WWWednesday: December 9, 2020

Holiday Star, image from Cleanpubliddomain.com

Conventions:

DisCon III (next year’s Worldcon) is trying to decide whether to hold an online in August, 2021, or move their date to December of that year and try for an in-person event. They are polling the community. You do not have to be a WorldCon member to take the survey.

At this time, the Horror Writers of America still plans to hold their May, 2021 StokerCon as an in-person event. They are creating a contingency plan, though.

Books and Writing:

December is “best of” and “roundup” month, and LitHub honors the tradition with its annual roundup of best cover art. Most of these are general fiction. In the article, click on the title to see the cover.

Audible offered a compromise in its ongoing dispute with the Authors Guild over a “return” scheme that deprived authors of legally earned royalties. The Guild is not satisfied.

I didn’t know the name for this technique, but it’s fore-edge painting.

Via File770, the ALA unveils a poster of the Baby Yoga character, looking as cute as a bug’s ear, encouraging us to read.

The Speculative Literature Foundation announced this year’s grant winners. Kanyinsola Olorunnisola and Tatiana Schlote-Bonn are the awardees.

Once again I’m sharing the great Six Books feature from Nerds of a Feather, this one with Tim Pratt.

James Davis Nicoll invites us to contemplate five speculative novels where steady erosion of safety protocols led to catastrophe.

The Internet:

Obelisks, they’re going viral! Can’t remember if I linked to the Romanian one.

An enigma device was found in the Baltic Sea.

Shortly after it was closed and declared unsafe, the observatory at Arecibo, Puerto Rico collapsed.

Gift guides:

2020’s ten best gifts for cats. (Next week I’ll do dogs, promise.)

Fifty gifts for the birders on your list.

Gifts for astronomy lovers.

Streaming, Movies, TV:

Ars Technica tells us what to expect from Season Three of American Gods. I don’t know how happy I’m going to be if Anansi and the djinn are gone, but I’ll give it a try.

… and, the fourth season of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

A short film explores the relationship between two marooned spacefarers.

Video: 

For those of you who admire synchronized performances, the Silent Monks perform from the Hallelujah Chorus.