chuggnutt.com

Halfway through the month, and I haven't written here yet. Shameful. I guess it's time to get my nerdtastic geek on.

• The new Enterprise: I've been entirely mum on the topic of the new Star Trek movie coming out next year—a prequel to the original series with re-cast young stars and directed by J. J. Abrams—largely because, well, I'm not really sold yet. By and large, I have no problem with the re-casting of the original crew for a prequel—hey, multiple actors works for James Bond—but at the same time, does the franchise really need to re-visit a well-mined concept rather than doing something new?
  
  However, this week, the new Enterprise for the movie was revealed. And... no, I don't love it. I'm not even sure I like it. Well, as a standalone Star Trek Universe ship—great. Fine. But as the original Enterprise? Why on earth wouldn't they go back to the Original Series design? A bit unhappy.
  
  ...yeah, I guess I am one of those Star Trek geeks who gets bothered when they screw up canon. The TV show "Enterprise" really bugged me when they did that, too.
• Also this week I stumbled across New Scientist's Future of Science Fiction special. It's a good read, nothing too dense or heavy, but worth the time.
• My brother sent me a link to the Snoopy WWI Flying Ace game trailer. Holy crap, that games look awesome. The Charlie Brown-esque Nazi-looking dudes are great. (Yes, I'm aware that there were no Nazi's in World War One. I'm using poetic license here.) The game won't be released until 2010, but it's definitely going to be a must-have.

So here's the deal. It's blindingly obvious that I haven't devoted much time to this blog in quite a while, even though I consider this site my "main" identity on the web. Part of it is blog fatigue, part of it is all my best ideas these days are related to my other blogs, part of it is inertia.

Whatever, I'm tired of looking at how desolate and empty this site has become. So I'm going to revitalize this blog, and in doing so I'm undertaking something that is—for me—entirely new and radical.

I'm going to start publishing all of my fiction writing here. Mostly old stuff, and whatever new stuff I write. All of it.

My thinking is this:

I talk a lot about being a writer, but let's face it—these days especially—it's mostly talk. Well, that's not entirely true; I seem to be writing a lot on the blogs, but for this exercise I'm talking about being fiction writing. So I talk a lot about being a writer, and wanting to do it for a living, but I also need to be realistic about it: I know myself, and at the rate I'm going (or rather not going), that's just not going to happen.

I've got a bunch of old writing that I haven't done anything with, though only one or two stories are actually finished; it's mostly work-in-progress stuff, rough drafts, like that. Science fiction, largely, though there's some plain vanilla fiction and at least one horror-ish piece. And some Star Trek fan fiction as well.

As for new stuff, well, I've got lots of ideas, but my execution has been lacking. I'm thinking that this will prompt me to, you know, actually write.

So I'm gonna put my money where my mouth is and publish it all online here. Because the reality is, if I don't do it here, I won't do it at all, of which I'm 99.993% certain.

Plus, I get to dabble and experiment in this whole new publishing model, where writers are putting their works online under Creative Commons licenses, for instance. Why not? Stuff published online potentially has a much vaster audience available than traditional printed works with limited runs. It's wide open.

So here's the deal: I'll tag the title of the post as "Fiction" and whether it's a completed piece or (most likely) a work in progress ("WIP"). Much of it will be dreadful, I'm sure—some of this stuff goes back years, and... well. Let's just say a lot of this will be "rough drafts."

It'll all be published under the same Creative Commons license I have on this site—Attribution, Noncommercial, Share Alike 3.0—which means it can be copied, shared, remixed, mashed up, basically treated how you want as long as proper attribution is given (i.e., credit given to me) and it's all noncommercial (no money is made from it). Otherwise, it's all free.

Comments and criticism are welcome (encouraged!) and on the off chance that someone actually does some sort of CC-related stuff like I related above, let me know.

I'm nerdy, no two ways about it: while thinking about the kind of things I would want for Christmas this year, I got to wondering about fictional gadgets and technology that I wouldn't at all mind having. So, as a perfectly goofy/nerdy/idle/self-amusing blog post, I put together a wish list of sci-fi/fantasy gadgets I'd like to get for Christmas (or my birthday).

(Incidentally, I do have an Amazon.com wish list here. It doesn't necessarily match the list I made for my family this year, but I'm just sayin'.)

Lightsaber

Forget laser guns, a lightsaber is the perfect all-in-one weapon. The blade is indestructible, cuts through anything, deflects energy blasts, and acts as a flashlight. Plus, when you're done slicing up Sith Lords, it has a ton of household uses.

Tricorder

The ultimate all-purpose scanning device and handheld computer. As the various Star Trek series show, there's really nothing your tricorder can't tell you—from general weather and environmental conditions to the movements and stats of hidden people to the spin orientation of quarks.

Sonic Screwdriver

Doctor Who's miracle tool. There was almost nothing he couldn't do with that thing... repairing any machine... unlocking any door... cooking meals... getting cash from ATMs...

Time-traveling DeLorean... or TARDIS

Gotta have a time machine.

For vehicular transport, I can't decide between these two. If I went with the DeLorean, I'd have to go with the fusion-powered flying version, but then I'd run into various hijinks related to the existence of magical automobiles in the wrong era. And, of course, the hassle of being able to get the car up to (arbitrarily) 88 miles per hour just to get anywhen. Plus, it doesn't travel spatially—you travel to the same corresponding point in space in the different time period. Could be a problem if there's a building there in the future or something.

But, the thing looks cool.

On the other hand, Doctor Who's TARDIS travels both temporally and spatially, and is bigger on the inside than the outside. Drawbacks? Doesn't seem like you actually have much control over where and when you travel. Plus, it always seems to look like a goofy blue police box. Or, at least the Doctor's did. Perhaps I could get one of my own, an updated, working model.

Babel fish

Yeah, this isn't a gadget per se, but man, being able to understand and communicate in any language without having to fiddle around with something as cumbersome as a Universal Translator...

That's all I can come up with right now. Though I'm sure somebody will point out that since I chose a Babel fish from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, that I should choose, well, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" as a must-have gadget. Nah. I figure I'll just load Wikipedia onto my tricorder.

Cyberpunk:

Cyberpunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, noted for its focus on "high tech and low life" and taking its name from the combination of cybernetics and punk. It features advanced science such as information technology and cybernetics, coupled with a degree of breakdown or a radical change in the social order.

Cyberpunk writers tend to use elements from the hard-boiled detective novel, film noir, and postmodernist prose to describe the often nihilistic underground side of an electronic society.... much of the action takes place online, in cyberspace, blurring any border between the actual and the virtual reality.

Classic example: Neuromancer

Steampunk:

Steampunk... concerns works set in the past, or a world resembling the past, in which modern technological paradigms occurred earlier in history, but were accomplished via the science already present in that time period.

The prototypical "steampunk" stories were essentially cyberpunk tales that were set in the past, using steam-era technology rather than the ubiquitous cybernetics of cyberpunk but maintaining those stories' "punkish" attitudes towards authority figures and human nature. Originally, like cyberpunk, steampunk was typically dystopian, often with noir and pulp fiction themes, as it was a variant of cyberpunk.

Further derivatives: Stonepunk, bronzepunk, ironpunk, sandalpunk or classicpunk, middlepunk, clockpunk, dieselpunk and atomicpunk, transistorpunk, spacepunk... though I don't think most of these are full-fledged subgenres, and were developed for the GURPS Steampunk role-playing game.

Classic example: The Difference Engine

Biopunk:

It describes the nihilistic, underground side of the biotech society which is said to have started to evolve in the first decade of the 21st century. Unlike cyberpunk, it builds not on information technology but on biology. Individuals are enhanced not by mechanical means, but by human genetic engineering.

Postcyberpunk: Not so much a derivative as an evolution.

Postcyberpunk describes a subgenre of science fiction which some critics suggest has evolved from classic cyberpunk. Like its predecessor, postcyberpunk focuses on technological developments in near-future societies, typically examining the social effects of an ubiquitous datasphere of computerized informaton, genetic engineering and modification of the human body, and the continued impact of perpetual technological change. Unlike "classic" cyberpunk, however, the works in this category feature characters who act to improve social conditions or at least protect the status quo from further decay.

Includes a sense of humor, as opposed to the frequently deadly serious nature of cyberpunk.

Classic example: The Diamond Age

...At some point, you know, this all seems like a snake devouring its own tail...