Gravity Lens Weblog

January 1 - January 31

Wednesday, January 31

Kurt Amacker of Mania! looks at when comic companies draw the line on bad taste.

A couple reminders that we live in the future From Geekpress: The country of Sweden is setting up an embassy in a virtual world, and some facts about the recent rash of spaceports.

Tuesday, January 30

Emmet Cole at Wired gives us a wheelchair that can read your mind.

There's going to be a Doctor Who cartoon. Also, Derek Jacobi will appear in season three.

Monday, January 29

This weekend I went and saw the 3rd annual Animation Show, which is currently on tour. My favorites were Shane Acker's "9" and Oury Atlan's Overtime, but all the entries were good.

I went to check on the status of the cruise scheduled to travel into our hollow earth when I learned it was postponed because the organizer died last year.

Thursday, January 25

If you've been wondering what happened to all those unsold first-generation RoboSapiens...

Wednesday, January 24

Kurt Amacker of Mania looks at the pros and cons of comics going mainstream.

Laura Allen of Popular Science lists the scariest ideas in science in It Came From The Lab!

Neatorama lists the world's five smallest countries.

Sadly, the Duchy of Grand Fenwick and Latveria are not on the list.

Tuesday, January 23

Recommended Readin' (Lunar Edition): Paul D. Spudis of The Space Review gives us the best reason for going back to the moon, while Anthony Young explains why the post-Apollo generation doesn't care.

Kelly Young at New Scientist Space looks at the idea of launching ships from the moon with a ion beam generator.

David Powell of Space.com informs us that the moon is destined to disintegrate anyway.

Monday, January 22

Assorted Items: Will Snyder of Popular Science tells us of a plan to terraform mars in 1000 years. There's a slide show as well.

The Eternal Golden Braid links to this gallery of cutaway illustrations of vehicles and structures from Gerry Anderson shows.

Grow A Brain sends us to the comic tour book of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

Friday, January 19

Friend Alex sends along this footage from late last year of Christopher Lee being interviewed and fronting the metal band Inner Terrestrials on their cover of The Toreador March.

Here's the Inner Terrestrials site.

Thursday, January 18

New Scientist informs us that black diamonds may be from outer space, a fact comic book readers have known for years. Then again, isn't everything from space?

Wednesday, January 17

A little while back Figures.com put out a call for would-be toy reviewers to submit their opinion. I did. And they liked it. Now my take on the SOTA Toys Cthulhu figure is up for all to see, accompanied by some poor photos I took. I really need a new camera.

Popular Science tells us about an implant that zaps damaged brains back to an active state, similar to the cortical stimulator on Star Trek.

The guy who built the bear-protection suit has designed a neat-looking military exoskeleton.

Tuesday, January 16

Taylor Dinerman of The Space Review examines the questions and implications of independent space colonization, while David Tenenbaum of Astrobiology looks at optimism about habitable planets in nearby systems.

Michael Cassutt at SciFi Weekly continues his examination of a SF TV Canon.

Monday, January 15

George Dvorsky explains much better than I can why Star Trek's Prime Directive is stupid.

Saturday, January 13

YouTube goodness: footage from unfinished productions of Moebius' Incal and Arzach.

Thursday, January 11

A moment of silence, please, for Mr. Robert Anton Wilson.

Word is spreading that the CGI documentary Walking with Dinosaurs has been turned into a touring animatronic arena show that premiered yesterday in Australia. There's a cool video preview online. It is scheduled to tour internationally. Between this and the functional Martian war machine from Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds stage show, there's the possibility of some freaky live science fiction entertainment in the future, something more advanced than seeing Robosaurus lurch around at a local monster truck show.

Wednesday, January 10

The headline reads: "Elvis Robot Arrives."

Oh, by the way, the Molecule of the Month is Prostanoic Acid and Prostagladins.

Tuesday, January 9

Assorted Space Stuff: Red Orbit informs us that Stephen Hawking hopes to go into space.

Dwayne A. Day of The Space Review looks at the role space has played in Bond films.

The Speculist links to this neat gallery of space settlements.

And although Pluto is no longer considered a planet, it is now most certainly a verb.

Monday, January 8

This may be old news to many of you, but until last night I was unaware that outspoken atheist, humanist, and sceptic Richard Dawkins is married to Lalla Ward, who played the Time Lord Romana on Dr. Who.

Tell your mother to stop worrying: self-cleaning underwear has been invented.

Saturday, January 6

Friend George Dvorsky was recently had a segment on the CBC show The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos about the future of humans. See the clip here.

Thursday, January 4

If there has ever been an argument against building creepy androids, it's EveR2-Muse.

Wednesday, January 3

Things Magazine links to this gallery of cutaway views of James Bond villain lairs.

Retrosexy: Friend Wayne sends along word of The Thrilling Wonder Story, a site of pulp SF reviews, while SF Signal links to Steampunkopedia. and Warren Ellis links to the European adventure webcomic The Rainbow Orchid.

According to this preview page at Comics Continuum, IDW will publish a variant of their upcoming Star Trek comic entirely in Klingon.

Recommended Readin': Physorg explains the mathematics of cloaking.

Michael Huang of The Space Review gives his opinion on why we are returning to the moon.

BBC News has a neat piece about how the human brain visualizes the future.

Tuesday, January 2

Assorted SF Items: The Website @ the End of the Universe continues its tradition of offering a downloadable pulp science fiction calendar. They also link to a huge scan of the official Space Patrol Handbook from Dreams of Space.

SF Signal links to The Ultimate Iron Giant website.

Mark R. Leeper at SF Crowsnest informs us that he has special powers, while Geoff Willmetts explores the nature of reality in SF.

Richard English of Modern Drunkard proclaims Andre the Giant to have been the Greatest Drunk on Earth. The magazine also looks back at its ten years of publication.

Monday, January 1

It is January.

The God of the Month is Chuang Mu, the Lady of the Bedchamber.

The Molecule of the Month isn't up yet.