Reminder: Cory Doctorow speaks at KU this Thursday!
Science-fiction author, journalist, technology activist, and Boing Boing co-editor Cory Doctorow presents this year's Richard W. Gunn Memorial Lecture:
"The Coming War on General Purpose Computing:
Every single political issue will end up rehashing the stupid Internet copyright fight."
When:
Thursday, February 28, 2013
7:30pm - 9:30pm
Where:
Alderson Auditorium
University of Kansas Student Union
Lawrence, KS 66045
Cost:
Free! Seating is limited, so arrive early to ensure a spot.
Jayhawk Ink bookstore will have copies of several of Doctorow's books available to purchase in Alderson Auditorium (as well as the bookstore on Level 2) and get signed by the author after the talk.
This is Doctorow's third visit to KU: first in 1999 when his story "Craphound" (his first published story) was a finalist for the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and next in 2009 when his novel Little Brother won the John W. Campbell Memorial Award.
Don't miss hearing one of the most interesting thinkers of our time talk about some of our most-relevant issues! Sponsored by the J Wayne and Elsie M Gunn Center for the Study of Science Fiction.
Bio:
Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist, journalist, and technology activist. He is the co-editor of the popular weblog Boing Boing, and a contributor to The Guardian, the New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Wired, and many other newspapers, magazines, and websites. He was formerly Director of European Affairs for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit civil-liberties group that defends freedom in technology law, policy, standards, and treaties. He holds an honorary doctorate in computer science from the Open University (UK), where he is a Visiting Senior Lecturer; in 2007, he served as the Fulbright Chair at the Annenberg Center for Public Diplomacy at the University of Southern California.
Doctorow's novels have been translated into dozens of languages and are published by Tor Books and simultaneously released on the Internet under Creative Commons licenses that encourage their re-use and sharing, a move that increases his sales by enlisting his readers to help promote his work. His work has won the Locus, Sunburst, Ontario Library White Pine, Prometheus, Indienet, and John W. Campbell Memorial awards, and been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, Theodore Sturgeon Memorial (for "Craphound"), and British Science Fiction Awards. His latest young-adult novel is Pirate Cinema, a story of mashup guerillas who declare war on the entertainment industry. His latest novel for adults is Rapture of the Nerds, written with Charles Stross and published in 2012. His New York Times Bestseller Little Brother was published in 2008. A sequel, Homeland, was just published. His latest short story collection is With a Little Help, available in paperback, ebook, audiobook and limited edition hardcover. In 2011, Tachyon Books published a collection of his essays, called Context: Further Selected Essays on Productivity, Creativity, Parenting, and Politics in the 21st Century (with an introduction by Tim O'Reilly) and IDW published a collection of graphic stories inspired by his short fiction called Cory Doctorow's Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now. The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow, a PM Press Outspoken Authors chapbook, was also published in 2011.
He co-founded the open-source peer-to-peer software company OpenCola, sold to OpenText, Inc in 2003, and presently serves on the boards and advisory boards of the Participatory Culture Foundation, the Clarion Foundation, The Glenn Gould Foundation, and the Chabot Space & Science Center's SpaceTime project.
In 2007, Entertainment Weekly called him, "The William Gibson of his generation." He was also named one of Forbes Magazine's 2007/8/9/10 Web Celebrities, and one of the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders for 2007.
Born in Toronto, Canada, he now lives in London.
The Lecture Series:
The Gunn Lecture, endowed by Dr. Richard W. Gunn, James Gunn's brother, has featured several science-fiction scholars. Although it has also sponsored speakers on Shakespeare and Ralph Ellison, it often brings distinguished science-fiction scholars to the campus beginning with scholar Fredric Jameson, William A. Lane Professor at Duke University; and continuing with Bill Brown, Edgar Carson Waller Professor at the University of Chicago; China Miéville, British author of what has become known as the New Weird; and Nöel Sturgeon, Theodore Sturgeon's daughter and trustee of his literary estate, Professor of Critical Cultures, Gender, and Race Studies at Washington State University, and juror on the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. The Center also recently co-sponsored a visit from Michael Chabon, prize-winning author and editor.
Promotional materials:
SFWA news item here.
Google+ event page here.
Yelp event page here.
Posters in .pdf format:
Feel free to use these images and posters on your websites, share them around, remix them to help promote the talk, and so forth!
If you are unfamiliar with Doctorow's work and would like to get acquainted with it, here's a short reader (from my "Science, Technology, & Society" course) - all available free online:
Short story, “I, Robot.”
Short-short story, “Printcrime.”
Chapter 4 from the Campbell Award-winning novel, Little Brother.
Want to read more Doctorow stories? Novels? See the recommended reading, below.
Essay, “I Can't Let You Do That, Dave: What it means to design our computers and devices to disobey us.”
Essay, “Disorganised but effective: The most profound social revolutions in human history have arisen whenever a technology comes along that lowers transaction costs for everyone.”
Essay, “Internet copyright law has to have public support if it's going to work.”
Essay, “A Vocabulary for Speaking about the Future.”
Want to read more Doctorow articles and essays? Here's some more recommended reading to become familiar with his work:
- Doctorow's just-released novel, Homeland, (sequel to Little Brother), is already available for free download here.
- The novel, Little Brother, is available for free download in several formats here or plain HTML here. Doctorow also provides some great teaching materials for the book here. Won the Campbell Award.
- The very recent novel, Pirate Cinema, is available for free download here.
- The story, “Craphound,” his first short-story publication and a finalist for the Sturgeon Award.
- Go here for free downloads of some of his most-popular short stories.
- Go here for free downloads of the graphic-novelization of six of his most-popular short stories in .epub or .pdf formats for the book, Cory Doctorow's Futuristic Tales Of The Here And Now.
- Discussion about “Where Characters Come from,” published in Locus.
- Essay, “With a Little Help: Cory Doctorow kicks off a unique publishing experiment - and a monthly PW column” (full archive of his PW series here).
- Essay, “Just because something has value doesn't mean it has a price: If every last shred of incidental online value is given a price tag, we'll never harvest the full fruits of our ingenuity.”
- Go here for links to many more of Doctorow's online articles.
Best,
Chris