When I was a kid, my whole circle of D&D-playing, science-fiction reading pals was really into Roger Zelazny’s ten-volume Chronicles of Amber, but somehow I never read it; for years, I’d intended to correct this oversight, but I never seemed to find the time — after all, there’s more amazing new stuff than I can possibly read, how could I justify looking backwards, especially over the course of ten books?
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Tag: Old school
Paleocomputing watch: Tech magazines cover the BBS scene
The wonderful folks at Paleotronic (previously) have rounded up scans of articles from 1980s-era computer magazines that advised new computer users on navigating the burgeoning world of dial-up BBSes.
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Read: Jeannette Ng’s Campbell Award acceptance speech, in which she correctly identifies Campbell as a fascist and expresses solidarity with Hong Kong protesters
Last weekend, Jeanette Ng won the John W Campbell Award for Best New Writer at the 2019 Hugo Awards at the Dublin Worldcon; Ng’s acceptance speech calls Campbell, one of the field’s most influential editors, a “fascist” and expresses solidarity with the Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters.
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The Folio Society is releasing a facsimile of Marvel Comics #1
The Folio Society’s limited, slipcased editions (previously) are some of the most beautiful books being produced today; the company’s $225
Marvel: The Golden Age 1939-1949 ships in late September, and includes a facsimile of the ultra-rare Marvel Comics #1, reproduced from one of the last surviving mint-condition 1939 copies.
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“IBM PC Compatible”: how adversarial interoperability saved PCs from monopolization
Adversarial interoperability is what happens when someone makes a new product or service that works with a dominant product or service, against the wishes of the dominant business.
Podcast: “IBM PC Compatible”: how adversarial interoperability saved PCs from monopolization
In my latest podcast (MP3), I read my essay “IBM PC Compatible”: how adversarial interoperability saved PCs from monopolization, published today on EFF’s Deeplinks; it’s another installment in my series about “adversarial interoperability,” and the role it has historically played in keeping tech open and competitive. This time, I relate the origin story of the “PC compatible” computer, with help from Tom Jennings (inventor of FidoNet!) who played a key role in the story.
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How To: play Vlad Taltos in an RPG
Vlad Taltos is the (anti)hero of Steven Brust’s stupendous, longrunning fantasy series (which is nearly complete, a generation after it was begun!); Issue 220 of Dragon magazine (August 1995) included a feature by Ed Stark explaining how to play the human assassin and witch who lives amidst a race of nearly immortal elves, against whom he bears a serious grudge. I just love that there’s a stats-sheet for Vlad! The only thing that would make me happier would be the next goddamned book.
In 1943, the chairman of the NY Fed backed Modern Monetary Theory: “Taxes for Revenue Are Obsolete”
Modern Monetary Theory is the latest incarnation of chartalism, the economic theory that holds that government spending — and a federal jobs guarantee — doesn’t create inflation, so long as the spending is on things that the private sector isn’t buying: if a factory can produce ten widgets but is only producing five because that’s all the public sector wants to buy, the government can put in an order for five more widgets, putting more workers to work, without driving up the price of widgets.
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How F Scott Fitzgerald conjugated the verb “To cocktail”
F Scott Fitzgerald, in a 1928 letter to Blanche Knopf: “As ‘cocktail,’ so I gather, has become a verb, it ought to be conjugated at least once.” (via JWZ)
Kickstarting “The Decline of Mall Civilization,” a sequel to the long-out-of-print “Malls Across America” book
Michael Galinsky’s 2011 photo-book “Malls Across America” went out of print quickly and now sells for upwards of $1000/copy; Galinsky is now kickstarting a sequel, The Decline of Mall Civilization, featuring 112 pages of images of American malls from 1989.
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