Weekend Linkee-poo before the weekend is out

Happy Fall everyone. Yea, I didn't notice either.

"… well, it’s ungracious to begrudge the old familiar place its newfound good fortune, just because it isn’t exactly the way it was when we found it all those years ago." Dr Doyle with the "before it was cool" argument as it pertains to SF/F. Wait, SF/F is popular?

Tobias Buckell reflects on the fact that most of our "far future dreams" are now almost a century old. So while I'm on record as being a heretic about some of these (such as human level AI and post-human fantasies), I do agree it's time for new ideas. But that's the rub, ain't it, while we like to claim how SF is all futuristic, it general deals with current (or past) problems projected on a set that has the trapping of an increasingly pie-in-the-sky future model.

"You fail only if you stop writing." Something I try to keep in mind. As I've said recently (not here) about the reboot, if I fail, I want to fail for trying, not fail for not trying.

Horse feathers, you say? Dinosaur feathers, I say. Stuck in amber and (re)discovered. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

"She was a professor?" On the plight of the adjunct professor (who are probably teaching the majority of classes in US colleges and universities these days), abject poverty and no respect from the administration, for whom they help balance the budget. If you think this is a rare case, think again. Full disclosure, my wife is an adjunct professor and despite her actual working tenure being much longer than most full-time professors at the places she teaches, is never considered for the full-time positions that come available. What's not said in the article is that adjuncts across the country are having their course loads cut because "of Obamacare." See, part of the ACA requires employers to evaluate how much time per week an employee actually works. And, as a surprise to no one but the collegiate administration, their "part-time" employees have long worked more than full-time hours. Well, the new law says they then need to offer health care. So to avoid paying health care (or, say, creating more full-time positions), they just cut them back to one class a semester (which increases their costs to maintain a larger employment pool and the turn-over that entails). (Grokked from Dr. Phil)

~The nine thought experiments that might keep you up at night. But maybe not (maybe that's the tenth, secret thought experiment going on here). (Grokked from Tor.com)

Those neighbor kids bothering you with playing their ZZ Top too loud? Then what you need is a 16' tall AT-ST, conveniently for sale. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

SF not your cup of tea? Okay, how about a 30' robotic, fire-brething dragon to teach those kids a lesson? (Grokked from Jim Hines)