Brian Cooksey

http://joy-babbleon.blogspot.com/2009/07/here-i-go-again.html

http://joy-babbleon.blogspot.com/2009/07/rest-of-chesters-story.html

Chester Greenwood was born in Farmington, Maine in 1858. A grammar school dropout, he invented earmuffs at the age of 15 (1873). While testing a new pair of ice skates, he grew frustrated at trying to protect his ears from the bitter cold. After wrapping his head in a scarf, which was too bulky and itchy, he made two ear-shaped loops from wire and asked his grandmother to sew fur on them. He patented an improved model with a steel band which held them in place and with Greenwood's Champion Ear Protectors, he established Greenwood's Ear Protector Factory. He made a fortune supplying Ear Protectors to U.S. soldiers during World War I. He went on to patent more many other inventions. In 1977, Maine's legislature declared December 21 "Chester Greenwood Day" to honor a native son and his contribution to cold weather protection.

Farmington, Maine, is now the Earmuff Capital of the World. There is a parade that celebrates Chester's birthday the first Saturday in December, with local police cruisers in the parade decorated as giant earmuffs.


Another of Chester's inventions was the steel-tooth rake - U.S. patent #2066036, issued on December 29, 1936. Chester Greenwood accumulated over 100 patents in his lifetime.



By Mary Bellis

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/could-a-familiar-face-be-returning-to-dollhouse/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15568

At the end of the first season of “Dollhouse,” Miracle Laurie’s character Mellie was set free from the title organization, part of a deal to buy the silence and complicity of Paul Ballard.

And when Mellie was freed from the clutches of the “Dollhouse,” it appeared to many that her time on the show might be over.

Not so fast says Laurie.  The actress recently told the Baltimore Sun that Mellie will be back for the second season of “Dollhouse.

“All I know for sure is that I’m coming back next season,” she told the paper. “I don’t actually know in what form I’ll be back. The writers are kind of teasing me—everybody knows but me.”

“Dollhouse” debuts on DVD and Blu Ray later this month and returns on Fox on Friday, September 25.  The season premiere is a week later than originally announced by Fox.  The network pushed back the premiere to allow series creator Joss Whedon to write and direct the first installment of season two.

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/warehouse-13-starts-strong/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15567

The two-hour debut of “Warehouse 13″ was the strongest debut for a series on SyFy/SciFi Channel since the debut of “Eureka” according to SciFi Wire.

The premiere drew an audience of 3.5 million viewers according to preliminary ratings and was the most watched cable show for the evening.’

“Warehouse 13″ drew the third-highest total viewership for a Syfy original series, trailing only the series premieres of “Stargate Atlantis” (4.2 million total viewers on July 16, 2004) and “Eureka” (4.1 million total viewers on July 18, 2006).

When final DVR viewing is included, “Warehouse 13″ will increase its viewership and may surpass one or both of those premieres.

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/imagine-lesser/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15575

Written by: Mike McCafferty (Slice of SciFi Contributor)

The Sci-Fi channel has changed their name to SyFy. The reason is to attract more women in the 18-49 year-old range by softening the name and the content. Their once much desired 18-25 year-old male demographic has fled for the greener pastures of Spike TV (boobs) and video games (killing without character development). This shift is evident in their new marketing campaign, a Skittles-on-LSD commercial which feature no robots, monsters or space ships, only paper unicorns, magic carousels and hip young people (I’m not making that up). The message is clear: leave your hardcore nerd at the door, we wanna go mainstream!

And you know what? I’m okay with that to a certain degree. The name is ridiculous to be certain and I will never, ever write the phrase SciFi (SyFy) channel without the appropriate parenthetical demarcation. SciFi stood for Science Fiction at one point in time and I’ll not bastardize it further so that that it one day becomes a question in some future etymological trivia game. But back to the point, SciFi (SyFy) needs to sell ads to make money and if they think that puppies wings and magic kittens lure in the ladies, who am I to argue?

But I am going to take issue with lazy storytelling and borrowed premises. I’m desperately trying to work my way through Warehouse 13, one of the new shows to debut on the network that’s now heavily relying upon the “And sometimes ‘y’ is a vowel” rule to rebrand itself. It’s a difficult prospect and like a hiker ascending Everest, I need to take slow steps and pause often lest I suffer from episodic hypoxia.

What’s this show about? No clue. That’s not to say that it’s so nuanced, subtle and mysterious that I can’t fathom it. Rather, I submit that Warehouse 13 has lifted from so many other sources that I can’t plumb the depths of plagiarism to find an original idea.

Let’s use the ol’ SciFi (Syfy) subterfuge and see if we can’t separate the parts into their individual stolen components…
* our leads are two attractive government agents. They crack wise with each other and feign indifference when in fact there’s a spark between them that may lead to something else. AS SEEN IN X-FILES and FRINGE.
* A strange warehouse in the middle of nowhere houses unusual artifacts. AS SEEN IN RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.
* A ‘Crazy’ lead scientist who oversees the project. He’s both brilliant and a little off, providing comic relief. AS SEEN IN FRINGE, EUREKA and BACK TO THE FUTURE.
* Mysterious benefactor/boss who speaks in cryptic sentences and hints of larger conspiracies (yet to be fleshed out by producers). AS SEEN IN X-FILES, LOST.
* Monster of the week AS SEEN IN…EVERYTHING.

I could go on and list the Men-in-black, Friday the 13th (the Series), even The Invisible Man connections (boo-yah!), but why bother? The creators obviously pitched this show to the network (whose name I shall not invoke!) using those very series as direct references. They promised a Frankenstein patch-work of a series and they don’t care if people recognize that they dug up their loved ones for spare parts. This is a shambling ‘mediocrity monster’, stunning everyone in it’s path with a ‘meh’ or a ‘it’s not so bad’. The only thing that can kill it is counter programming as it hypnotizes those that watch it with just enough promise to warrant another episode. That will never come, of course and once he show has run out of ideas to drain, it will flee from the schedule to haunt Hulu for the rest of its days.

Look, I get that all ideas are modifications with enhancements on the other ideas. But I gotta take a stand on this. If someone is gonna take the time to change their name and be all trendy (Of “Trendi”?), they can’t just be the same old person. SciFi ditched their name, created a pretty ad campaign and then serves up something that they claim to be indicative of their new direction. It’s only on inspection that inside the shiny box is the same old feldercarb.

Sorry SyFy, bring us compelling stories, interesting characters and bend our imagination or don’t show up at all. Your tagline is “Imagine Greater”, and you need to heed your own advice. Take a chance and greenlight a series that will truly let our imaginations soar to new places and times with magic and science that seems like magic. You take the leap and we’ll be there to catch you. You trot out derivative shows like Warehouse 13, and we’ll box them up an store them in our own warehouse of lesser Science Fiction/Fantasy works, never to be thought of again.

http://www.sonic.net/~rknop/blog/?p=103

Via a Cosmic Variance blog post, I found this astro-ph paper by Catena and Ulio that claims the local density of Dark Matter is 0.39 GeV/cm3.

What does this mean?

Well, first, you may object that GeV is a unit of energy, so really what we’ve got here is an energy density of Dark Matter, not what most of us mean when we say “density” all by itself (which is mass density). Physicists, however, know that converting between energy and mass is so easy (via E=mc2) that they will very often, especially when talking about fundamental particles, cite masses in energy units. Divide by the speed of light squared to figure out that this is a density of 6.9×10-25 grams per cubic centimeter.

Second, “local” means “in our area of the Galaxy”. Dark Matter clumps on scales of hundreds of light-years, at the smallest, so if you’re looking on a scale smaller than that, it’s going to look smooth. It’s similar to our atmosphere; if you climb a mountain and get five miles above sea level, the air will be noticably thinner. But, if you go up just a few meters, you’re not going to notice any difference in the density of air.

What is the density of air? Well, if you believe Wikipedia’s Answer (and you should in this case), it’s about 0.075 lbm/ft3… or, in more reasonable units, 0.0012 grams per cubic centimeter. (That’s at room temperature and standard sea level pressure.)

And, while we’re at it: the density of Dark Energy in the Universe is about 75% of the critical density, the critical density being 3H02/8πG, or 9.7×10-30 grams per cubic centimeter (for a Hubble constant of 72 km/s/Mpc).

Right.

So let’s put this all together. Cup your hands. That makes a box roughly 5cm on a side, or 125 cubic centimeters in size. In your hands, you are holding:

• 0.15 grams of air
• 8.7×10-23 grams of Dark Matter
• 9.1×10-28 grams equivalent of Dark Energy

Strictly speaking, “holding” isn’t the right term, because the Dark Matter particles are passing right through your hands as if they weren’t there… but at any one moment, that’s how much Dark Matter is on average within the box you make by cupping your hands. (Air is coming in and out as well, because you probably have cracks in the box you make, but it doesn’t pass through your hands.) And, it’s hard to say whether Dark Energy is passing through your hands, or is a property of the vacuum and as such it is just how much energy density is there as a result of the volume you’ve cupped, but you get my drift.

Oh, and I suppose I should mention that every second, about 140 million neutrinos from the Sun pass through your cupped hands (based on the neutrino flux cited at this page from HyperPhysics). However, they’re going so bloody fast (very close to the speed of light) that at any moment, there’s only about a 2% chance that one of those neutrinos is right then within your hands.  (A similar consideration is probably true with Dark Matter particles, but I’d need to know the mass of said Dark Matter particles (nobody does), and I’d need to know their velocity (there are estimates, but I haven’t tracked them down) to actually give you numbers.)

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/editorial-what-a-doctor-who-movie-could-mean-for-the-matt-smith-era/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15561

Editorial by: Michael Hickerson (Slice of SciFi Editor)

For the upcoming San Diego Comic Con, outgoing “Doctor Who” producer Russell T. Davies has elusive promised that he would make an big announcement regarding the series.  Given the fact that actor David Tennant will be making the jump across the pond to join Davies on the panel, it doesn’t take too much to connect the dots and assume that the long-awaited “Doctor Who” movie could be announced at this year’s ComicCon.   And it’s also be an easy jump to assume that David Tennant would be starring in the film, which might be penned and/or produced by Davies.

As a long-time “Doctor Who” fan, I suppose I should be excited about the potential of seeing the good Doctor on the big-screen.  We haven’t had a “Doctor Who” movie since the Peter Cushing films on the 60’s (both of which are retellings of two early Dalek stories) and the prospect of an original “Doctor Who” feature should fill me with glee, joy and unparalleled geek love.

And yet, I can honestly say it doesn’t.

Why do you ask?

Because I fear that a “Doctor Who” movie with David Tennant in the lead as the Doctor will only serve to marganilize the upcoming era of the 11th Doctor.  Incoming producer Steven Moffat has promised a show that will be a bit darker when the 11th Doctor comes into the role–something the show desparately needs.  I’ve made no secret that I prefer any script Moffat has written to the best of Davies, so the thought of him being given the reigns to shape the series in his vision is something that makes me want to squeal in geek joy.

And yet, I have a feeling that this new, darker vision of “Doctor Who” is going to get lost in the shuffle.  In a lot of ways, I find myself wondering if the new era of “Who” will get overlooked by some fans in the same way that some “Star Trek” fans overlooked “Deep Space Nine” during its seven-year run on television.

Easily the best of the modern “Trek”s, “DS9″ was consistently overlooked in favor of the more high profile movie projects featuring the “Next Gen” crew and the launch of “Voyager.”  Even when “DS9″ was running circles around a lot of other genre shows (at the time, only “The X-Files” and “Babylon Five” were consistently in the same league as “DS9″) and a lot of conventional television series, it was widely ignored by critics and never really got the due it deserved.  Looking back, “DS9″ is still like the red-headed stepchild of the “Trek” universe.

To paraphrase Rodney Dangerfield, it just don’t get no respect.

Which is exactly what could happen to the Matt Smth era of “Doctor Who.”  In a lot of ways, Smith already has the decked hugely stacked against him.   In poll after poll, David Tennant easily wins the fans hearts as their favorite Doctor, so Smith has big shoes to fill there.  Tennant inhabited the role for four years and three seasons plus a series of specials.  In a lot of people’s minds, Tennant is the Doctor in much the same way that Tom Baker was the Doctor in the 70s.   Add to it that Smith comes in during a behind-the-scenes regime change and with a new companion and that’s a lot to ovecome in winning the fandom over.

So the idea of a movie featuring Tennant doesn’t seem to help things.  It could end up overshadowing Smith and his start on the show.   And it could end up dividing the fandom–well, even more than it already is.  (If you want to see a good arguement, go on any “Who” message board and write that you like the Sylvester McCoy era.)

I’m not against a “Doctor Who” movie, per se.  But I think the timing could have been a bit better–assuming it is a movie we’re getting in the near future.  Surely the year long hiatus would have been a better slot for the movie.   And while I don’t think that a movie as David Tennant’s last hurrah would have been a good idea (making fans pay to see the continuing storyline isn’t always the best idea….see “The X-Files”), it might have been more fun to see the program’s resources put into one solid movie idea rather than the two specials we’ve got so far.

Of course, a lot of my misgivings about this movie is that Davies is invovled and possibly writing it.  As former script-editor Christopher H. Bidmead recently told “Doctor Who Magazine” Davies has a lot of great first-draft ideas.  It’s just too bad that he never appears to do any re-writes–especially later in the season as the demands of being producer start to catch up with him.

I could, hopefully, be surprised though.  And I’m hoping I will be.  I was dead-set against a “Star Trek” reboot and it worked beautifully.  Maybe the same will happen here.

I just hope it does and that it doesn’t overshadow the hard work that Moffat, Smith and company will be putting into continuing the phenomonal success “Doctor Who” has been for the past several years.

Extracts from Anna Chen’s “illustrated personal journey through the life and crimes of Hollywood legend Anna May Wong“, as presented on May 26 2009.

At bleedingcool:

The next movie I write will be Jurassic Park 4: ADAMZOIC, in which a group of committed Creationists sneak onto a dinosaur-infested Island in an attempt to prove that humans and slavering proto-avian carnivores can live in harmony, as in Eden. The film will be 3 hours long; will feature multiple variations on the theme of Cute Naked People being disembowelled while trying to sing hymns; will include at least one incidence of punning, based on the words “pray” and “prey”; and will end when the sole survivor realises the error of her ways, embraces the Power Of Darwin, and spontaneously evolves a set of wings to escape.

Then gets shot down by Jeff Goldblum: Avenger Of Maths.

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/will-cameron-diaz-join-the-green-hornet/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15571

The often-delayed Seth Rogan “The Green Hornet” movie has been pushed back yet again.  Filming was due to begin this month, but according to the Hollywood Reporter it won’t go before cameras until August 3.

That may be to allow actress Cameron Diaz to join the cast.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Diaz is considering an offer to join Rogan and Stephen Chow in the movie.  Diaz would play the lead female character according to reports.

“A deal hasn’t been sealed yet, but sources tell EW that she is in early talks for the role. Her reps at CAA declined comment,” reports the magazine.  “Michel Gondry is set to direct the film based on a script by Rogen and his writing partner, Evan Goldberg. Shooting is supposed to begin shortly, with a release date already set for July 9, 2010.”

I heard on the Interwebs through a series of tubes that GoogleOS based on Google Chrome is coming out in 2010! It will not only cause the collapse of Microsoft, but it will solve world hunger, put a man on Mars, get everyone to dress well, fix the economy, give us all universal health care AND look good! Also, it will be awesome.

I am a happy consumer of many a Google service, especially the fine search engine. I’ve been using it since it had a Stanford URL and remember, distinctly, evangelizing it when people went “Google what?” while heading off to Altavista. I have Gmail! I use Google Reader! I sometimes use Google Docs.

But the world is littered with Microsoft Killers. Linux has been THE Microsoft Killer any day now since 1994. I am still waiting. MacOS, which I love unto death, has a tiny market share compare to Windows. Solaris is not a desktop consumer OS despite several incarnations of Solaris on the Desktop.

And lo, yesterday, the Interwebs was rife with the coming of the great Google Messiah. A little digging turns up that it’s not a new operating system at all, it’s just yet another Linux variant that uses Chrome as a window manager designed to run on netbooks because we don’t have enough Linux variants with different window managers yet. Theoretically it will have better security (it will) and privacy (yes) but this is from riding on top of Linux which is naturally more secure and private than Windows. I am positive it will be great for netbooks. (Full disclosure: I have an HP Mini that runs Ubuntu.) It will be a pretty well-designed window manager. Lots of people will love it. It may even push Windows XP out of the default install netbook space, or lower its market share. But this is not going to get “Google to beat Microsoft” and I am not convinced Microsoft even cares about the netbook space.

Reality is a harsh mistress. Android isn’t beating the iPhone or Blackberry, and GoogleOS won’t destroy Microsoft in some David vs. Goliath — or, to the point, Goliath vs. Goliath — technical showdown.

So huzzah for another Linux distro! May it be like all the rest.

There was a nice rant at Naked Capitalism that is very much worth a read.

Originally published at /project/multiplexer. You can comment here or there.

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/stargate-atlantis-season-five-winners/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15574

Congratulations to Anthony Crabtree of Pittsfield, ME, Pierre-Luc Labrie of Terrebonne, QC and Shaun Aki of Orlando FL.   You have won a set of the fifth season of “Stargate: Atlantis” on DVD.

Your prizes will be arriving in your mailbox any day now.

And thank you to everyone who entered the contest.   And keep your eye open for another “Stargate” contest coming soon….

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2009/07/09/whithouse-talks-about-being-human/

http://www.sliceofscifi.com/?p=15564

Already a success in the U.K., the popular series “Being Human” will make the jump across the pond later this month and debut on BBC America, July 25.

The series centers on three roomates who happen to be a ghost, a werewolf and a vampire who’s on the wagon.  Created and written  Toby Whithouse, who penned the “School Reunion” episode of “Doctor Who,” the series is one that many fans have been looking forward to seeing in the United States since it’s run on the BBC in January.

And Whithouse said that getting the show to television screens was a bit different than how most British shows are produced and commissioned.

“It was a very odd process, really, because we don’t do pilots in this country at all,” Whithouse told SciFi Wire. “For some reason BBC Three … decided to do this series of pilots. We’d already been developing ‘Being Human’ just as a normal series. Suddenly this opportunity to do this as a pilot came up. In a way we felt it improved our chances.”

When the pilot aired, it “got this extraordinary response that we were completely unprepared for,” Whithouse said. But when the BBC gave them the green light to make the series, many of the cast members were otherwise employed. “Apart from George the werewolf [Russell Tovey], pretty much everyone else changed,” he said.

The casting changes didn’t mean that Whithead had to discard the mythology he’d created for the series, he said.

“The benefit of doing the pilot was that it gave us a chance to re-examine certain aspects that didn’t work,” Whithouse said. “One of the things we didn’t feel worked in the pilot was the portrayal of the vampires. They were just kind of too … they were very Anne Rice in the pilot. And we felt that, because we’d gone to such lengths to make everything else so believable and realistic, we felt that that just wasn’t in keeping with the rest of the show.”

And the series is definitely one for adults.  The original British cuts feature some nudity and adult language.  When asked if these would be toned down for the American audience, Whithouse wasn’t sure if any cuts were being or had been made.

And should the series prove to be a success on BBC America, there’s more to come.  Whithouse is currently working on the final two episodes of the second series, which will being production later this year.