Doctors! Doctors EVERYWHERE!

Click to embiggen.

Via Arctic-Donkeys, h/t Tor.

Eleven Time Lords!


One Time Lord, hahaha!
Two Time Lords, hahaha!
Three Time Lords, hahaha!
Four Time Lords, hahaha!
Five Time Lords, hahaha!
Six Time Lords, hahaha!
Seven Time Lords, hahaha!
Eight Time Lords, hahaha!
Nine Time Lords, hahaha!
Ten Time Lords, hahaha!
Eleven Time Lords, hahaha!

Eleven Time Lords!

Sorry, couldn't help myself. ;)

A thousand hits! Huzzah!

And a holy frak! I am astonished. Thanks to everyone visiting, hope you enjoy the posts, of which there will be more. I'm shooting for more than once a day.

Asteroid mining, you say? Indeed!

So, funny thing happened today and by funny, I mean awesome as frak: Larry Page (CEO and co-founder of Google), Eric Schmidt (who used to run Google and is now their chairman), James Cameron, along with others announced today that they were forming a corporation called Planetary Resources with the goal of making a piece of science fiction into science fact - asteroid mining.

The inaugural step, to be achieved in the next 18 to 24 months, would be launching the first in a series of private telescopes that would search for asteroid targets rich in resources. The intention will be to open deep-space exploration to private industry.

Within five to 10 years, however, the company expects to progress from selling observation platforms in orbit around Earth to prospecting services. It plans to tap some of the thousands of asteroids that pass relatively close to Earth and extract their raw materials.

 They do realize that it'll be decades before they see any returns on their investments, but they're willing to do it anyways and I applaud them for it. Unfortunately, it's long since become clear that the federal government and politicians don't give a rat's ass about the space program or journeying out to the stars, so like it or not, we're going to have to look to the private sector to do what the former won't.

Oh, Arthur C. Clarke, why were you so good?

I bought a copy of The Fountains of Paradise yesterday and much like Rendezvous With Rama, I am hooked. Welp, I guess the only solution is to buy all his books, or at least the good ones. The Rama sequels certainly don't appeal to me, so I'd avoid them. I think this is an extension of my new found interest/appreciation in classic science fiction.

In any case, the plot of the book involves an famous engineer and his attempt to build the world's first space elevator on top of a mountain which happens to be occupied by a Buddhist monastery. Interspersed is the tale of a king who ruled the fictitious island of Taprobane (the location of the main story) two thousand years before. The book won the 1979 Hugo and Nebula Awards, which is both impressive and about as surprising as find a hooker in a whorehouse.

Picture via riffs&fragments.

Ah, gotta love starfighters

I doubly like this picture by EhsanA because it reminds me of the intro to Freelancer, one of my favorite computer games.




Man, I will never understand why they never did a sequel.

I'm adding this to my list of things I need to do

Alt text: Do you mean he never told you the tale? To amuse your Captain, no? Never told you how the Enterprise picked up the Botany Bay, lost in space from the year 1996 with myself and the ship's company in cryogenic freeze?

Because clearly, reenacting the most heartbreaking scene in science fiction is a requirement. The above comic is Yellow Peril by Jamie Noguchi and if you aren't already reading it, or are looking to add a new comic to your reading list, then I highly recommend his.

Red 5 is standing by!

By the talented ninjaink. h/t •GEEK•LEE•TIST•.

Books currently being read - Star Trek: That Which Divides by Dayton Ward

Memory Alpha.

I bought this several weeks ago and I've been biting chunks out of it whenever I've felt the jones for Treklit or scifi in general. As you can tell from the cover, the book is set during the TOS-era, before the movies. Here's the synopsis from the book itself:

Located in an area of non-aligned space near Federation and Romulan territory, the Kondaii system is home to a unique stellar phenomenon: a spatial rift that opens every three years in proximity to the system's sole inhabited planet. Only during this brief period is communication possible with the small, mineral-rich planetoid inside the rift. The local population has established a mining colony on this planetoid, and for the limited duration that the rift is open, a massive interplanetary operation is set into motion: ferrying mineral ore to the home planet while simultaneously transferring personnel and replenishing essential supplies and equipment–everything necessary to sustain the colony before it once again enters forced isolation.

While studying the rift, the science vessel U.S.S. Huang Zhong is severely damaged and crash-lands on the planetoid. After the Starship Enterprise arrives to conduct rescue operations, evidence quickly points to the rift's artificial nature. It is a feat far beyond the capacity of the local inhabitants, and presents an alluring mystery for Captain James T. Kirk and his crew. It also attracts the attention of the Romulans, who are most interested in studying and perhaps seizing this supposed advanced technology–by any means necessary.

I like it so far, it reads like an episode of Star Trek and there's a connection to a classic episode of TOS - one of the characters is Samuel Boma, who was a science officer in The Galileo Seven. There's a bit of discontinuity here between That Which Divides and two novels by Diane Carey: Dreadnought! and Battlestations! In those, Boma is said to have been court-martialed by Scotty and kicked out of Starfleet for his actions during that episode. Afterwards, he went to work as a civilian scientist where he created a new type of alloy and worked on developing new weapons. Fortunately, it's not a big deal.

Assessment so far: A good read. I'd recommend it if you like Treklit or are looking for a good place to start. The book is standalone, so you don't have to know any of the continuity that the Treklit has built up.

Trust the Doctor

Even if he has blue fur.

Via The Face of Book, h/t Tor.

And inexplicably, I have survived another year

Despite the valiant efforts of Romulans, Daleks, Crimson Guardsmen, Sith, Kzinti and this freaky ass bitch,

You're only delaying the inevitable. You must sleep, I don't.

today marks my 29th year of still being alive. Of those near three decades, I've been a nerd for 23. I was six when I started playing video games (E.T. on an Atari 5200) and comics followed a few years later, along with many science fiction on the boob tube. Unfortunately, the only library back where I lived was at the elementary school I went to and I don't recall them having any science fiction or fantasy books, so it would be a while before I delved into that.

Looky what I found

The things you find at thrift stores. If only there had been more.

Picture via BattleTech Wiki.

Ultramarine made out of Legos? Ultramarine made out of Legos

This is beyond awesome. Mark Stafford created this beast out of Legos and you can help make it an official Lego set by voting here. Truth be told, I don't hold much hope for that happening - Zod knows how much Games Workshop would demand for licensing. Still, one can dream and hope.

(h/t Super Punch)

Who wants to see ten minutes of Space Battleship Yamato 2199?

Of course you do! I've been meaning to post this since last week, but it kept slipping my mind. Yamato 2199 is a remake of sorts of the anime series Space Battleship Yamato  that originally aired during the 70s. It keeps the exact same plot as the original, but with spiffy new animation. Yamato aired in the U.S. as Star Blazers back in the 80s and was hugely popular. The guy who uploaded this has two versions up, they're both the same but the version below comes with English and Portuguese subtitles. I prefer this one, since I can follow what's actually going on.



I like it. I was a baby when Star Blazers ran on TV, so I never got to watch it. When I get the money, I'm buying both the original and 2199 when the latter comes out on DVD.

(h/t Greyhawk Grognard)

Eli Arndt's The Galactic Trade Authority is an interesting concept

I saw this post over on Eli Arndt's most excellent I See Lead People blog and it really piqued my interest. The idea behind The Galactic Trade Authority is simple: An organization that provides protection for trade ships and depots for a price. Initially created by an alien race called the Nawleen to secure their own interests, the GTA soon extended its services to other alien races and eventually was officially endorsed by the galactic government to act as a pan-galactic agency. While the Arndt created the GTA for wargaming, its a concept that can easily be employed in worldbuilding.

Scenario: Piracy is rife in the galaxy and the major powers/galactic government is either unwilling or incapable of handling it adequetly. A group of corporations or trading guilds decide to take action and form a body to protect their convoys and trade centers. The organization soon grows in reputation as more and more companies enlist their services until the government(s) promotes it to that of a government entity. You could even have it where the agency becomes corrupt overtime due to political patronage or just straight up bribery.

See you in space, cowboy

Via The Atlantic. h/t Laughing Squid.

Look at what I stole from Matgc's blog

His transports never knew what hit them, bwahahaha!

But anyway, when I saw this sweet looking ship on his blog, I just had to repost it. Truth be told, when I first saw it, I thought it was a rifle or one of those arm cannons Mega Man and Samus Aran have. As for the game itself, Firestorm: Armada is a wargame that, like Starfleet Wars/Galactic Knights, uses miniature warships. In the game, you can play as either human or a variety of alien races. If the rest of the ships in Firestorm look like that dreadnought, then it's definitely worth checking out.

And a tip of the hat to Matgc and his blog, My Ever-Growing Fleets for the picture.

Starfleet Wars/Galactic Knights

So when I first discovered wargaming blogs, the one game I kept seeing over and over again was Starfleet Wars.

Image inspiration - mission briefing

This is where we've stored all our weed and Doritos.
It is vitally important that the Imperials not take our stash.

I like to imagine that this is how it looked when Admiral Flowers gave his briefing on Operations Tsunami and Shockwave.

Picture via Wookieepedia.

Amazing Mega Man X fan film by Olan Rogers is mindblowing in its awesomeness

God.frakking.damn.



You wanna know the real mindfuck? This only cost $700 to make. Imagine what Olan Rogers could do with an actual budget. People like Rogers and Alex Albrecht (the guy who directed the super amazing Voltron fan film) are the future of scifi movies and they should be the ones in the directing chairs, not hacks like Michael Bay and Roland Emmerich. I mean, these guys made these awesome mini-movies with budgets too meager to even qualify as "shoestring". Meanwhile, guys like Bay and Emmerich can't make a good movie, even with hundreds of millions of dollars at their disposal.

(h/t Topless Robot)

I wrote this and I don't know why

Context: I had this pop into my head a week ago and it wouldn't leave, so I decided just to write it down. It centered around two events that ends a war between two interstellar powers and was probably inspired by The Lost Fleet and all these space-based wargaming blogs I read, like Super Galactic Dreadnought. So yeah, enjoy.