian tech update

Cyber-utopian Cory Doctorow ponders: Is there a totalitarian urge embedded in our new technologies? Listen to his Leonardo Lecture at Simon Fraser University in Canada. This

"Many of us dreamed that computers, and later the Internet, would lead to an unstoppable burst of freedom. " writes Alex Smith on Ecoshock "Now we see people pushing RFID tracking chips for all our kids, cameras on every street corner, and secret rooms in AT&T to record all our Net activities."/