It’s always interesting to figure out how various writers work and this long article by George Saunders, which explains the genesis and creation (and recreation) of one of his novels, is a great window into a process that had me going “aha,” and nodding in equal measure.
Non-fungible tokens or NFTs have been a bit a media rage this past year, as a trend, a new investment opportunity, and possibly a silver bullet that contains your daily recommended dose of antioxidants. I keep thinking, they can’t be as stupid as they sound, can they? You can find out the answer to this and many other questions about NFTs in this excellent article by Vicky Osterweil which, spoiler alert, is called “Money for…
Some days, do you ever wonder, what with all the exoplanets being discovered and concerted studying of the skies, where all the aliens are? And why haven’t we found any evidence of them? And do they make their spacecraft entirely out of the black box? Well, Jill Tarter is here to clear some of that up. And by “clear up,” I mean “tell you how much we don’t know.” Mind you, it might be good…
Last Wednesday, I was in more meetings than not, so when it came to figuring out a good “wonky Wednesday post,” this article by Olga Khazan in The Atlantic resonated with me. Basically, the article points out how much of the jargon is not only used in business and office settings a form of the office culture, but that it’s also, shall we say, an act. Both from my background in theater and anthropology, I…
Those of you who know I grew up listening to vintage radio will understand that I jumped at the chance to provide a radio announcer voice for that era… and I’m very happy that it’s part of the short film Desolate Dreams, being developed now by filmmaker Kiyoka Rhodes and a fantastic team. Besides the video, be sure to check out their website to learn more about the people working to bring this film to…
I still remember reading Vernor Vinge’s A Fire Upon the Deep with the idea of the “net of a million lies,” which we may well have already reached without the bonus of having an interstellar civilization. Instead, we have an absurd amount of people around the globe thinking they’re on a flat Earth. I stumbled across this video that has a succinct explanation for a lot of conspiracy theories.. One of the concepts mentioned in…
As the New York Times obituary put it, a “Titan of the American Musical” has left the stage. Stephen Sondheim has died at the age of 91. The whole article is a long and excellent read — and I tend to agree with Mark Evanier in that there doesn’t seem to be much for me to individually add about my own personal connections to Sondheim’s work. However, one thing that has become evident to me…
I remember playing around with shortwave radio growing up in the previous millennium and the excitement at finding broadcasts from other countries. Well, thanks to some enterprising folks over in the Netherlands, you can do some globetrotting yourself without leaving the comfort of your Internet browser. Radio Garden is a project that allows you to tune into all sorts of small radio stations all across the globe. Be warned, it can be a bit of…
With the prospect of pandemic restrictions being lifted, thoughts of vacationing further afield have come to mind… but am I thinking far enough? Thanks NASA.
Jabberwocky Audio Theater has been one my main creative outlets in the past few years, which has been simultaneously challenging and fortuitous during the pandemic. It’s challenging, because one of things we like to do is bring everyone together to record at the same time, an old school method that served many a vintage radio show well for decades. Now we needed to account for various different home recording set-ups, where even equally good home…