November 1998

New Blood

New Recruits to the Info Alert since last time include Tina Jafari and
Marc Hunter from Houston; Danny L. Cooper from close at hand in League
City; A.T.Campbell from across the state in Austin; Hugh McCall III from
the somewhat frozen northlands of Piedmont, South Carolina; and Jim Morris
from the seriously frozen halfway to the pole northlands of Winnebago,
Minnesota. Welcome aboard and thanks for signing up.

We assume that the previously mentioned A. T. Campbell is identical to the
one who (among (many) other things) once edited the monthly publication of
the Fandom Association of Central Texas, The FACT Sheet, the last issue
which was published to the Web in mid 97. Though in fact (no pun
intended) the print version still comes out today.
The FACT Sheet - http://www.fact.org/fact-sheet/ .

Artists on the Web

Patti Prevett, an early Info-Alert recruit, is a Space/Science Fiction
artist extraodinaire. Her Web page provides background on her media and
technique as well as a mini-history of her connection with art shows and
conventions and a listing of various places where her artwork has
appeared. She even includes a link to our (Friends of Fandom) Web page.
(Thanks Patti.) (We are not sure how she or her daughter accomplished it
but the last time we looked at her page, even though it was on the
Geocities site, it didn't have one of those annoying Geocities pop-ups).
The real pull of her Web page, however comes from the small pieces of art
that adorn the left hand side and bottom. One word - Wow. Patti accepts
commissions and anyone looking for a Christmas present for me need look no
further. (hint hint!)
Patti Prevett -
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Boulevard/3738/artwork.html

Major Fannish Disasters

In the September Info-Alert we mentioned that Houston Fan, Ann McKannan,
was responding well to her cancer treatment and had moved from a 25% to a
50% chance of making it. Near the end of October, we heard from Linda
Sparr that she was back in the hospital and her condition was very bad.
Ann died the morning of Nov 4, 1998. Due to the timing, neither Margaret
nor I was able to make her wake or mass.

It doesn't seem possible that we won't be bumping into her at the next
Science Fiction convention and stopping to chat awhile. Although Ann
McKannan was a long time Science Fiction fan active in fandom, and also a
long time SF convention attendee, I knew her best as a regular at Brad
Frank's (now defunct) SF bookstore, Future Visions Books. I can't claim
that I knew her all that well, just well enough to talk to, but over the
years we talked a lot. Whether the subject was what she was planning to
read next, or one of life's speed bumps, Ann was uniformly cheerful and
upbeat. I am going to miss her a lot.

My personal thanks to anyone who sent her a card or email and particular
thanks to Linda Sparr for keeping us advised of her condition.

World Fantasy Winners

According to Locus Magazine the winners for the World Fantasy awards were:

Life Achievement Award (tie): Edward L. Ferman and Andre Norton
Best Novel: The Physiognomy, Jeffrey Ford (Avon)
Best Novella: "Streetcar Dreams", Richard Bowes (F&SF Apr 1997)
Best Short Fiction: "Dust Motes", P. D. Cacek (Gothic Ghosts, Tor)
Best Anthology: Bending the Landscape: Fantasy, Nicola Griffith and
Stephen Pagel, editors (White Wolf Borealis)
Best Collection: The Throne of Bones, Brian McNaughton (Terminal
Fright)
Best Artist: Alan Lee
Special Award, Professional: The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, John Clute
and John Grant, editors (Orbit; St. Martin's)
Special Award, Non-professional: Fedogan & Bremer, for book publishing

Edward L. Ferman is a multi-Hugo winning Professional Editor
While he didn't quite have the run of Gardner Dozois, he has nonetheless
won a respectable number. See
http://www.city-net.com/~lmann/awards/hugos/80s.html
If you need an introduction to Andre Norton, then you didn't grow up
reading Science Fiction and Fantasy. One of her best known and loved
creations was the science fantasy Witch World Series. See
http://www.xenite.org/witchwor.htm .
The Physiognomy -
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0380793318/fantasicfuturesbA
Gothic Ghosts -
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0312866844/fantasicfuturesbA
Bending the Landscape: Fantasy -
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D1565048369/fantasicfuturesbA
The Throne of Bones-
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0965813509/fantasicfuturesbA
Alan Lee - http://www.auburn.edu/~speedhe/lee.html
The Encyclopedia of Fantasy -
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0312145942/fantasicfuturesbA
Locus - http://www.locusmag.com/

Bruce Sterling Alert

In a neat bit of time travel, Bruce has issued a manifesto as of January
3, 2000 essentially creating a new "technocultural art movement" taking on
global warming and our "cultural substance abuse problem with CO2". Bruce
is always thought provoking and if we have another warm winter and killer
summer, he is likely to have a convert here, at least in so far as
admitting that there is indeed _a_ problem. However, in the large scheme
of things, I don't see the big problem. The geological record clearly
shows a succession of cold and warm spells with the cold spells usually
brought on by a period of volcanic activity or bombardments from space,
either of which will throw enough junk into the air to bring on a Ice Age.
As a proponent of techno-fix, I don't understand why we can't rent a big
deserted chunk of Siberia from the Soviets and use clean nukes to blow
enough dust into the air to bring the temperature down to whatever we want
(Controlled Nuclear Winter). Prudence would dictate a certain amount of
cautious experimentation until we manage to calibrate the temperature
control, but the idea sounds a great deal more attractive than letting the
Earth go Venus.

Viridian - Technocultural Art Movement -
http://www.well.com/conf/mirrorshades/viridian.html .
Bruce Sterling Online Index -
http://lonestar.texas.net/~dub/sterling.html .

Speaking of Bruce, he will be in Austin in early December doing a signing
at Adventures in Crime & Space. This is after Elizabeth Moon in late
November, and he will be followed by L.E. Modesitt, Jr., on January 23rd.
Adventures in Crime & Space - http://www.CrimeandSpace.com

Forthcoming SF&Fantasy Books

October releases from Poul Anderson, Raymond Feist, and Terry Pratchett.

For more listings and more detail (updated monthly), see
http://www.clever.net/cam/forthcomingsf.html .

Wedding Bell News

Well known Science Fiction and James Bond fan, Brad Frank, was married in
late October to high school sweetheart, the former Angela Keele Kamp. The
wedding celebration contained any number of innovative (well, we hadn't
seen them before) elements while maintaining a very traditional feel. Of
course, we took notes. (Yes, for those of you who don't know us very well
yet, one of these days Clif and I are planning to be married. Only the
date is a secret because we ourselves don't know it yet!! However, this
is at least the seventh wedding we have now attended together. -Margaret.)

One element of Brad & Angela's wedding that I (Clif) liked was a large
empty white frame to hold a wedding picture, and a pen for people to write
their wedding wishes for the couple along the frame.

One element that I (Margaret) especially liked was the extent to which
both Brad's and Angela's families were included in the ceremony. For
example, Brad's brother did one of the readings and Angela's brothers did
another.

Although the first paragraph could just as well, and perhaps more
accurately, have said "James Bond and Science Fiction fan", in truth it is
as a Science Fiction fan that I (Clif) know Brad best. It was my
privilege to act as Brad's vice-chair (read personal gopher) at what I
believe was Houston's best and most exciting Science Fiction convention
ever. (The opinion of other con chairs or assistant chairs may differ.
;-) Your mileage may vary).

It was interesting, and not a little weird to meet and talk to people who
had known Brad all his life. I am used to being Brad's earliest Houston
friend. Candice Pulleine may have met him earlier at a SF convention, but
she didn't get to know him till much later.

Early on, I had one of those periodic automotive crises that seem to dot
my life. At the time I had a good salary but also had some significant
help in spending it. The bill was going to demolish what could laughingly
be called my life savings and eat up a large part of my next paycheck as
well. Unfortunately, the next paycheck was most of a month away. Brad,
who at the time was a college student supporting himself working at a
bookstore, not only provided much needed transportation, but also
suggested that we put it on his credit card until the next month. It was
a large enough chunk of change that he felt he should warn his father it
would be showing up on the account. I believe his father asked, "Uh, how
long have you known this guy?" Really, it was an excellent question. At
that point Brad hadn't known me all that long. But Brad had faith in me.

In all the years since then, in one way or another, Brad has continued to
have faith in me. Some may consider that to be questionable judgment.
But there has been a time or two when knowing that Brad had faith in me
has helped me to have faith in myself. One of what turned out to be the
best ways that Brad demonstrated his faith in me was when he asked me to
do a series of book reviews for his Science Fiction newsletter. As a
direct result of those reviews, Margaret and I, who had totally lost track
of each other, got a second chance to connect. So that is a very special
one we owe Brad.

When Brad told us he was getting married, we told him "We want to meet
her. We want to decide for ourselves if she is good enough for you".
Brad obliged and we did get the opportunity to meet Angela. She
completely charmed us, as indeed I think she has charmed all of Brad's
friends. Afterwards we told him, "Go for it. This one is a keeper". But
Brad is a very smart fella. I think that he had figured that out before
we told him.

Our wedding wish for Brad and Angela (down in the lower left hand corner
of the frame) is:
Many Years ..., Much Happiness ...,
LIVE LONG AND PROSPER!

Forthcoming SF, Fantasy, & Gaming Cons

Although winter has yet to threaten, May is approaching faster than you
think. Those of us who don't yet have memberships in the 18th
International Space Development Conference (ISDC), sort of the National
Space Society's version of Worldcon, should seriously start considering
how we are going to attend. In this line, I would point out that Starbase
Houston and FACT, as co-sponsors of the conference can offer their members
a much lower registration rate. For questions concerning ISDS email
Marianne Dyson at mjdyson@compuserve.com or for more details see the
listing on our What's Happening list at
http://www.clever.net/cam/concalendar.html . (Both FACT and Starbase
appear on our organizations list at
http://www.clever.net/cam/clubslist.html ).

Spider Robinson, unfortunately, had to cancel as ExotiCon One GOH but not
before he secured John Varley as replacement Guest of Honor for the con
(which will be held Nov.20-22, in the greater New Orleans area).
See his letter to the con at
http://home.earthlink.net/~rfontenot/spider.htm . Check out the details on
our What's Happening list at: http://www.clever.net/cam/concalendar.html .

Local Boy Makes Good

Ex-Houstonian Sean Stewart, now leading the good life out in California,
makes a triumphant return to Texas as the Guest of Honor at next year's
Armadillo-Con 21. If you have never read Sean Stewart, you don't know
what you are missing. In point of fact, if you have read every Sean
Stewart book but one, you don't know what you are missing. He never
writes the same type of book twice. The only
constant you can depend on is rich quality writing that will grab you.

In Nobody's Son, he wrote a standard heroic fantasy page turner with a
twist or two that sandbags you when you aren't looking. In Passion Play,
he wrote a very very dark Science Fiction murder mystery which is the best
thing of its kind I have ever read, and one I never want to read again.
Then in Clouds End, he wrote a novel I have read again and again, and will
read with pleasure many times in the future, but still can't
satisfactorily classify. (It's fantasy of course, but what kind? Is it
about fascinating and unique characters and how they are changed by their
choices? Yes. Is it about a strange world we travel through and
gradually learn more about? Yes. Is it a novel about ideas? Apparently
not. And yet the underlying point seems to be certain mythic ideas. In a
way it's as if Sean were providing intellectual enlightenment by emotional
argument. The effect is puzzling but intoxicating). Resurrection Man is
even harder to describe as it doesn't fit comfortably as either Fantasy or
Science Fiction. As always with Sean Stewart, it is a character story.
But here the ideas are thick, if low key. And the world background is so
rich and haunting that it (or at least an extrapolation of the background)
served as the background for the "sequel", The Night Watch. Notice that
"sequel" is in quotes. Sean never writes the same type novel twice. Then
there is Mockingbird. I haven't read it. (I will). There is no telling
what I am missing. I have heard it described as Magic Realism, but
dollars to doughnuts it is something far more complex.

Nobody's Son
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0441001289/fantasicfuturesbA
Passion Play
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0441652417/fantasicfuturesbA
Clouds End
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D044100332X/fantasicfuturesbA
Resurrection Man
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0441003397/fantasicfuturesbA
The Night Watch
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0441005543/fantasicfuturesbA
Mockingbird
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=3D0441005470/fantasicfuturesbA
Sean Stewart - http://www.redshift.com/~sstewart/index.html
Armadillo Con is of course listed in the What's Happening list at
http://www.clever.net/cam/concalendar.html .

Houston-area and Texas Science Fiction Organizations

If you like SF for breakfast and are up & awake by 9 AM Saturdays and
don't mind driving to near downtown Houston, have we got a group for you!
Try out the Houston Ritual SF Breakfast Group for good conversation with
fellow literary sf fans/sf authors/NASA folk and breakfast, too!
To find out more, see our listing at
http://www.clever.net/cam/clubslist.html .

Science Fiction on TV

Last episode of Babylon 5 set to air November 25! Next B5 movie will be
Call to Arms, set to air January 3, 1999. For more information about
Science Fiction on TV (including series' official Web home pages), see our
listing at http://www.clever.net/cam/sftv.html .

Space, The Final Frontier

The Universe keeps piling on one surprise after another. Galileo, which
has been orbiting Jupiter and its moons for 2-1/2 years is currently in
the middle of the Galileo Europa Mission, but is still useful for keeping
an eye on Jupiter. At this point it seems fairly clear that the light
spots on Jupiter are the equivalent of our hurricanes, e.g. heat driven
storms which get their power from temperature differentials and depend on
that heat differential for their growth and continued existence. They are
consistently cooler than their surroundings and form low pressure centers.
Galileo looking down into one of these cyclones was able to see past the
ammonia clouds and catch sight of a water cloud thunderstorm.
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/PIAGenCatalogPage.pl?PIA01639
Galileo was also able to detect lightning on Jupiter's night side.
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/PIAGenCatalogPage.pl?PIA01636
The ammonia cloud acts as a translucent screen and has a known diffusion.
It is possible to work backwards from the apparent width of the lightning
to obtain a depth of 46 miles, consistent with the expected depth of the
water cloud. The presence of lightning in water clouds argues for moist
convection and a process similar to lightning formation on Earth. On
Earth, lightning is an indicator of precipitation. Models of terrestrial
lightning suggest that to build up electrical charge, both liquid water
and ice have to be present.
Given the temperatures involved on Jupiter it is hard to say whether any
precipitation is rain or snow. But precipitation requires a relatively
wet Jupiter and that is controversial given the fact that the Jupiter
probe failed to report any moisture at all, all the way down till its
communications ceased.

The dark structures are also storms but are quite different and there seem
to be no terrestrial equivalents. They are very stable and long lived.
The Great Red Spot is at least 100 years old. They are anti-cyclones and
rotate in the opposite direction from the light cyclones. They are warm
storms, warmer than their surroundings while the cyclones are colder.
There is no lightning associated with the dark storms. It seems unlikely
that the dark anti-cyclones are drawingenergy by convection from the
warmer layers below. Instead, going back to the Voyager movies, it seems
that the cyclones spin out small anti-cyclone structures, and the large
stable anti-cyclones actually maintain themselves by continually merging
with the small structures.

There are, at least there were, three separate cold storms, white ovals,
in Jupiter's equatorial band for the last half century. Each of the storms
was about two-thirds the diameter of Earth and were separated by
anti-cyclones. Then in February 1998, two of the white ovals collided and
merged. The actual collision took place under cover of darkness while
Jupiter was turned away from view. The new storm is about the size of
Earth and is the second strongest storm in the solar system, second only
to the Great Red Spot itself.
For a comparison of Hubble and Galileo views of the new storm see
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/PIAGenCatalogPage.pl?PIA01477 .

This is the first time that humans have ever observed such a large
interaction between two storm systems. The Galileo data shows that, like
other white ovals,the new storm is visible at visible wavelengths and most
infrared wave lengths but, unlike other such storms, is invisible at
infrared wave lengths used to peer underneath the storm's upper cloud
layers. Furthermore the new storm is unusually cold, an entire degree
colder than its surroundings (For the sake of comparison, we are talking
about -251F). The anti-cyclone that used to be between the two white ovals
used to be warmer than its surroundings, but now shows no temperature
difference at all.

One possible explanation is that the anti-cyclone was a buffering
mechanism that kept the two white ovals apart, but that it somehow lost
power and is no longer as warm, as powerful, or spinning as fast, and so
was no longer able to hold them apart. Because the new storm was colder
and stronger it may have built up an extra thick layer of clouds which
cover the lower levels, explaining why the new storm disappears at certain
wavelengths.

Jupiter's moon, Callisto, its second largest, has appeared to be a dead
and boring moon, nothing but a hunk of rock and ice. Oddly enough,
evidence to the contrary arose from consideration of Galileo's
magnetometer instrument as it measured Europa. There are several lines of
evidence that indicate that Europa has an internal liquid ocean underneath
a sheath of ice. Galileo's measurements indicated that changes in the
varying electrical currents associated with Jupiter on the surface of Europa
caused changes in Europa's magnetic field. One explanation would be an
internal salty ocean that might be acting as a conductor of electricity.
Based on these readings, data obtained during Galileo's fly-bys of Callisto
in November 1996, and June and September of 1997 were checked based on what
seemed a far-fetched theory that Callisto could have an internal ocean.
Surprisingly there were indeed signs that Callisto's magnetic field, like
Europa's, is variable.

The source of the currents cannot be Callisto's atmosphere which is almost
nonexistent and does not contain charged particles sufficient to generate
Callisto's magnetic field. Likewise, the ice crust would not be a good
conductor. So it seems almost certain that there something is hidden
below Callisto's surface and if that is not a liquid salty ocean, it is
not clear what it could be.

There will be four Callisto fly-bys between May and September of 1999 and
the results may be interesting. In the meantime, scientists are now
re-examining magnetometer readings from Ganymede, the largest moon of
Jupiter to see if there is any evidence that it too has a liquid interior.

Even if there is a liquid interior for Callisto (or Ganymede) they are not
necessarily promising sites for life. The only likely heat source for
them is natural radioactivity. On the other hand Europa should have a
fairly significant energy source from the tidal effects from its close
proximity to Jupiter.

The latest Galileo images of Callisto are at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/news30.html#callisto . An artist's
cutaway view of the proposed structure of Callisto is at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/callistocore.gif .

In the beginning of November, Galileo sent back (not yet released) Europa
observations including a mosaic of images taken by the spacecraft camera,
showing several terrain types that scientists believe provide the best
evidence yet for the existence of a liquid ocean under Europa's surface.

Meanwhile, back on Mars, NASA's Global Surveyor continues to send back
images vastly superior to Viking photos of the same regions. In late
October, NASA released pictures showing giant plates of solidified
volcanic lava and evidence for active dunes near the planet's north pole,
with sands that have hopped or rolled across the surface in recent months.
Some of the dunes appear to be coated with thin, bright frost that was
left over from the northern winter season that ended in mid-July. This
frost is covered with dark streaks emanating from small dark spots that
dot the bases of many of the dunes. The simplest explanation is that
gusts of wind have blown the dark sand out across the frost-covered dunes,
creating a streak of deposited sand over the frost. Some spots seen in the
close-ups have multiple streaks, each one indicating that a different wind
gust has moved in a different direction.

The Elysium Basin lava field images put an end to speculation that they
might be the bed of an ancient vast lake some 5,000 feet deep that only
dried up relatively recently after the surrounding features were formed.

Surveyor Sand Dune (and other wind based features) images are available at
http://www.msss.com/mars/global_surveyor/camera/images/MENUS/wind_list.html .
Elysium Basin high resolution images can be found at
http://www.msss.com/mars/global_surveyor/camera/images/10_29_98_gsa_release/10_29_98_elysium_basin_rel/index.html .

Speaking of Mars, back during the time of the Pathfinder Mission, Margaret
and I watched CNN coverage, and what we really enjoyed and appreciated was
the enthusiastic and intelligent coverage provided by CNN's space
correspondent John Holliman. Regrettably, John Holliman was killed in an
automobile accident on September 12, 1998. Not surprisingly, CNN dedicated
its John Glenn-STS 95 coverage to Holliman. Even President Clinton (when
he realized that he was being interviewed by CNN) made the time to remark
on how much he and the country had always appreciated and enjoyed
Holliman's work during space missions. Holliman will indeed be much
missed.

Now NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has named an asteroid in his memory.
The asteroid was discovered by astronomer Eleanor F. Helin, investigator
for the Near Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) program that detects near
Earth asteroids, on April 30, 1989 at the Palomar Observatory. The
asteroid, 6711 Holliman, has a diameter of about 6 miles. Its orbit is
inclined 15 degrees to the ecliptic plane and moves in an orbit between
Mars and Jupiter. See http://huey.jpl.nasa.gov/~spravdo/holliman.htm .

The Deep Space 1 spacecraft was launched on October 24. The Deep Space
mission is basically a technology mission, proving a series of
technologies that will be extremely useful in future flights, but which no
one wants to risk a real mission on until they have been shown to be
dependable by someone else. While it is at it, it will do a fly-by of an
asteroid, Mars, and a comet.

The real biggie being tested is the ion drive. NASA's first ion engine
was built by Lewis Research Center in 1960. Since then, there have been
many tests of the technology in the laboratory and some limited tests in
space. (Actually I think my father may have worked on some of the lab
tests using NASA large vacuum facility.) But no mission has really been
willing to use the technology as a primary propulsion system because of
the possibility that it might not work.

The drive works by ionizing xenon gas and then electronically accelerating
it to about 30 km/second before emitting it as exhaust. Compared to a
chemical rocket the thrust from an ion engine is very gentle, but it
continues and continues and eventually you can get ten times the
acceleration than =66rom a conventional propulsion system with the same
mass. This is extremely useful on long distant missions and could, for
example, remove a couple of years off a mission to Pluto

What I find interesting are the AI technologies. The Autonomous Remote
Agent lets the spacecraft decide what task to try next without continuous
instructions from the ground. The remote agent includes an onboard
mission manager that carries the mission plan, expressed as high-level
goals. A planning and scheduling engine uses the goals, knowledge of the
spacecraft's state, and constraints on spacecraft operations to generate a
set of time-based or event-based activities, known as tokens, that are
delivered to the executive. The executive expands the tokens to a
sequence of commands that are issued directly to the appropriate parts of
the spacecraft. The executive monitors the response to these commands and
reissues or modifies them if the response is not what was anticipated.
The advantage to all this is that the remote agent has more information
about the spacecraft than can feasibly be sent back to Earth and so can
make better decisions than can be made from the ground.

Similarly the Autonomous Navigator allows the spacecraft to determine its
location in the Solar System as well as its flight path without help from
controllers on Earth. By photographing reference asteroids against the
background of fixed stars, the spacecraft triangulates to calculate
exactly where it is. It then can project its path to its destination and
use its propulsion system to make any course changes that are required. By
freeing up the Deep Space Network (DSN) from the time-consuming task of
using sophisticated ground based techniques to measure the position and
speed of spacecraft, this technology will help assure that the DSN of the
future will be able t o devote more of its time to receiving data the
spacecraft have collected in their journeys, and less time simply helping
them to navigate.

Information on all of the technologies tested by Deep Space 1 can be found
at http://nmp.jpl.nasa.gov/ds1/ .

So far, Deep Space 1 is doing fairly well. There was a glitch when the
natural radiation of space created a random error in the spacecraft's
solar array electronics and so one of the solar panels initially pointed
away from the sun. Fortunately Deep Space 1 can operate perfectly with
even just one panel, and the glitch was easily overcome.

The Star Tracker, which is not new technology but rather old tech, is
behaving a bit erratically, from time to time failing for a second or two,
but it doesn'tappear that this will cause any real problems.

As October ended with Deep Space 1 roughly five times further from the
earth than the moon is, the spacecraft turned to point the ion engine
toward the Sun so that it could bake off any contaminants that might
interfere with its operation. Then Halloween was spent testing the solar
arrays' electrical characteristics. On November 2 there was an unexplained
change in the orientation of the spacecraft (still under investigation)
but the spacecraft self-corrected quickly using its attitude control. By
the time you read this, the first short test of the ion drive should be
complete. If all goes well the ion drive will turn on for real about
November 23. It should stay on for about half the mission.

Back on Earth the last released measurements from the TOPEX/Poseidon
satellite STILL show the tropical Pacific Ocean seesawing between El Nino
and La Nina as they battle for dominance. This was supposed to be an
unstable condition. The latest images are available on the web at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/elnino .

John Glenn and company made it back, even if part of their craft fell off
during launch. With any luck, we can send him up again in another 30
years.

Also of some interest, the Southern California Integrated Global
Positioning System (GPS) Network, an array of 60 current and 250 planned
GPS receivers continuously measure the constant, yet tiny, movements of
earthquake faults throughout Southern California. Analyzing current data
from the SCIGN reveals that Downtown and West Los Angeles are moving
toward the San Gabriel Mountains and the metropolitan area in between is
being and will be squeezed slowly over the next several thousand years.
More information about SCIGN is available at http://milhouse.jpl.nasa.gov/

They Laughed When I Sat Down at the Typewriter

There a number of locations on the Web that might interest the serious
would-be Science Fiction Writer. Among them is the James Gunn Writer's
Workshop at http://writing-critiques.com/bio-sf.htm . For $35 a week for
an eight-week course, the budding writer gets one-on-one attention from
Mr. Gunn and/or peer-to-peer critiquing and live online discussions, all
from the comfort of his (or her) home. The price actually sounds
reasonable, comparable to say music lessons from a name-musician. For
more information see Shosin Distance Learning Center at
http://writing-critiques.com/ .

Selling writers will at once see a new market opportunity. :-)

While, we are at it, we should point those interested in writing to
resources at Robin's Nest at
http://www2.netdoor.com/~smslady/mainwriters.html and Using the Internet
for Research at http://www.purefiction.com/pages/res1.htm .

Microsoft Purchases Catholic Church

Not really. That was just the subject of a joke email we received a year
or so back. On the other hand, Microsoft does seem to be buying things up
all over the web. Those of you who use Hotmail know that you are now part
of the Microsoft empire. Similarly the Listbot system we use has now been
incorporated into Microsoft. Now, we don't confuse Bill Gates with the
anti-Christ, but we were planning on migrating to our own system anyway.

A small number of you are receiving this issue on our test system. Our
not quite ready for prime time, but getting close, archive system is at
http://www.clever.net/cam/archive/ for those who want to take a sneak
peak. In some ways it represents an improvement over what we have now
since you can actually follow the links. Also we can put the issues that
Listbot makes us slice and dice back together again.

FFFFFeedBack (screech!)

We heard from Judith Ward:
: I really like receiving the Info Alert.
: Thanks

>From Tina Jafari (who identifies herself as a stranger in a strange land)
: Thanks for thinking of me ... the newsletter is great ... Yes, every :
month will be fine. Is there a fee?

>From Marc Hunter
: Thanks for adding me to the list! As usual, it is thorough and
: thoroughly entertaining.
: Looking forward to future mailings....

Geeze, you guys are going to give us swelled heads. There is no fee for
the Info-alert. It's distributed by email free as a function of Friends
of Fandom.

By way of 001-Science Fiction,
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=3D24083, we also heard from Sam
Aho:
:Loose the Space Waste
:
:You have a interesting newsletter that's fun to read. Recently you have
:started including a loong section in the middle on NASA information. If I
:wanted NASA information I would look at NASA.com. I read you to find out
:what is happening in the Science Fiction World. LOOSE THE SPACE WASTE
:
:I look at your Web page every so often, but can never tell when you are
:going to have a new I-A newsletter. Either keep a better schedule or send
:out notices when you post a new one. I don't want my mailbox filled up
:and so will not subscribe as things are now.
:
:Why do you call it subscribing? It makes people think you want money.

Sam, let's take your points in reverse order. You may well be right that
calling it subscribing is confusing. A couple of people have wondered if
we wanted money. On the other hand, what else would you call it? We are
open to suggestions

We generally have a new Info-Alert out by the middle of every month.

Emailing short notices that the next Info-Alert is ready is something we
could do now with little trouble, it just means keeping a second mailing
list on the side. People whose email reader can't follow links might
actually prefer to access the Info-Alert from the web. I think this is
something we would be glad to do by special request. Now if only you had
left your email address....

You also might have more luck accessing nasa.gov than NASA.com . Not
everything in the newsletter is going to be everyone's cup of tea. But
surely it is not that onerous to fast forward to the next section. If you
look down at the bottom of the "fine print" it states that we are engaged
in educational scientific and literary activities pertaining to science
fiction, fantasy and science fact in its various forms. (That's a phrase
I originally wrote in our application to the IRS with the idea in the back
of my head that it would cover just about anything we would ever want to
do. It doesn't quite, but neither the IRS or the Board of Directors
called me on it, or as far as I could tell, considered the implications.
Getting to make the rules is always a huge advantage. :-) On the other
hand, if we were to get large amounts of email complaining about it, I am
sure that Margaret would make me drop it).

Look at it this way, Sam. One of the main reasons a lot of us read
Science Fiction is to get our fix on that old sense of wonder. If a lot
of the things going on today don't toggle that sense of wonder, then you
either aren't paying attention, or you are dead (either metaphorically or
physically)!

AND That's About Another Issue

Send any email comments or suggestions regarding fannish activities/events
in the greater Houston area (or within Texas) or regarding this Info Alert
to fof@clever.net . If you received this Info Alert as a sample and would
be interested in receiving future editions directly, email
clifton@cs.uh.edu or join the list by entering your email address on any
of our Web pages as listed above (where it says LISTBOT).

Be seeing you!

Margaret A. Fincannon, Friends of Fandom &
Clifton B. Davis, Friends of Fandom Vice Pres. of Publications
http://www.clever.net/cam/fof.html fof@clever.net

And for those who live to read the fine print ...
****************************************************************
The Friends of Fandom Information Alert is an official publication of
Friends of Fandom, distributed in electronic and print form in furtherance
of its tax exempt purpose. The information contained therein reflects
that believed to be true and accurate by its editors. However, we make no
guarantees. All opinions expressed are those of the individual
contributors and may not necessarily reflect either the official position
of Friends of Fandom or the opinions of the editors, nor the officers or
board of directors of Friends of Fandom. Friends of Fandom is a
nonprofit, literary, scientific, and educational 501(c)(3) corporation
committed to encouraging and facilitating interest and activities
pertaining to science fiction, fantasy, and science fact in its various
forms.
*****************************************************************