tv

Thursday various

  • The Wiseline Institute imagines the (surprisingly Stephen Baldwin-heavy) Creation Science Fiction Channel fall lineup:

    • With the schedule set, King plans to go on vacation until the end of the season. “There won’t be any changes, since CreSyFy has a rule against things evolving,” King explained.

  • “The thing I dream is this: That some night, a hundred nights, a hundred years from now, there will be a boy on Mars reading late at night with a flashlight under the covers. And he’ll look out on the Martian landscape, which will be bleak and rocky and red and not very romantic. But when he turns out the light and lies with a copy of my book, I hope, The Martian Chronicles, the Martian winds outside will stir, and the ghosts that are in my book will rouse up, and my creatures—even though they never lived—will be on Mars.” – Ray Bradbury

    • Evolution of The Martian Chronicles cover. I think the 1950 (original?) cover is my favorite, although a battered copy of the 1984 version is what I own. Though I’d love a copy of the new one. [via]

  • So…first Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, then Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, and now Wuthering Bites. I guess it’s officially a trend now. With this, and the Twilight connection, I have to wonder: has Emily Brontë ever been this popular before?

  • Speaking (sort of) of popular vampires, I have to say I think I prefer True Blood as a sitcom to the alternative. I guess you almost have to admire its willingness to be flat-out batshit crazy, but I lost interest after the first couple of episodes.

  • And finally, with today being Support Our Zines Day, I found this questions — is it a bad thing that small presses are usually built around one individual? — worth considering. Kaleidotrope, after all, is a one-man operation…

    • Friday various

    • Tonight, I’ll be attending a live taping of The Sound of Young America. It’s streaming live at 8 PM Eastern, if you’d like to watch too. I expect part, or all, of the show will eventually find its way into the radio show and/or podcast.
    • So how is the World, Dubai’s string of man-made paradise islands for the über-wealthy and famous, doing? Not too surprisingly, not too well. [via]
    • Are Twitter users “well on their way to becoming violent, idiotic vagabonds hell-bent on destroying the world”? We can only hope! Every time I read a story like this, or one bemoaning the rise of social networking sites in general, I really don’t know how to respond, since their fears almost never match up with how I (or, I think, most people) use these things. [via] As Noel Murray writes:

      This is a common critique of Twitter: “I don’t need to know what a bunch of strangers had for lunch.” And yet that’s so far removed from the way I use the service that I’m unsure where to begin refuting it. Personally, I only follow a small group of people on Twitter, and I have a limited circle of friends of Facebook. Most of these are people I know—or at least know of. We’re talking to each other about things we’re presumably all interested in; we’re sharing quick thoughts on movies, TV, kids, and the petty annoyances and subtle joys of a passing day. The other day one of my Twitter-followers—someone I don’t follow, I hasten to note—complained that he didn’t like me having a six-or-seven-Tweet exchange with a friend and thereby “cluttering up his feed.” And all I could think was, “Dude, following me is not compulsory.” I think that’s what critics of Twitter often fail to understand. Though some may use Twitter and Facebook as one big “look at me,” the majority are just trying to stay connected with friends, old and new.

    • A live-action Scooby-Doo prequel? And here I was, thinking nothing could make me nostalgic for the Matthew Lillard/Freddie Prinze, Jr. versions… I don’t have a problem with the movie in theory — it would be ridiculous to think Scooby-Doo has any kind of canon that needs protecting, and I remember genuinely liking A Pup Named Scooby-Doo — but in practice, this looks pretty dire.
    • And finally, there’s got to be an easier way to avoid ads in Gmail… [via]

    Thursday various

    Wednesday various