The Great Geek Manual

1630
Popcorn is introduced to the Pilgrims by an Indian named Quadequina, who delivered it to them in deerskin bags as his contribution to the first Thanksgiving dinner. Indians had been growing popcorn for more than a thousand years before the arrival of European colonists.

1774
The English House of Lords rules that authors do not have perpetual copyright.

1828
German biochemist Friederich Wohler informs Jakob Berzelius that he has synthesized the organic chemical, urea, which was formerly found only in urine. This marks the first time that a chemical produced only by living organisms has ever been synthesized.

1912
National Cash Registers (NCR) becomes the first company ever prosecuted under US antitrust laws. When the company is found guilty of having violated the Sherman Antitrust Act, its top executive, including Thomas J. Watson (who will later found IBM), are sentenced to a year in prison. Antitrust laws will later play a significant role in the computer and telecommunications industries. Visit the official NCR website.
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Now that the thrill of our hyper-connected existence is gone, virtual life has become a depressing daily grind. We toil late into the night, unleashing an endless stream of status updates and tweets in a desperate attempt to keep ourselves relevant, desirable and in. There’s an ominous irony in FarmVille, a Facebook application that enables users to build and maintain a virtual farm. It’s more than a game: It’s an allegory. Virtual existence is feudalism for the modern age. Those who hold the information are kings and those of us toiling in the virtual fields are the servile peasantry: selling our souls for the mind-numbing comfort of an online existence.

… It turns out virtual life is less about connectivity than self-branding.

… Bleak, shallow and repetitive, virtual life seems increasingly less worth living. Users are beginning to realize that it’s not leisure, it’s work that borders on servitude.

- “Bleak, Shallow and Repetitive” by Irene Angelopoulos, February 16, 2010.
Originally published by Adbusters.

Book: Hidden Empire
ISBN-13: 978-0765320049

Author: Orson Scott Card
Series: Sequel to Empire
Publisher: Tor Books
Genre: Science Fiction
Release: Dec. 22, 2009
Length: 336 pages (Hardcover)

Rating: C- (65 / 100)

Verdict

Though this book is marketed as a tie-in to the 2009 video game Shadow Complex, Hidden Empire bears more resemblance to Card’s Mormon fiction Seventh Son than to the epic science fiction of Ender’s Game. It’s three hundred pages of overly-simple characters facing philosophical dilemmas punctuated by infrequent action sequences that lack any emotional punch.

Long-time fans of Card’s work may enjoy another nostalgic taste of their favorite childhood author, but most readers are going to be disappointed by this flaccid, heavy-handed morality tale too dull to be considered science fiction and too pedantic to be called a political thriller.

Pros: Intriguing underlying concept. Extremely contemporary setting. Great quotes.

Cons: Preachy. Heavy-handed with the politics. Overly-simple characters. Distinct lack of action sequences. Disappointing ending.

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1804
The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes is tested at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales, on what is normally a horse-drawn tramline. The engine is able to pull a load of fifteen tons at a speed of about five miles per hour. However, adhesion is a problem. The iron wheels slip on the iron rails and the the cast-iron rails of the tramways are not strong enough to support the weight of the new machine. The experiment will soon be abandoned.

1858
The first electrical burglar alarm is installed in the US by inventor Edwin T. Holmes in Boston, Massachusetts. When a door or window is opened, a spring is released, closing an electrical circuit.

1875
Jeanne Calment is born. Calment will live for 122 years and 164 days, which will be the longest confirmed lifespan of any human being in history.

1878
The first telephone book is issued in New Haven, Connecticut by the New Haven Telephone Company. It lists twenty-one names.
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People know many things, and half of them are wrong. If only we knew which half, we’d have reason to be proud of our intelligence. What is knowledge? A belief that is shared by all the respectable people in a community, whether there is any real evidence for it or not. What is faith? A belief that we expect other people to argue with. What is scientific fact? An oxymoron. Science does not deal in facts. It deals in hypotheses, which are never fully and finally correct.

- Hidden Empire by Orson Scott Card, 2009.
Chapter: Brave Boys

If I ever design a super-bunker to ride out the apocalypse, this is exactly what it would look like. Except, maybe I’d have a few aisles’ worth of Oreos stacked about. I wouldn’t survive very long, mind you, but I would enjoy myself while I lasted.

Source: “Stockholm Library interior” by Olivier Charles

Art

• Adam Crowe offers this timeline of 20th Century Art movements.
• Fandomania has posted a gallery of Alien fan art gathered from around Deviant Art.
• Neoseeker has posted a gallery of Mass Effect 2 concept art.

Film

• Interview: In Contention talks with the minds behind Coraline, Neil Gaiman and Henry Selick in separate audio tracks.
• Check out this awesome Aliens vs Predator infographic. This is what infographics are for!
• Daily Mail has compiled a list of the Pixar’s in-jokes found in Up.
• MovieLine names 9 Islands Schlockier Than Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island.
• SciFi Squad names The Top Ten Mainstream Directors Gone Sci-Fi.

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1792
US President George Washington signs the Postal Service Act, creating the United States Postal Service. Under the act, letters can be delivered within thirty miles for six cents and within one hundred fifty miles for twelve and a half cents.

1937
The first successful automobile-airplane hybrid, the Arrowbile, is completed. Its first flight will take place the next day, February 21, 1937. The vehicle has a top speed of 120mph in the air and 70mph on the ground. The Arrowbile was designed by aeroengineer Waldo Dean Waterman and five were built by the Westerman Arrowplane Corporation of Santa Monica, California. The Studebaker Corporation, which supplied the hundred horsepower engines, will eventually take delivery of the Arrowbiles. Read more about Waldo Waterman.

1943
American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies.
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