59 posts tagged with 2017.
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Countries of the World, courtesy of Yakko, Rob Paulsen, and Yung Wind Boi
Yakko's World is a fine song to identify and locate the countries of the world in under two minutes, but as noted in the Genius page for the song, it's from 1993, so it's a bit dated, but also there are some errors. Rob Paulsen, the voice of Yakko himself, updated The Countries of the World song for 2017, tacking on additions and corrections at the end, where monotoning YouTuber Yung Wind Boi merged "fixes" into a 2018 edition, and cites his sources.
Some recommended SF/F from 2017
The 2017 Locus Recommended Reading List is out. Rocket Stack Rank breaks down the short fiction lists according to whether several other sources also recommended the story (e.g. Gardner Dozois, Jonathan Strahan, Neil Clarke, Jason McGregor, and Charles Payseur). Incidentally, none of the r/Fantasy "Stabby" Award winners made the Locus list, but many nominees did. Additional short fiction recommendation lists from A.C. Wise (part 1 & part 2), Maria Haskins, and forestofglory are also available. 2017 SF/F short fiction on MeFi previously, previously, previously, previously, and previously.
Some people talk to animals. Not many listen though. That's the problem.
MeFi's own Miss Cellania posted several end-of-year lists on her blog. This one is about animals. [more inside]
'2017 was not a great year for the English language'
The 2017 word of the year is youthquake (?!) and fake news and feminism and complicit and populism and Kwaussie, but also sontaku ("the pre-emptive, placatory following of an order that has not been given") and aporofobia ("peniaphobia" ("phobia of poor people")) and 初心 ("original intention or initial yearning"). ✍️ "Words of the Year" by Louis Lemand (quoted), The New Yorker. ✍️ "The worst words of 2017" (Quartz).
2017 was full of great comics, and here's where to find them
The best comics of 2017: The Verge - The 10 best comics of 2017, Wired - Extremity and 5 More of the Best Comics of 2017, Uproxx - The Best Comics Of 2017 As Selected By Dan Seitz, Polygon - Our definitive list of the best comics in 2017, The Hollywood Reporter - The Best Comics of 2017. Not linked: a lazy, insulting and arguably rather sexist list from Vice.
Mysteries, codfathers, and cuttlefish brawls
The Last Trial of the Codfather: "Since his release from prison in the 1980s, Carlos Rafael has ruthlessly run his Massachusetts seafood business with little regard for the law. But is there any other way to survive the gauntlet of restrictions on the New England fishing industry?" This feature is part of Hakai Magazine's Best of 2017. [more inside]
A sea of imprecision and lies cloaked by an authoritative UI
Jane Lytvynenko has encapsulated much of her and other folks' reporting this year in a single quiz: "If You Get 41/55 on this quiz, Fake News Didn't Fool You This Year"
Reasons to feel better about the year that was
Literally Anything Is Possible
“Yes, 2017 went off the rails. But what pushed it? We asked 29 of our favorite journalists, writers, and thinkers: What were the most important events of the past 12 months, and what were the least?” - The Morning News on the year was and wasn’t (previously)
"Aaand... commercials! Two minutes to Forrest Trump sketch..."
But the more of SNL I watched this year, the more I felt like I was watching a different show than everybody else was. I was tempted to call it the worst show of 2017, but I’m not sure that’s what I mean. It’s certainly made with a certain degree of love and affection that marks it as the work of talented people.Saturday Night Live’s current cultural cachet is built on a mirage [Todd VanDerWerff, Vox]
No, what SNL was was the emptiest show of 2017, and the fact that it was so over-praised makes me worry we’ll learn nothing at all from this particular moment in pop cultural history. And there’s no better way to talk about that emptiness than to consider just how poorly SNL handles the current occupant of the White House, even as it clearly wants to say something daring.
Cricket, football, fire and snow
"The things that make us different. Those are our superpowers."
We don`t know the half of it !
The Top Ten Ocean Stories of 2017 from the Smithsonian.
From wind turbines to massive sunfish to octopus cities, the seas proved full of surprises this year.
From wind turbines to massive sunfish to octopus cities, the seas proved full of surprises this year.
Everyone loves a clumsy owl
Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2017 The winners & runners-up in this year’s competition. Treat it like a few minutes of well earned self care.
Bennelong by-election plunges Australia's government into danger
This evening, the Australian government's fate rests with the middle-class, multicultural voters of Bennelong, an electorate covering a handful of suburbs on Sydney's lower north shore [PDF]. If the government loses the seat, they will lose their majority in the House of Representatives and have to govern in minority. Fighting to retain the seat for the Coalition government is incumbent MP John Alexander, former tennis pro, who triggered the byelection by resigning when it was revealed he was a dual British citizen, against the provisions of the Australian Constitution (previously 1 2). Trying to wrest it out of government hands is the high-profile challenger from the main opposition party Labor: American native, Sky News Australia host and former NSW premier Kristina Keneally. There's been many gaffes, much mud thrown and a lot of time, money and effort poured into the campaigns—Labor is widely expected to secure a swing to them of some magnitude, but will it be enough? We'll find out when the polls close in 60 minutes... [more inside]
"The camera is always on..."
22. Facebook wants you to send it your nudes, so it can block other people from posting those nudes as revenge porn.35 Times Privacy Was A Lie In 2017 [Katie Notopoulos, BuzzFeed]
As a revenge-porn prevention measure, you can upload your nudes to Facebook through Messenger, then Facebook will digitally scan them using machine learning and block anyone else from uploading that exact same photo. Facebook says they're not storing the photos anywhere; they'll only store a digital "hash" of it (basically a 1s and 0s version). Buuuut...at least one employee has to see the photos to moderate it and verify it's actually a nude and not like, a photo of Trump.
2017 in music: more light to fight the darkness
Music and politics have a long history and in 2017, a new chapter in their fraught and complicated relationship burst open (related, previously) .... It was a strong year for guitar rock, the best of it coming from relatively younger bands dominated by women (related).... 2017 was also a year when much beloved artists abandoned the sounds their fans first fell in love with to try something new.... There was so much more that happened in 2017 .... but let's try to wrap our heads around some of it, or at least take some time to read year-end lists, or skip the words and listen to the music. [more inside]
Struggle for the Heart of Dixie
One month ago, Alabama's sleepy special election to replace Jeff Sessions in the U.S. Senate was rocked by bombshell underage sexual assault allegations against far-right firebrand Roy Moore, lifting Democratic challenger Doug Jones into an unthinkable lead.
But after state leaders resisted calls for Moore to drop out, GOP opposition eroded, with the most toxic elements of the party eventually giving full-throated endorsement (and $$$) to the twice-impeached theocrat.
Polls showed Moore rebounding, but the unique confluence of scandal, tribalism, enthusiasm, and high stakes in this deep red state makes turnout impossible to predict.
Polls are opening now, and close at 7PM central time -- stay tuned to see if the Yellowhammer state elects a radical child abuser... or the first Democrat in a quarter century. [more inside]
Fiery the angels fell
Protest music, past and present, from Pitchfork
The Year in Protest Music 2017 -- A list of 20 urgent tracks that spoke truth to power this year. Pitchfork has had a few other lists of protest songs in the past few years: We Shall Overcomb: Music as Protest at the Women’s March (Jan. 25, 2017) and 15 Ways to Protest Trump by Buying New Music (Jan. 20, 2017), and earlier with Protest Soul: Music for Healing a Broken World (Dec. 14, 2016), Sounds of Black Protest Then and Now (Sept. 15, 2016), and The Sounds of Black Lives Matter (Oct. 17, 2016). Handy song links listed below. [more inside]
“You don’t take a photograph. You ask quietly to borrow it.”
A List of Words You Can Argue About
Featuring 374 titles and filterable on a laundry list of criteria, NPR's 2017 Book Concierge isn't the typical end-of-year best-of list. [more inside]
How Dollar General Became Rural America's Store of Choice
The more the rural U.S. struggles, company officials said, the more places Dollar General has found to prosper. “The economy is continuing to create more of our core customer,” Chief Executive Todd Vasos said in an interview. [Alternate link] [more inside]
Now We Have a Competition!
Top 25 Films of 2017: a perfectly edited video montage of David Ehrlich's annual favorites (SLVimeo). Via kottke.
Lord willing and the creek don't rise
After cathartic Democratic gains on Tuesday, 2017 awaits one last big federal contest -- Alabama's December 12th special election to fill A.G. Jeff Sessions' seat in the U.S. Senate. The normally determinative Republican primary was riven by divisions, with the controversial theocratic ex-judge Roy Moore defeating establishment-backed Luther Strange. The Democrats, meanwhile, nominated respected US attorney Doug Jones, best known for successfully prosecuting the Klansmen behind the horrific 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. Still, Moore was widely seen as the narrow favorite... until today's bombshell WaPo story in which multiple conservative women independently confirmed Moore sexually harassed them in the 70s -- some as young as 14. While the Moore campaign rejects the story as "fake news", GOP senators are abandoning him in droves, with talk of mounting a write-in campaign for primary loser Luther Strange. With just a month until election day, could deep-red Alabama elect a progressive Democrat for the first time in more than twenty years? [more inside]
What happened when my partner became prime minister?
The Taika Waititi Fan Post
Taika Waititi is a New Zealand film director, writer, actor, painter, and comedian. While you may soon be watching Waititi's latest film - Thor: Ragnarok - it's worth checking out what convinced Hollywood to bank on him. [more inside]
To complain is to be truly alive
California bans salary history requirements
The new law, banning employers from asking about salary history, goes into effect Jan 1, 2018. AB 168 also requires employers to provide the pay scale on request - no more, "tell us what you made before, and we'll tell you if you might be a candidate for the position." [more inside]
We did this.
After almost a month of coalition negotiations, 37 year old Jacinda Ardern will be New Zealand’s second-youngest Prime Minister ever. [more inside]
Always look for the helpers
California wildfires continue to rage but one doctor managed to rescue several newborn babies on his motorcycle. Devastating fires have been burning counties in Northern California for weeks now, leading to massive property destruction, death, and a healthcare crisis. New fires are cropping up in Santa Cruz County and Sausalito and Dublin. Fires have been worsened by a perfect storm of fire-favorable conditions. In addition to paid firefighters, incarcerated women are being paid $1/hour for fighting on the front lines.
Culture is a very complicated and hard thing to understand and get right
A father and a daughter driving after baseball practice. A momentary glimpse of a peacock. An ignored phone call from Mom. The Queen song “Don’t Stop Me Now.” All of these are part of Toyota’s marketing campaign for its new Camry. But which commercial you get to see may depend, in part, on what ethnicity you are.Different Ads, Different Ethnicities, Same Car
Three recent texts from alternate timelines
"The Primordial Gound" by Justin E. H. Smith (The Public Domain Review, October 2017; but reworked from earlier articles): "Klopp records that in May of 1777 Kant's ship suffered heavy damages in a storm in the South China Sea." "From The New Ecyclopedia" by Byron Landry (Conjunctions, April 2017): "Little is known about the pre-Socratic philosopher Polycyathus, and that little unlikeable: ... he believed that, of all the forms of governance, tyranny was best, because 'it breeds monuments.'" "The Doctor is Who?" by Heavy (alternatehistory.com, July 2017): "Several actors were considered to play the Second Doctor ... Peter Jeffrey, Valentine Dyall and Patrick Troughton were all approached but each declined the role."
Five Ghost Stories
"Taiya" by Vanessa Fogg (The Future Fire, 2017): "Surprisingly, Patrick doesn't seem annoyed when he hears about the ghost. He's washing dishes, his sleeves rolled up and a dishtowel draped over one shoulder. 'A taiya you said?' He doesn't look up from the suds. 'Those things don't cause any harm.'" [more inside]
Recent SF/F about Machine-Assisted Therapy
Xia Jia's story "The Psychology Game" (Clarkesworld, 10/17) contemplates a familiar sort of Turing test in a new venue: "This is a globally popular reality TV show ... The patient and the therapist are not in the same room." But she mentions Hector Levesque's "On Our Best Behaviour" / "The Winograd Schema Challenge" [PDFs] as a greater hurdle for AI. Recent news from Apple and Google suggests more near-term realities for automation. Meanwhile, David Burr Gerrard's "The Epiphany Machine" (Guernica, 2017; standalone excerpt from the novel) imagines machine-based insight from a magical realist perspective: "1. The epiphany machine will not discover anything about you that you do not, in some way, already know." [Siri, previously.]
Two short fantasies / fairy tales of architecture / urbanism
"The View from the Top of the Stair" by E. Lily Yu (Hazlitt, 2017): "Upon hearing of the death of my father ... my second thought, I am sorry to say, was that at long last I could gratify my passion for stairs." "Blue Funk" by Rikki Ducornet (Fairy Tale Review, 2006; recently posted online): "People love my city for its brasseries like hothouses, ardent and perverse, its breezes that smell of coffee and of the sea. But when I am in my blue funk I see nothing of all this."
September 19. 1985, 2017
32 years to the day after the infamous and memorable September 19, 1985 earthquake, and two weeks behind a recent one in Oaxaca called the "strongest in 100 years" , Mexico suffers a deadly earthquake that has severely affected Mexico City, plus towns in the states of Puebla, Morelos and Estado de Mexico. [more inside]
"A country of inveterate, backwoods, thick-headed, egotistic philistines
Terrorist attack confirmed in Barcelona
Van driven into crowd in heavily populated area in Barcelona today. Catalonian police confirm a terrorist attack. Updates from Mossos, Guardian, and NYTimes.
(Noted this was getting some discussion on the catch-all thread, so starting a separate one here. Mods, if inappropriate, feel free to remove).
Socialists, Tenant Farmers, Native And African Americans Against The War
"The aftermath of the rebellion was a radical change in Oklahoma politics, which included a severe crackdown on the Socialist Party of Oklahoma (which had not been involved in the Green Corn Rebellion) and the Industrial Workers of the World. There was also a crackdown on all forms of dissent against the draft and World War I, and a large scale orientation of Oklahoma politics towards the right — a major change in a state which had once had the strongest and most active Socialist Party in the USA." - Remembering The Green Corn Rebellion 100 years later with contemporary accounts, video, Oklahoma issues, and more
Michael Stipe & Douglas Coupland talks about Ego
In which Michael Stipe and Douglas Coupland talk about ego at the 2017 Heartland Festival.
Warning: contains a few NSFW moments.
Warning: contains a few NSFW moments.
A Standalone SF/F Short Story by a Well-Known Cartoonist
"Leg" by Shaenon K. Garrity (Kaleidotrope, Spring 2017): "'Why don't you look for a job as ...' the HR director searched for the right euphemism, realized none existed. 'As a leg?' Deep in its central processor, Tony's leg sighed. It had been dreading the question. Waiting for the other shoe to drop, as it were ..." The creator of Narbonic, Skin Horse, and more, Garrity has appeared on the blue for many, many reasons in the past, not least for her short fiction. More previouslies. More short fiction.
Spirits in the Medicinal World
"Remote Presence" by Susan Palwick (Lightspeed, April 2017) is an SF/F novelette that draws heavily on the author's experience as a spiritual-care volunteer in an ER: "Every three years, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations conducted a weeklong on-site accreditation survey of each hospital in the country. The survey was thorough, merciless, and struck apocalyptic terror into hospital administrators ... Roxanne blew out a sharp breath. 'We can't have revenants in the building. That's one of the requirements.'" Spiritual Care Volunteers: A Training Resource [PDF] is a manual produced by NHS Wales that offers more practical insight into healthcare chaplaincy.
SF/F by Emerging Writers via The White Review's 2017 Prize Shortlist
"The Critic of Tombs" by Ethan Davison: "Emilia came to Tombs in the twelfth year of the interregnum. It was the first time in history a critic had been assigned to the city. A chilly place split over the St. Laurent, it is very small as cities go, even in the north, and not much accustomed to visits by anyone important." "The Refugee" by Kristen Gleason (winning story for the US & Canada): "Brian Ed waited outside the ration house. Merlijn took his time coming to the door, and opened it slowly. Brian Ed raised his hand and waved. Merlijn smiled an embarrassed smile and held up four fingers. 'No rations until four o'clock, Brian Ed.'" The full list.
A Semi-Autobiographical SF/F Mystery Novella
"And Then There Were (N - One)" by Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny, March/April 2017): "... Four months later, I flew to Nova Scotia, took a bus to a seaside town too small for a dot on a map, boarded a ferry to Secord Island, and stepped through the waiting portal into an alternate-reality resort hotel lobby swarming with ..." Q&A with the author. [more inside]
Ten Recent SF/F Short Stories about Love
"Upgrades" by Barry Charman (Daily Science Fiction, 2/14/2017): "The robots kept their rendezvous, and held hands beneath the bridge. This wasn't supposed to happen, they knew, but only the moon could see them, and it wouldn't tell." [more inside]
Whether Tokyo residents can choose another destination remains unknown
"The X Prize Is Now Backing Sci-Fi Like It Backs IRL Science" [Wired]: "Starting [6/28/2017], 22 new science fiction stories go live on the Seat14C website, courtesy of genre luminaries like Margaret Atwood and Charlie Jane Anders. Each story details the future from the perspective of a different passenger on a plane that traveled through a wormhole 20 years into the future." [more inside]
"That should keep the Americans preoccupied for a while."
The Spring 2017 issue of Big Echo features five literary responses to the short fiction of Arthur C. Clarke. Among them is Vajra Chandrasekera's short story "The Negation of the Negation of the Negation," which builds on the events of Clarke's well-known story "The Nine Billion Names of God" (HTML; PDF).
Titanic at Cherbourg
Art's Titanic Model. The. Most. Amazing. Titanic. Model. To. Date.
Let it snow, let it snow...
Finnish spring weather has been exceptionally miserable and cold this year. It's getting so unbelievable that even weather forecasters are having trouble keeping a straight face while delivering the bad news. Here's Pekka Pouta trying to get through his morning forecast.
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