WorldCon Potential Future - 2023

I follow the activities of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from time to time.  Mostly because I expect the proverbial "other shoe to drop".

The CCP has engaged in a decades-long propaganda campaign to normalize their activities and expand their relationships abroad.  At the same time, there has been a subtle campaign to establish cultural norms for the people of China that will give the CCP greater control over that society.

There is a bid to host WorldCon in Chengdu China in 2023 that is on the ballot this year.  Some of the more engaged members of WorldCon fandom have registered their concerns.  Their bid appears to have the general support of the CCP.  I'm not sure how deep that support actually runs.

This is my prediction.  Should the CCP actually consider hosting a WorldCon to be a significant enough activity within the context of their propaganda effort, then they may "encourage" some of their citizens to purchase supporting memberships that will (eventually) be allowed to vote this year on the site selection for 2023.  If they "encourage" enough participation, they could ensure that the Chengdu bid will win.

I would then expect there to be additional English language publishing of translations of works by Chinese authors in 2022 so that such works would be eligible for the awards in 2023.  

Thus far there are only 11 members of DisConIII from China out of a total of 4649 paid members.  One should reasonably expect that number to increase somewhat as we get closer to the Con actually happening.  Fandom exists everywhere, including in the PRC.

But if those numbers skyrocket into the thousands, then a more organized/directed effort may be underway.

What inspired me to put down this marker was a recent story about the CCP taking an interest in shaping Chinese popular culture.  Prominent media company owners and personalities have been forced out of the limelight and even out of China.  Entrepreneur Jack Ma has largely disappeared after he dared to criticize the CCP.  Then there has been the trampling of individual rights in Hong Kong and the serial threats against Taiwan.

A CCP that has the capacity for that sort of discrete targetting of individuals is a CCP that has the potential to "encourage" a pop-up campaign to capture the 2023 WorldCon.

I hope I'm wrong.  I think the odds are good that I am wrong.  It's just not far enough outside of the range of possibilities for my comfort.

Review: Artifact Space

Artifact Space by Miles Cameron
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a first-rate piece of MilSF/Space Opera. A young cadet in a public orphanage gets a hacker to forge her graduation credentials so that she can join the crew of a Greatship; a massive, interstellar trade/combat ship that circles the region of space where humans have spread.

Our young cadet has problems both small and large. Her small problems include the above forgery and also where the head of the orphanage is trying to blackmail her. Then she also needs to develop as a pilot of the small trade/fighter transports that service the Greatships. And learn all the basics of being an officer. And learning about galactic trade, repelling boarders, shooting guns and other little necessities.

The large problems include uncovering a network of spies and saboteurs that are trying to take out the Greatship Athens. Uncovering the mysterious enemy who is blowing up the Greatships. Helping to find a way to communicate with the alien "starfish" whose xenoglas makes the great galactic circle of trade viable.

The book is a non-stop joyride that would make Robert Heinlein proud. I literally could not put this down; the hallmark of excellent storytelling. The best book of 2021 that I've read thus far.

Miles Cameron hits another home run!

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A small gripe. Most won't notice it.

The political system is somewhat odd. There is a wealthy upper class that is funded by their companies and trade. A person can buy into this upper class and obtain the right to vote and other benefits. The characters claim that their system is "democratic-socialism" and that it is someway superior to our current political/economic environment that the characters describe as the Chaos times.

But in reality, their system isn't too much different from our own. There is a thriving free-market trade in goods and services. The "socialism" is limited to health care and basic income allowances. The companies are regulated and taxed to the point where they cannot/will not perform basic research. Essentially, their world exists because of the "Chaos times" where freer markets allowed greater innovation.

The polity is in turn deluded about their level of "socialism" and blind to the effect of excessive regulation and taxes. At one point one of the characters points out that she didn't think her ancestors would have understood their version of "socialism".

View all my reviews

Hugo Awards - 2021 - Short Stories

 I've been read other books lately and had not intended to return to the Hugo nominees.  But as I had them downloaded anyway....

1 - “Metal Like Blood in the Dark”, T. Kingfisher (Uncanny Magazine, September/October 2020) - a great little story about the loss of innocence for a pair AI driven robots.  Or at least one of them

2 - “A Guide for Working Breeds”, Vina Jie-Min Prasad (Made to Order: Robots and Revolution, ed. Jonathan Strahan (Solaris)) - An interesting twist on AI/robots as contract labor.  You never really see where the humans intersect with the AI/robots, but it's there all along.

3 - No Award

4 - “The Mermaid Astronaut”, Yoon Ha Lee (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, February 2020) - a somewhat interesting space travel story with merfolk added on the side.  Good, but not above the bar on my ballot.

5 - “Open House on Haunted Hill”, John Wiswell (Diabolical Plots – 2020, ed. David Steffen) - a pedestrian haunted house story.  Nice, but not really notable.

6 - “Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse”, Rae Carson (Uncanny Magazine, January/February 2020) - Surviving the zombie apocalypse without men.  But they still want babies.  Almost half of which will end up being men.  Illogical setting/world building.

7 - Little Free Library, Naomi Kritzer (Tor.com) - a twee little story using a plot device that has been done too many times already.

Interesting News 8/26/2021

 Yes, I'm still interested in these weekly collections of interesting items.  Yes, I went a few weeks without publishing one.  And yet you are back for more!

Brad Torgersen has a great essay regarding Covid, vaccines, mandates, masks, etc.  I generally agree.  The technology behind the vaccines is sound.  Almost everyone should get one.  A bit of commonsense about masks, handwashing, etc. will go a long way.  The folks pushing mandates are really very scary.  It's almost as if they've been waiting for an excuse to send rough men to hold people down and do "things" to them.

They found 300 recall election ballots in the car of a thug.  But sure...the election system is safe and sound.  One is foolish to wonder about election security breaches associated with using a mail-in system.

This is old news, but so is the theory of gravity and the knowledge that water is wet.  Children do far better living in a home with both their mom and dad present.  Single-parent households are a self-reinforcing spiral into poverty.  Solutions aren't easy, but you will never find a solution if you are not first willing to accurately identify the problem.

In another victory for Trump administration policies, the NY Times has an extensive piece on the billing/pricing of medical procedures and how providers and insurers are colluding to make pricing models as opaque as possible to improve their respective profits.  Red State has the news with links to the NY Times.

A final item comes in a National Review piece about a recent US Supreme Court decision that confirms Joe Biden's prediction that the court would strike down the CDC's moratorium on the eviction of renters.  At the center of the piece is the observation that the leftist faction of the court wants the administrative branch to pretty much be able to do whatever it wants with the thinnest of legislative justifications.  I would add that the American left wants the entire government to be able to do whatever it wants without any Constitutional justification.