The Great Geek Manual

1906
The Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur, are granted a US patent for their “new and useful improvements in Flying Machines”. (US No. 821,393) It is the first airplane patent in the US.

1925
Tokyo Broadcasting Station becomes the first Japanese radio broadcaster. Later in the year it will move to Atagoyama, where it will begin regular transmission.

1930
An audience at Proctor’s Theatre in Schenectady becomes the first to see closed-circuit television projected onto a big screen.
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Film

• Popular Mechanics explains How Old School Effects Brought Schwarzenegger’s T-800 Back from 1983. (Spoilers)
• VideoHound presents its list of Seven Things We Want From Star Trek 2.

Internet

• Klingon for Beginners.
• The Terminator Wiki has a complete directory of every Terminator of the Franchise. There have probably been more than you think.

Literature

• Free Fiction: Listen to “End Game” by Nancy Kress at Escape Pod.
• Free Fiction: Read an anthology of Michael Moorcock stories at the Suvudu Library.
• Free Fiction: Read “Crimes and Glory” by Paul J. McAuley at Subterranean.
• Free Fiction: Read “Last Son of Tomorrow” by Greg van Eekhout at Tor.com.
• Free Fiction: Read “TVA Baby: by Terry Bisson at Tor.com.
• The Guardian explains How Ursula K Le Guin led a generation away from realism.
• Notes from the Geek Show discusses the question of What is Literary Fiction?

Television

• Check out the trailer for the new V TV series from ABC. It looks less hokey than the original, but that ain’t saying much.
• Here’s a good question. Why is Kirk mythic while Picard isn’t?

The first trailer for the live-action adaptation of Robert Venditti’si graphic novel, Surrogates, staring Bruce Willis, hit the web today. It looks something like Die Hard meets I, Robot.

The film takes place in the future in which high-tech surrogates (androids) allow people to live their lives remotely through unflawed robotic versions of themselves in order to experience life without consequences. When a college student linked to the man who developed surrogate technology dies while using the technology, FBI agents are called in to investigate the murder, which is the first seen in fifteen years.

I hardly think we need another Bruce Willis cop flick, but here’s hoping that the intriguing concept will carry the story. Either that, or this is going to be the Babylon A.D. of 2009. Surrogates is set to open September 29th.

Check out the Surrogate BlogSpot for behind-the-scenes photos and movie posters.

From Around the Web

Build you Own Recession Special – PC Magazine walks readers through the parts and components necessary to build a “surprisingly robust” system for only four hundred dollars.

Duck Duck Go – A new search engine that can recognize special category pages, calculations, phone numbers, zip codes, ISBN numbers, product codes, as well as street and IP adresses. It’s displays about five of the most relevant sites to prevent info overload, and does a pretty good job keeping them relevant.

Five Reasons Why Humanoid Robots Will Someday Fight Our Wars – Robots are officially on the battlefield—UAVs like the Predator and Reaper patrol the skies while militarized bomb-disposal robots like the Talon detonate explosives on the ground. But where are the humanoids? Roboticist and author Daniel H. Wilson makes the case for a humanoid robot army.

Mozilla Labs Jetpack – Mozilla has released an experimental program, Jetpack, that allows anyone who can build a web page to build a Firefox add-on. This means that if you only know HTML, you can build simple extensions for the popular browser. Jetpack also supports CSS design and Javascript.

The Quad-Core, 1-kW, Liquid-Cooled Desk – Popular Mechanics outlines the construction of a serious cool desk that contains its own computer.

Research Show Robots Forming Human-like Societies – A lone group of Swiss scientists have been using scattered LEDs, neural circuity, and an army of miniature robots to explore the very basis of good and evil. No, you aren’t reading the back cover of a DVD in the “one dollar each, please get this trash out of our store” bin of your local blockbuster -this research is very real and very, very awesome.
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The great books are not merely a record of civilization, but the most potent civilizing force in the world today.

- Mortimer J. Adler

1853
The world’s first public aquarium, the Aquatic Vivarium, is opened at Regent’s Park, in London, England. Read more about the Aquatic Vivarium.

1873
The New York Times publishes a proposal for a “travelling sidewalk” to accommodate pedestrian traffic along Broadway in New York City. The transport system consists of two sidewalks, one running in each direction at a speed of nineteen miles an hour. The design will never be implemented, but in 1893, a moving sidewalk of similar design will be built for the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. This later design will feature four sidewalks, two running in each direction at speeds of 3 mph and 6 mph for easier boarding.

1877
A demonstration of a mobile telephone system for trains is given at the Pennsylvania Railroad Company manufacturing facility at employees of Alexander Graham Bell.

1927
The Spirit of St. Louis, the plane of Charles Lindbergh touches down at Le Bourget Field in Paris, France, completing the world’s first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean.

1928
Walt Disney files a trademark application for his character, Mickey Mouse, with the United States Patent Office.
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Art

• OddFae presents this Monster under Glass, titled “Steampunk Oddfae.”
• Stéfan’s Stormtroopers 365 is an awesome Flickr stream featuring everyone’s favorite action figure in a variety of fun poses.

Film

• Colin, a British zombie movie that cost just £45 to make has become a hit at the Cannes Film Festival.
• The Future of Classic blog remembers Actors who were Miniaturized.
• A side-by-side Comparison of Terminator 2 and 3 reveals an enormous number of similarities.
• SciFiCool names Sci-Fi’s Top 5 Toughest Gals

Internet

• io9 explains How to Turn a Robot Evil, In Nine Easy Steps, to which I would add (from Asimov): “Prove humanity is incapable of caring for itself.”
• io9 counts down Science Fiction’s ten most murderous robots.
• LiveScience names 5 Reasons to Fear Robots.

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Movie: “Angels & Demons”
Director: Ron Howard

Rating: Rated PG-13 for sequences of violence, disturbing images and thematic material.
Release: May 15, 2009
Running Time: 2 hrs 18 min
Starring: Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer… IMDB listing

Verdict:

Like most films based on a good book, Angels & Demons looses something in the translation.

Part of the difficulty is that much of the fascination with the book lies in its lapses into trivia-laden infotainment, all of which is sacrificed to time considerations in the film. Another problem is that the pacing of the book, which Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon through a frantic day-long race against time, simply can’t be replicated in a two hour film. A film simply can’t convey the passage of time and the wearying of characters the same way a novel can.

I would judge that, had I not read the book, Angels & Demons would have compared favorably with National Treasure, which had the advantage of not being held up to the expectations of legions of readers. As it stands, however, this adaptation falls flat for me as a Dan Brown reader, and I expect it will disappoint other readers as well. As such, I advise fellow readers to save their money and rent this film when it comes out on DVD.

For those who have not yet read the novel, this is an implausible but face-paced mystery that provides a nice break from the run-of-the mill explosions and gun play of Hollywood’s summer fare. It improves significantly on the DaVinci Code and has the added bonus of being set against the stunning backdrop of Vatican City. If you’re into mysteries, go see, if not, take a pass.

Synopsis:

When the Vatican police approach symbologist Robert Langdon as he’s doing laps in the Harvard pool, the last thing he expects is to face a vast conspiracy, but as the clues present themselves one by one, he’s confronted by the inevitable conclusion that the ancient brotherhood of the Illuminati has finally resurfaced to take its revenge against the Catholic church once and for all. Four Cardinals have been kidnapped from the heart of Rome, and a a container of “highly combustible” anti-matter – enough to level the Vatican – has been hidden somewhere in the city. Now, Langdon must join forces with physicist Vittoria Vetra, whose research partner was killed for the anti-matter to prevent disaster. Together, the pair race through the city following the clues left by the Illuminati’s founders to discover the long lost four alters of science in time to save four kidnapped Cardinals and uncover canister of anti-matter before midnight. But they soon find themselves hampered by unbelieving security forces, a skill assassin, and an unknown collaborator.
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