WWWednesday: August 29, 2018

Hugos:

File770 looks at instances of 3-in-a-row (threepeat) winners and finds that in the novel/novella categories N.K. Jemisin has pulled off a “first.”

Here’s the text of Jemisin’s acceptance speech.

The UK Guardian approves of Jemisin’s threepeat. Deeper into the essay they seem to imply that her characters aren’t rounded, and that is not correct.

Conventions:

Have I mentioned recently that I love File 770? Here, they provide a wrap-up of WorldCon 76.

Also, healing energy and best wishes to Mike Glyer who is recovering from surgery.

DragonCon will be held in Atlanta, as it always is, over Labor Day weekend. Here is a partial list of media guests. Here is the home page. They expect 85,000 people. Can that be right? Sounds overwhelming.

Books and Writing:

Walmart has partnered with Kobo, a Kindle-challenger, to create its own online bookstore. I’m not optimistic about this venture.

There is still more N.K. Jemisin! On Vox’s podcast, Jemisim demonstrates how to build a world with Ezra Klein. (This is one hour and 25 minutes long, and it has commercials.) UPDATE: I forgot to thank Ryan for this link. Thanks, Ryan!

Locus Magazine has a list of forthcoming titles. You can check our New Release page, too.

Mary Robinette Kowal blurbs the second book in THE LADY ASTRONAUT series.

Cartoonist and writer Brian Fies lost his house to the October, 2017 wildland-urban fires in northern California. He’s written about it in his book A Fire Story. Abrams will publish Fies’s Emmy-winning work in March, 2019. (This article was hastily written and they got the name of one of Fies’s books wrong, but the publishing details are correct.)

Greg van Eekout talks about his upcoming middle grade book Voyage of the Dogs.

TV and Movies:

Kin opens Friday (8/31). Here’s an article, and here’s the latest trailer.

Internet:

The Society for Creative Anachronisms had an issue earlier in 2018, when their newly crowned King and Queen wore period robes embellished with a swastika design. Many people reacted with shock and disgust – and some, notably white supremacists, with delight. This article addresses the dust-up in some detail.

The ninety-degree-angle cross design was in use for centuries if not millennia before the Nazis seized it as their symbol. In the USA, it was a positive symbol in several native tribes, called by some the “whirling log.” Can it ever be “reclaimed?” According to Dottie Indyke, native peoples did not think so:

“In 1940, in response to Hitler’s regime, the Navajo, Papago, Apache and Hopi people signed a whirling log proclamation,” Indyke writes.

“It read, ‘Because the above ornament, which has been a symbol of friendship among our forefathers for many centuries, has been desecrated recently by another nation of peoples, therefore it is resolved that henceforth from this date on and forever more our tribes renounce the use of the emblem commonly known today as the swastika … on our blankets, baskets, art objects, sand paintings and clothing.”

Vox.com has a detailed overview of the Hugos since Racefail in 2009, and it’s probably the best single source of the history I’ve found.

Games:

Admit it, you’ve always had a secret hankering to play a Disney villain, haven’t you? This board game gives you the chance.

Tech:

It was not Verizon’s finest moment last week when the giant cellphone company throttled the bandwidth on a high-user… which happened to be a California fire department engaged in providing emergency services during the state’s current wildfire situation. Verizon’s explanation that this was a “simple customer service error” didn’t hold water with the Santa Clara fire department or CalFire.

Space:

Atlas Obscura updates a 1958 “Map of Space.”