WWWednesday: January 3, 2024

Let’s start the New Year off right! Here is a chocolate review by Elizabeth Bear.

Tor.com reviews the Doctor Who Christmas episode, introducing Ruby Sunday, the new companion.

Stubby the Rocket shares seasonal holiday favorites that aren’t holiday themed in this article.

Nerds of a Feather review Marie Vibbert’s new fantasy, The Gods Awoke.

From earlier last month, they also had an interview with Malka Older.

Champagne toasts? Football games? Fireworks? How about getting scared silly by creatures in sealskins, coming at you with harpoons? It’s just New Year’s in Greenland.

The Mary Sue critiques the 8^th episode of Marvel’s What if…? (Spoiler alert, it’s set in Shakespeare’s time.)

From Publishers Weekly, a judge in Iowa has blocked that state’s sweeping law trying to ban books in school libraries. The judge clarified some points in the law, and criticized it as 1) far too broad and 2) a solution in search of a problem. The law intends to ban any reference to sexual content in any book (history, science, self-help, fiction and so on), but there is no indication in Iowa that sexual content is causing any problems in schools.

The New York Times joined the growing list of publications and authors suing over illegal use of their material to “train” learning machines. The Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement.

Murderbot will be coming to a streaming device near you soon. Apple TV Plus has taken it on, casting Alexander Skarsgard as the titular SecUnit. Is that casting choice controversial? What do you think?

Smithsonian Magazine gives us a tour of the heavens and what we can expect to see in January’s night skies.