Random Articles - RAW 160304

The weekend is here so you may wish to kick it off  with the last article on this list 3 Reasons to Keep Your Laptop Closed This Weekend, it's a good rationale for enjoying what we have been given.

If you have time why not look through some of my own articles, my latest one is on Spiderman and the Christian life.  I have another one on the Incredible Hulk and the Christian life coming out in two weeks time.  A quick review on the new Sliding Void book, Anomalous Thrust by Stephen Hunt has been getting a lot of attention, have a read if you haven't already.  You may also be interested in one from the Dusty Shelves archives, that I've recently re-titled Creating Beats Consuming to reflect the content better.

So sit back with your favourite beverage and enjoy.

Helen Garner learns of $207,000 literary prize win after checking junk email

Australian writer Helen Garner first learned she was the recipient of a US$150,000 (A$207,633) literary prize after reading an email in her junk folder. Garner told the Sydney Morning Herald that when she read the email sent from someone at Yale University who had “good news” and wanted her phone number, she thought it was a hoax. Only after checking with her publisher and contacting the university was she able to confirm she had, indeed, won their Windham-Campbell prize for writers. Read more...

Abundance versus scarcity: Of e-books, fabbers, and James Burke 

 I’ve come across some more recent predictions of his, concerning the future of scarcity. Given the way scarcity works with regard to e-books, it brings me to realize we may have even more interesting times facing us in a few decades. Back in 1973 Burke made some surprisingly forward-looking predictions about how the world might look in twenty to thirty years from then. Some of those predictions were pretty inaccurate, but others were remarkably close.  Read more...

Axel Scheffler: the Gruffalo wouldn't exist without UK in EU

The German illustrator and creative partner of Julia Donaldson has written that their collaborations would have been impossible in a less open Europe. Axel Scheffler, the illustrator of the Gruffalo and Stick Man in Julia Donaldson’s books, has warned against a Brexit, saying that without the EU, the hugely popular children’s tales would never have existed.  Read more...

Latest e-reader numbers show how skewed AAP ebook figures are

The latest eMarketer data on U.S. e-reader usage – already covered by Chris Meadows – provides some interesting perspective on those much-vaunted Association of American Publishers (AAP) figures showing a static U.S. ebook market. Because, if dedicated e-readers really have held their ground against generic tablets in the U.S., and are still growing their user numbers, then how come AAP is reporting a static or shrinking ebook market? Read more...

The White House Wants To Use Science Fiction To Settle The Solar System

Earlier this month, the White House’s Office of Science and Technology assembled a strange gathering: scientists, artists, engineers, and policy-makers, for a workshop designed to imagine how humanity could settle the solar system. Read more...

Nab One of NASA’s Exotic Space Posters For Free - now.space

As humans continue to probe space for signs of life, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) had a little fun imagining space’s distant lands as actual travel destinations. The whimsical posters were designed to have a retro feel, and you can download them for free to print at home, or buy them at the JPL store. Read more...

3 Reasons to Keep Your Laptop Closed This Weekend

The weekend gives most of us the chance to downshift and recharge. But how often do we seize on it to catch up or get ahead on our work instead? Slow down and imagine what could happen if we resisted the temptation. If you’re driven like I am, you have more projects than time. It’s easy to think of downtime as simply another opportunity to get more things done. But downtime is crucial, and there’s more evidence every day that it’s essential to our productivity and wellbeing. Read more...

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