Clarke Predicted the Internet in 1974!

Look at this charming photo here. The setting in 1974 inside a large data center filled to the brim with the behemoths of the day. The venerable Clarke stands to the right and a reporter for Australian TV along with his son. The reporter asks Clarke what the boys life will be like in 2001.

Clarke in a room full of what the present, at that time, considered the height of technology, describes something quite different.

With the racks and rows looking on Clarke all but names the internet.  The boy's home will contain a vastly smaller computer which will supply the boy's information needs.   The unit will be so innocuous that the boy will take it for granted, much as he would the phone.  Remember this is way earlier than the "web" and predates the internet by a good 20 years.

Clarke does acknowledge that there is a chance of dependance but that is outweighed by conveniences like tele-commuting plus the ability to talk to other people over the computer.

Rendezvous With Rama: a student film project

I remember watching Aaron Ross' "trailer" for Arthur C. Clarke's book Rendezvous with Rama which had an already stunning sound scape created by Andrew Halasz. It was stunning and beautiful and I honestly hoped it would galvanize someone into attempting the project. As you can no know, that didn't happen. However Aaron's film has not languished. I read in Cory Doctorow's Boing Boing that Vancouver Film School student Philip Mahoney took the film and added his own sound design to the film -- including a fantastic voice over -- to turn it into a trailer for a film.
Is it as good as the initial project? No, but it does add a dimension that was lacking that of a true movie trailer, which we now have and again it leads us in the direction once more of a film that I know I would love to see. Thank you Philip for rekindling the dream!

Rendezvous with Rama - Vancouver Film School (VFS) from Vancouver Film School on Vimeo.

2009 Arthur C. Clarke Award short list

Here is the short list for the Arthur C. Clarke Award for the best UK novel printed in 2008

• Song of Time - Ian R. MacLeod
• The Quiet War - Paul McAuley
• House of Suns - Alastair Reynolds
• Anathem - Neal Stephenson
• The Margarets - Sheri S. Tepper
• Martin Martin's on the Other Side - Mark Wernham
  

The award will be presented on 29 April 2009

2009 Arthur C. Clarke Award long list submissions

In a break with tradition, for the first time I can remember, the powers that be at the Arthur C. Clarke award have released the long list submissions for the, as the Wikipedia puts it:

• The Arthur C. Clarke Award is a British award given for the best science fiction novel first published in the United Kingdom during the previous year. The award was established with a grant from Arthur C. Clarke and the first prize was awarded in 1987.

Torque Control was granted this unparalleled honer

The Ashes of Worlds by Kevin J Anderson (Simon & Schuster)
The Line War by Neal Asher (Tor)
The Heritage by Will Ashon (Faber & Faber)
Man in the Dark by Paul Auster (Faber & Faber)
Neuropath by Scott Bakker (Gollancz)
Matter by Iain M Banks (Orbit)
Flood by Stephen Baxter (Gollancz)
Weaver by Stephen Baxter (Gollancz)
City at the End of Time by Greg Bear (Gollancz)
Kethani by Eric Brown (Solaris)
Necropath by Eric Brown (Solaris)
Sputnik Caledonia by Andrew Crumey (Picador)
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (HarperCollins)
Incandescence by Greg Egan (Gollancz)
Infoquake by David Louis Edelman (Solaris)
The Broken World by Tim Etchells (William Heinemann)
Omega by Christopher Evans (PS Publishing)
Blonde Roots by Bernadine Evaristo (Hamish Hamilton)
Principles of Angels by Jaine Fenn (Gollancz)
Eve: The Empyrean Age by Tony Gonzales (Gollancz)
The Temporal Void by Peter F Hamilton (Macmillan)
The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway (William Heinemann)
Template by Matthew Hughes (PS Publishing)
The Invention of Everything Else by Samantha Hunt (Harvill Secker)
Song of Time by Ian R MacLeod (PS Publishing)
The Night Sessions by Ken MacLeod (Orbit)
The Affinity Bridge by George Mann (Snowbooks)
The Quiet War by Paul McAuley (Gollancz)
Dark Blood by John Meaney (Gollancz)
The Steel Remains by Richard Morgan (Gollancz)
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness (Walker)
Debatable Space by Philip Palmer (Orbit)
House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds (Gollancz)
Swiftly by Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Going Under by Justina Robson (Gollancz)
The Last Colony by John Scalzi (Tor)
DogFellow’s Ghost by Gavin Smith (Macmillan)
Anathem by Neal Stephenson (Atlantic)
The Dog of the North by Tim Stretton (Macmillan)
Halting State by Charles Stross (Orbit)
Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross (Orbit)
The Margarets by Sheri S Tepper (Gollancz)
Blue War by Jeffrey Thomas (Solaris)
Off Armageddon Reef by David Weber (Tor)
Martin Martin’s on the Other Side by Mark Wernham (Jonathan Cape)
Winterstrike by Liz Williams (Tor)

Visionary Arthur C. Clarke dead at 90

Arthur C. Clarke, a visionary science fiction writer who won worldwide acclaim with more than 100 books on space, science and the future, died Wednesday in his adopted home of Sri Lanka, an aide said. He was 90. Clarke, who had battled debilitating post-polio syndrome since the 1960s died at 1:30 a.m. after suffering breathing problems. I am not going to bore you with anymore details. If you are reading this blog you know who AC was and what he was known for. Of note recently was Clarke's very vocal support for the Google prize for a private Luna mission. Other than that, the sense of lose is only matched by the loss in the 90s of Dr. Asimov.

AP story

The imagination of the science fiction author Sir Arthur C Clarke bubbled over with ideas about the future of science, technology and human society. BBC science and technology staff look at some that came true, and some that did not. Click Here for the BBC News report

Clarke Award Nominees

The Science Fiction Awards Watch blog has listed this year's nominations for the Arthur C. Clarke Award.

The short list for this year’s Arthur C Clarke Award is as follows:

• The Red Men by Matthew de Abaitua
  
• The H-Bomb Girl by Stephen Baxter
  
• The Carhullan Army by Sarah Hal
  
• The Raw Shark Texts by Steven Hall
  
• The Execution Channel by Ken MacLeod
  
• Black Man (Thirteen) by Richard Morgan
  

The winner will be announced at a ceremony at the Sci-Fi London film festival on April 30th.

The annual award is presented for the best science fiction novel of the year, and selected from a shortlist of novels whose UK first edition was published in the previous calendar year.

However according to Torque Control blog, not all is hunky dory as far as fans are concerned with the short list. Comments such as insular and ludicrous were bandied about. Click the Torque Control link to read more.

Happy 90th, Arthur C Clarke!

Sixty-two years ago Arthur C. Clarke sent a letter to the editor titled - Peacetime Uses for V2 - which was published in the 1945 February issue of the Wireless World magazine suggesting the use of Geostationary Satellites for the instant global communications. Quoting,

“I would like to close by mentioning a possibility of the more remote future--perhaps half a century ahead. An ``artificial satellite'' at the correct distance from the earth would make one revolution every 24 hours; i.e., it would remain stationary above the same spot and would be within optical range of nearly half the earth's surface. Three repeater stations, 120 degrees apart in the correct orbit, could give television and microwave coverage to the entire planet.”

Today, the Clarke Orbit has over 330 satellites. And even more amazing is that envisioned geo-sync, 2001, Rendezvous with Rama, Childhood's End and more, celebrates his 90th birthday 12/16/07. A fellow fan has put together a blog that allows fans like ourselves to log in and leave a birthday greeting for Sir Arthur. If you would like to, click on the link below or the article title, to be taken to the site.



Sir Arthur C Clarke’s 90th birthday wish blog

picture credit- Shahidul Alam

Rendezvous with Rama student project faux movie trailer!

directed and animated by Aaron Ross of the Tisch School of the Arts, we are treated to an absolute awe inspiring faux Rendezvous with Rama trailer. This CGI-and-live-action hybrid trailer as a degree project will entertain even the most sceptical sci-fi buff.As Tech Republic put it "Sweet hard-SF goodness".

Arthur C. Clarke award nominations

2007 Arthur C Clarke Award

The Wikipedia lists the ACC award as:
a British award given for the best science fiction novel first published in the United Kingdom during the previous year. The award was established with a grant from Arthur C. Clarke and the first prize was awarded in 1987. The book is chosen by a panel of judges from the British Science Fiction Association, the Science Fiction Foundation and the Science Museum of London. It is now administrated by the Serendip Foundation.

This year the short list nods go to:

End of the World Blues, Jon Courtenay Grimwood (Gollancz)
Nova Swing, M. John Harrison (Gollancz)
Oh Pure and Radiant Heart, Lydia Millet (Heinemann)
Hav, Jan Morris (Faber)
Gradisil, Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Streaking, Brian Stableford (PS Publishing)