The show clearly shows Murderbot as being ACE and uncomfortable with the sexual and gendered reactions of others towards them — which is as important in my view the outward and physical apparent gender.

There’s absolutely no incentive to log in to YouTube now that subscriptions and bells do nothing to control your feed. End stage enshittification.

There’s currently an Redexit of Canadians who are looking to get off US-controlled social media.

Lemmy.ca has had a huge spike in enrolment as it’s the one that was most prominently promoted in r/BuyCanadian. Apparently, it’s had over 9k signups in the past day.

This is also raising questions of foreign interference/influence in democratic process.

In Canada, the federal Elections Commissioner has been called on to investigate the source of bot campaigns for the leading opposition party: Online bot campaign backing Pierre Pollievre prompts call for probe.

Startide Rising is the best of them all.

Sundiver is quite good too.

The later books were deeply marred by Brin’s giving into pressure from his editors to centre them on a group of adolescent males of diverse species because his publisher was of the view that the average scientific fiction reader was a 14 year old male. Brin has written about this and how difficult it was for him to write outside his natural quite adult style. His fantastic characters from Startide Rising are pushed into the background and only get to step forward and shine again at the very end.

I’ve recently become aware of mulesing, an appalling practice used on Merino sheep in Australia and NZ due to a specific fly problem. The problem is that most merino wool is from those countries.

Also, most fabric generically labeled ‘wool’ is mostly merino from mulesinged sheep.

Ethics conscious knitters, crocheters and weavers are aware, and merino yarns certified as mulesing-free are on the market now.

Knowing country of origin and wool type is another reliable way to avoid endorsing this practice, but again most manufactured clothing or even fabrics will not give the necessary information.

Yoon Ha Lee really plays with fun math concepts. Great stuff. The Ninefox trilogy was a real entry point for me to begin to appreciate Korean mythology.

Yup, lack of advanced science concepts and an accumulation of errors despite a pretension to working problems for the audience.

Even some basic geography errors - early in the book, he claims that the sample had to be landed in Saskatchewan for a high latitude to match the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Baikonur is at 45 N latitude, about the same as the border between North and South Dakota. Everywhere in Saskatchewan is North of the 49th parallel and south of 60. Sigh.

I have to say that I just don’t get the hype about this book.

Project Hail Mary is really targeted at a middle grade reading and maturity level. I would have happily given it to our kids to read in middle grade (as I did The Martian).

It’s a Robinson Crusoe meets a buddy in space boys-own-adventure tale (although Weir insists on male gendering a hermaphrodite when ‘they/them’ is well understood). There are clear indications that the story was told to pull in immature readers - starting with the ludicrous scene where Grace has spent days waiting for zero G without stowing any of his lab equipment or supplies.

It’s a compellingly written ‘work the problem’ read but anything beyond high school science concepts isn’t really there. Once again, I feel like we’re seeing more overhyped STEM based on concepts that haven’t advanced beyond what a mid 20th century bachelors degree would cover.

It held my attention as an easy read while fighting a bug, I can’t see picking up another of his books for myself.

There are a few very odd ‘too much information’ references to sexual relationships and use of alcohol that seem almost awkwardly placed to bump up the level, but there’s not really enough in there to even warrant the ‘school edition’ treatment that ‘The Martian’ got. Otherwise nothing stretches past middle grade emotional maturity.

All told, I was expecting more.

Working through ‘Ten Low’ by Stark Holburn now. My partner is through the sequel already and recommended.

Love Scalzi but wish he could vary his voice more. I find I have to spread out reading his books as the snark will all blur after a while.

The orgy in The Diamond Age isn’t much better.

Stephenson got a pass on a lot of his weird stuff.

I found The Sea of Tranquility a bit dry but whimsical nonetheless.

In a genre overburdened by books with two dimensional characters and core dumps of exposition, it was an interesting puzzle but it also isn’t making me want to reread it either. 7.5 or 8.

Hugely disappointed by The Diamond Age after Snow Crash. It really lost the plot.

Well, I appreciate that perspective as long as the definition of science fiction doesn’t get so narrow that it has to fit within the scientific knowledge of a person with a bachelor’s in physics in 1975 - which it sometimes seems to.

My point is that it’s worth discussing early. That way the Sidebar can be clear, and the mods can do their thing and the rest of the members can avoid gatekeeping.

Personally, I can take or leave the wild science of Silver Age Superman comics, or Marvel. I’m not sure why anyone would consider that to be any more fantasy than Star Wars or Farscape however.

Strange New Worlds is marvellously strong this season. I’ll also watch anything Star Trek in first run but it’s appointment television this season.

I watched Silo and liked it. Read Wool, the first book, after the season finale and found the characters thin, 2D.

I picked up the remastered DVD set of the 1970s show the Star Lost because Silo reminded me of its premise somewhat. I’m working through them.

Sorry no, it never was good. I couldn’t get through the first season even.

It had some potential. Knowing the first seasons of Star Trek are often the weakest, I gave it a solid try. But no.

I’d rather watch the second season of Space 1999 than any Andromeda if we’re looking for benchmarks of good concepts badly delivered.

In July, I finished The Lords of Uncreation (and therefore the Final Architect trilogy) by Adrian Tchaikovsky, read the newest Lee and Miller Liaden novel Salvage Right when it arrived, then zoomed through Wool, the first of the Silo books.

Currently, I’m reading a Star Trek novel Agents of Influence by Dayton Ward. It’s a sequel to the excellent Vanguard and Seeker series set in Star Trek’s 23rd century. Not sure what’s next.

Thanks for volunteering. I appreciate the change in the community guidelines towards being more welcoming and informative.

A question and some observations, and a suggestion …

What is this community willing to consider as on topic?

The sidebar says this is a place to discuss all things sci-fi but the community name is ‘science fiction.’

‘Sci-fi’ is often considered to encompass all of speculative fiction including horror and fantasy.

‘Science fiction’ can be defined more narrowly. In the old subreddit for sci-fi books, as an example, the discussion could be captured by those who insisted that only classic, hard science fiction, or fiction based on currently established science theory, was science fiction. There seemed to be a fair bit of gatekeeping of more popular franchises or works that involved more speculative science. There was a great deal of dismissiveness from some users about anything with faster than light travel. It made it challenging to have more wide ranging discussions.

My own preference would be for a big tent sci-fi community that embraces all the different permutations of the genres, and allows for the mashups.

If the intent is to go with that big tent speculative fiction definition, in the spirit of being open and welcoming, it would be helpful to be yet more clear in the sidebar on this point.

In case you weren’t already aware, fan-favourite Star Trek tie-in fiction author shared the script credit for Only a Paper Moon.

His other DS9 script credit is for Starship Down.

If you haven’t tried Mack’s tie-in novels, you’re missing some of the best.