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Communes once dotted the United States. Their occupants believed that if we just gave up sexual prudery and practice free love, the world would be better. Others abhorred the use of animals as servants and tried to live without animal products or labor. Others fell in love with the concept of socialism. Yes, it was a crazy time in our nation's history known as . . . the nineteenth century. More »
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This week an intriguing new film, Utopia in Four Movements, screened at Sundance. It explores the way people in the past imagined the future. We can't wait for it to bust out of the festival circuit. More »
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The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, who maintain the infamous "Doomsday Clock," have moved the clock's hand back by one minute. Now we are six minutes to world destruction, rather than five. More »
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The 2000s left us feeling battered, but the 2010s are looking awesome. Thanks to recent scientific research and an explosion of cultural interest in science fiction, there are at least 15 brilliant reasons to stick around for another decade. More »
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Marge Piercy explored both utopian and dystopian futures in Woman On The Edge Of Time, and she explained the difference between the two modes of imagining the future, in a speech at the University of New Mexico. More »
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Here you can see what Microsoft thinks the future holds, at least when it comes to computers and the internet. More »
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Just as we were asking ourselves when this dreary dystopian fad was going to wear off, news comes from a sunnier side of the universe. We’ve been plagued with so many movies and books that paint the future as a big, bad place to live that I’ve started to wonder if I should build a bomb shelter or just stock up on antidepressants. To provide an oasis in this dystopian desert, Solaris Books has commissioned Jetse de Vries to collect manuscripts for Shine, an anthology of optimistic near-future science fiction. More »
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Last Friday, Milton Friedman's grandson Patri Friedman and his fledgling Seasteading Institute had their first ever conference. Equipped with half a million dollars from PayPal founder Peter Thiel, the Institute wants to eventually build a fixed, independent structure off the coast of San Francisco called Ephemerisle that will function as an anarcho-capitalist utopia. The idea of a ocean-based civilization isn't a new one, and the Institute has heaps of failure to learn from. Click for the best and worst waterworlds. More »
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With the Y: The Last Man film coming in 2010, we’ll soon get a big-screen treatment of Brian K. Vaughan’s world without men. All-female societies are not uncommon in science fiction, from culturally advanced utopias to post-apocalyptic sex comedies. Far less common are societies where men live, either by choice or circumstance, with few or no women. How do these societies come about? How do they perpetuate themselves without the opposite sex? And what happens to men when the women disappear from their lives? More »
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One of Japanese artist Enoki Chu's newest installations is RPM-1200, a futuristic, crescent-shaped skyline made with pieces of junk metal polished to a brilliant shine. You can't tell from the picture, but this is an impressive sculpture that stands 11 feet tall and has a diameter of 15 feet. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=327758&view=rss&microfeed=true If you don't know why the early-1980s Buck Rogers in the 25th Century TV series is damn near perfect, then this clip from the episode "Escape from Wedded Bliss" will explain it all to you. Earth is in danger because evil Princess Ardala (wearing the purple spangly lingerie and tiara) has declared that she'll use her superweapon to destroy New Chicago unless Buck agrees to marry her. When she zooms down to meet up with Buck, the Earthies throw a reception for her with "traditional folk dancing" which turns out to be disco skating. As if that weren't enough to make you weep with joy, we see Ardala giving Buck the old predatory eye, while two soldiers behind her sport the Gay Uniforms of the future: all white polyester knit with rainbow armbands. Don't thank me for this clip, thank Buck Rogers exec producer Glen Larson, who also worked on the 1980s Battlestar Galactica. More »
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