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Strong are we with the Force, but not that strong

SMOF.ca — Wed, 08 May 2013 18:21:04 +0000

Statistics Canada’s release of information on the religious affiliations of Canadians taken from the National Household Survey of 2011 show the number of people identifying as Jedi has dropped from over 20,000 five years earlier to around 9,000 now. This follows a general worldwide decline in the number of observant Jedi reporting as such to statistics bureaus. Whether the numbers jump again following the planned release of Star Wars Episode VII in 2015 is also a matter of speculation. The number of self-identified Jedi in Canada still outnumbers Zoroastrians (6,130), Scientologists (1,745), Rastafarians (1,055) and Satanists (1,050).

Aurora Award Nominations Announced!

SMOF.ca — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 05:15:58 +0000

Nominations for the 2013 Aurora Awards have been announced with a large slate of nominees in each category. Voting opens on 6 May 2013 and will continue until noon Friday 13 September 2013. The awards will be handed out at Canvention 33, to be held this year in conjunction with Can-Con in Ottawa, 4 – 6 October 2013.

The nominees are:

Best Novel – English

Destiny’s Fall by Marie Bilodeau, Dragon Moon Press
Food for the Gods by Karen Dudley, Ravenstone Books
Healer’s Sword: Part 7 of the Okal Rel Saga by Lynda Williams, EDGE
The Silvered by Tanya Huff, DAW Books, Inc.
Thunder Road by Chadwick Ginther, Ravenstone Books
Triggers by Robert J. Sawyer, Penguin Canada

Best YA Novel – English

Above by Leah Bobet, Arthur A. Levine Books/Scholastic
The Calling by Kelley Armstrong, Harper Teen
Dissolve by Neil Godbout, Bundoran Press
Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero by Michell Plested, Five Rivers
Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow, TOR Teen
Under My Skin: Wildlings Series (Book 1) by Charles de Lint, Razorbill Canada

Best Short Fiction – English

“Delta Pi” by Matt Moore, Torn Realities, Post Mortem Press
“Happily Ever After” by Marie Bilodeau, When the Villain Comes Home, Dragon Moon Press
“Knights Exemplar” by Al Onia, On Spec #90, Fall
“Synch Me, Kiss Me, Drop” by Suzanne Church, Clarkesworld, Issue #68, May
“The Walker of the Shifting Borderland” by Douglas Smith, On Spec #90, Fall

Best Poem/Song – English

“A sea monster tells his story” by David Clink, The Literary Review of Canada, July/August
“The Ghosts of Birds” by Helen Marshall, Phantom Drift 2: Valuable Estrangements, Wordcraft of Oregon
“Hold Fast” by Leah Bobet, Strange Horizons, June 11, 2012
“Roc” by Sandra Kasturi, Come Late to the Love of Birds, Tightrope Books
“Zombie Descartes Writes a Personal Ad” by Carolyn Clink, Tesseracts Sixteen, EDGE

Best Graphic Novel – English

Goblins by Tarol Hunt, webcomic
Looking for Group by Ryan Sohmer and Lar DeSouza, webcomic
Raygun Gothic by GMB Chomichuk, Alchemical Press
Weregeek by Alina Pete, webcomic
West of Bathurst by Kari Maaren, webcomic

Best Related Work – English

Shanghai Steam edited by Ace Jordyn, Calvin D. Jim, and Renée Bennett, EDGE
Imaginarium 2012: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing edited by Sandra Kasturi and Halli Villegas, ChiZine Publications
Hair Side, Flesh Side by Helen Marshall, ChiZine Publications
Blood and Water edited by Hayden Trenholm, Bundoran Press
On Spec published by the Copper Pig Writers’ Society

Best Artist

Richard Bartrop, illustrations for fiction on Reality Skimming blog
GMB Chomichuk, Raygun Gothic, Alchemical Press
Costi Gurgu, cover art for Inner Diverse, (Starfire World Syndicate)
Michelle Milburn, cover art for Gathering Storm and Healer’s Sword, (EDGE)
Erik Mohr, cover art for ChiZine Publications

Best Fan Publication

BCSFAzine, edited by Felicity Walker
Broken Toys, edited by Taral Wayne
In Places Between: The Robyn Herrington Short Story Contest, edited by Renée Bennett
Reality Skimming blog, content coordinator Michelle Carraway
Space Cadet, edited by R. Graeme Cameron
Speculating Canada blog, edited by Derek Newman-Stille

Best Fan Filk

Morva Bowman and Alan Pollard, Concert at FilKONtario 22
Debs & Errol (Deborah Linden and Errol Elumir), Songs in the Key of Geek CD
Brooke Lunderville, International Guest of Honour Concert at Consonance
Kari Maaren, Body of Work
Peggi Warner-Lalonde, Concert at NEFilk 22 ConCertino 2012

Best Fan Organizational

Andrew Gurudata, Organizing the Constellation Awards, Toronto
Evelyn Baker, Amy De Ruyte, and Peter Halasz, Executive Committee of WFC Toronto, 2012
Sandra Kasturi, Helen Marshall, and, James Bambury, Co-Chairs, Chiaroscuro Reading Series, Toronto
Sandra Kasturi and Laura Marshall. Co-Chairs, Toronto SpecFic Colloquium: Beyond the Human
Randy McCharles, Chair and Programming, When Words Collide, Calgary

Best Fan Related Work

Ron Friedman, conception and delivery of the Aurora Awards voter package
Helen Marshall, “The Book is Dead; Long Live the Book!”: Some Thoughts on the Coming of eBooks, lecture at the 2012 Toronto SpecFic Colloquium
Michael Matheson, compilation and maintenance of the Can Spec Fic List
Lloyd Penney, for fanwriting and letter and article writing for fanzines and e-fanzines
Peter Watts, “Hive Minds, Mind Hives” lecture at Toronto SpecFic Colloquium

Gordon Bennett

SMOF.ca — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 15:58:51 +0000

Engineers at Cambridge university have developed a program that simulates text and facial expressions based on a human actress. The program is currently used to help the deaf read lips and autistic children recognize emotional cues, but the developers say it could also be turned into a kind of electronic personal assistant. The fact that the program looks remarkably like Holly the computer from the science fiction comedy series Red Dwarf was not lost on reporters. That the actress’ last name is Lister is also worth noting.

The Commanding Office View

SMOF.ca — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 06:13:48 +0000

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, already the darling of social media with his regular tweets and photographs sent from the International Space Station, today took command of the station for the duration of Expedition 35. In a transfer-of-command ceremony, outgoing NASA commander Kevin Ford played O Canada, calling attention to the fact that Hadfield will be the first commander of the station who is not either a NASA astronaut nor a Russian Federal Space Agency cosmonaut. Hadfield, already used to high-profile chats with terrestrial well-wishers, was congratulated by both Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Queen.

Blue Sky On Mars?

SMOF.ca — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 03:01:31 +0000

NASA’s Curiosity rover has shown evidence that Mars was once capable of supporting life, though they haven’t found evidence of any yet. A drilling sample taken from the soil in Yellowknife Bay, the region of Mars the rover is exploring, shows that the area was once a body of water with a sandy clay bottom and not too salty, acidic or oxidizing for bacteria to survive. The area of Mars was named Yellowknife Bay after the Canadian city in recognition of its geological links in exploring the oldest rocks in North America.

One hit, one near miss.

SMOF.ca — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 18:22:55 +0000

One meteor strike and one near miss in the last week have made it very interesting to look up and wonder what’s going to come hurtling down at you.
A meteor that exploded over Russia on 15 February 2013 with the estimated force of 20 Hiroshima-sized bombs caused more than 33 million dollars of damage, including some 200,000 square metres of glass windows. The blast also injured more than 1,100 people, mostly from glass sent hurtling inwards by the shockwave. Meanwhile, the same day, another asteroid approximately 45 metres in diameter and 130,000 tonnes passed by Earth closer than orbiting communications satellites. Had it hit, it was estimated to do some significant damage as well. Of course, the chances of another large extinction-causing event happening in our lifetimes remains infinitesimal, but the universe has a way of reminding us that a good, well-funded space program is probably in our best interests, and soon.

Seventeen Billion Strange New Worlds

SMOF.ca — Sat, 09 Feb 2013 01:18:10 +0000

Scientists using data from the Kepler spacecraft have estimated that the Milky Way galaxy holds seventeen billion planets approximately the same size as Earth. As yet, however, none have been found in their star’s “Goldilocks Zone” where the surface temperature is neither too hot nor too cold and liquid water could exist.