Friday Schedule

Why are so many 21st-century readers enthralled by tales of wizards, dragons, elves, orcs, vampires, and werewolves, but relatively few by space travel, cyborgs, robots, and genetic engineering? Have we seen so much technological change in real life that we have to get our sensawunda fix from magic spells? Speak your mind!

Panelists:

• Danika Dinsmore
• Michael Stiber
• Sarah Hirsch
• Tom Hopp

It’s possible to interact via text, audio, and video with someone across the world – all without ever being in the same physical location. What’s it like to get to know people online? Are there differences between these friendships and in-person ones? How has science fiction predicted this sort of interaction? Some people have had friendships online for decades now – does it change?

Panelists:

• Beth Mitcham
• Devlin Bentley
• Jason Wodicka
• Miss Eli

They’ve asked me to moderate a panel! What now? Come to this panel and learn just what it is a good moderator does. Leave knowing new ways you can make the panels you moderate more interesting and enjoyable for everyone.

Panelists:

• Marty Hale-Evans
• Susan Mohn

Science fiction from Babel-17 to The Languages of Pao, not to mention Nineteen Eighty-Four, has posited that language can affect perception. How true is this hypothesis, and what are the real life and sfnal situations where you’ve seen it happen?

Panelists:

• Ben McKenzie
• Keffy R. M. Kehrli
• Ted Chiang
• Torrey Podmajersky

Jack Vance’s writing career lasted about half a century. The list of notable speculative fiction writers directly influenced by Vance is huge. George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois recently edited a Vance tribute anthology. For all that, Vance is not widely read today and remains something of a hidden treasure. What do you enjoy most and least about Vance, or if you haven’t read him, what has kept you from doing so?

Panelists:

• Jerry Chilson
• Tom Whitmore

The Makers are coming! The Makers are here! Why do people spend their time and energy making things for themselves instead of buying a mass-produced solution? Is this a sustainable alternative to the usual methods of manufacturing, or just a way for people with too much time to make things inefficiently? Is this an alternative to consumerism, or just a redirection to make people buy more tools and materials instead of finished products? What about self-expression, or the desire to show something’s importance by investing your own limited time in it?

Panelists:

• Dave Howell
• Hank Graham
• Jack William Bell
• Marty Hale-Evans

Oh sure, everyone loves oxygen, until you’re on fire. Arsenic (and Old Lace)? Uranium for the pretty glow? Tungsten? What are some of the most fascinating chemical elements, and what properties make them so interesting?

Panelists:

• Christopher Stringari

It’s your first time at a convention? Great! Come by this panel to learn from long-time con-goers, and get tips for having the best experience possible.

Panelists:

• Jason Wodicka
• Susan Mohn

Do you think you have what it takes to Win Tom Whitmore’s Hat? If you’ve got the luck and skill to beat the competition, you can earn the right to go head to head with Tom in a battle of SFnal trivia. To the victor shall go the chapeau!

Panelists:

• Chris Battey
• Jason Wodicka
• Sora Battey
• Sylvia Wodicka

If print is dead, what will become of the library? As the scope of libraries grows to incorporate other media, community activities, etc., are we losing something by not having an institution that focuses and gives validation to print-based literature? Or will libraries become even more important as broader-based information centers? We particularly invite library and information professionals to participate.

Panelists:

• Kathleen Retz
• Marta Murvosh
• Meredith Hale
• Miss Eli

It seems that utopian fiction is out of fashion these days, and perhaps we have more trouble than we used to in thinking about idealistic societies. Is it good that we’ve become more practical and less invested in fantastical scenarios, or should we be dreaming bigger?

Panelists:

• Frederick Douglas Saling Marshall
• Manny Frishberg
• Susan Mohn

Dip tasty fruit and cake into our flowing chocolate fountain, and mingle with your fellow Foolscappians at our annual chocolate reception.

Let’s talk about graphic novels! What defines them? What are some of the genre’s must-reads? What makes them good, and what makes them great? What can they do that neither novels nor comics can do?

Panelists:

• Alice Bentley
• Jim Woodring
• Kevin Radthorne
• Lee Moyer

Even though we still debate whether the Pacific NW Tree Octopus is a threat or a menace, there are always new hoaxes coming down the pike. What are some of the newest? Where do they come from? What gives them staying power? And what is the larger implication of the proliferation of hoaxes on our collective perceptions about what’s true?

Panelists:

• Ben McKenzie
• Christopher Stringari
• Manny Frishberg
• Miss Eli

Board games have been around for centuries, but where are they going next? What comes next after Euro games – and what’s happening with indie roleplaying games? Where’s the future of these games, and what interesting territories are they likely to explore? What does their analog nature make them suited to, and how are some pushing beyond the obvious?

Panelists:

• Jason Wodicka
• Ron Hale-Evans
• Susan Mohn

Egypt Urnash always wanted a Tarot deck but never found one she liked. So she drew her own. Come see what a transhumanist’s fortune-telling tool looks like, and maybe even ask a question or two about your future.

Panelists:

• Egypt Urnash

Astronomy heavily figures into the timing and practices of several religions. Leave the planet, and all your astronomical references either change or go away completely. A serious discussion of how various religions would need to adjust when confronted with things like different lengths of day or month, different numbers of moons, living on a moon with both a star and a planet in the sky, traveling between planets or stars with no day/night cycle at all, etc.

Panelists:

• Lise Eisenberg
• Llyne Foy
• Susan Mohn

Come get recommendations for interesting anime, old and new, or share your own favorites.

Panelists:

• Alice Bentley
• Edd Vick
• Jack William Bell
• Sylvia Wodicka

Are games an art form, or is art perhaps a kind of game? Did your blood seethe when Old Man Ebert declared games will never be art? Do you agree with him, or is the whole debate a tsunami in a semantic demitasse?

Panelists:

• Beverly Marshall Saling
• Dave Weinstein
• Ron Hale-Evans
• Ted Chiang

Stitch, bitch, bead, or sing – come bring your quiet crafts or your musical instruments to Foolscap’s open crafting evening and filk circle! Nobody else needs the room after us, so we can keep going as late as we want!

The man with the blue box has become one of the most enduring SFnal characters in modern media, with an influence that’s felt on both sides of the pond. Why has recent Doctor Who been so successful at actually incorporating SFnal themes into its story arcs – and what does it have in common with written SF?

Panelists:

• Manny Frishberg
• Marlow Weaver
• Sarah Scrivano
• Stefanie Stadnicki

As the hours drag on and the morning folks find their way to bed, gaming begins! Bring a board game, or just show up ready to learn – we’ll have games to try! Open gaming runs until the last players doze off, so just drop by the Commons and see who’s playing what!