The SFFaudio Podcast #130 – READALONG: Human Man’s Burden by Robert Sheckley

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #130 – Scott, Jesse, Tamahome and Jenny discuss Human Man’s Burden by Robert Sheckley.

Talked about on today’s show:
uppity damn robots, hilarious characterization, soulless robots, Galaxy Magazine September 1956, Star Trek, Harry Mudd, Sears Roebuck catalogues, freeze dried vs. flash frozen, Kiln People by David Brin, The Twilight Zone episode “The Lonely“, robot wives, manufactured fingernails, center of gravity, “could she have been a robot?”, Gunga Sam the foreman robot, duenna is Portuguese for chaperone, Gunga Din, the Writing Excuses podcast with Lou Anders, HuffDuffer, John Scalzi, Casablanca, The Dark Knight, Edward Flaswell, “Sure pal. Sure.”, Frontier Bride, mail order bride, freeze dried preacher, programmed by “a human supremacist of the most rabid sort”, was Flaswell talked into feeling bad, what is the Human Man’s Burden?, is it all a marketing ploy?, The Mote In God’s Eye, the Gold Rush, why is the combustion god?, “Him strong him good, believe me brothers, it is even as I say.”, Rudyard Kipling poem’s The White Man’s Burden, the justification for empire, satire, the page 99 illustration, labeling people, ultra deluxe model bride, “oil glistened on their honest faces”, Tama can prove the robots are having sex, “in their carefree robot fashion”, a series of robots on the moon ordering from Sears Roebuck catalogues (15 F&SF covers by Mel Hunter), Charles van Doren, face-parts, “the robot frontier”, Asteroids in fiction (Wikipedia entry), TZ ep.: “Two“, Dumb Martian by John Wyndham, TZ ep.: “The Lateness Of The Hour“, android vs. gynoid, Firefly, Gunga Sam knows best, Sheila was down-selling herself, this is a feminist story?, Human Man’s Burden could be a cartoon, Kindles/Xboxes/Wiis/PS3s are sold as cheaply as possible because of the profit being in the media they play, iTouch vs. iPhone, free robots in our homes selling moon makers and solidovisions, nesting dolls, Human Man’s Burden probably isn’t public domain, Psycho by Robert Bloch, The Status Civilization, Seventh Victim, Mindswap, Warrior Race, The Space Merchants, Blackstone Audio, Charles Stross, Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan.

ISFDB publication history for Human Man’s Burden HERE.

Human Man's Burden by Robert Sheckley - Page 95 - Galaxy Science Fiction magazine, September 1956

Human Man's Burden by Robert Sheckley - ilustration by Weiss

Sears Roebuck Ordering Robot - Art by Mel Hunter

Posted by Jesse Willis

Tantor Media offers MP3 Downloads (and limited time Buy One Get One Free)

SFFaudio News

MP3 – that’s pretty much the best kind of auidobook format. It’ll work on any device, is convertible to any other format, and is completely DRM free. Tantor Media has begun offering them!

There are now more than 1,000 downloadable titles available to choose from.

Tantor Media - Buy One Get One Free

Use Code: bogo8
Code expires: October 30, 2011

And, here’s the November 2011 Tantor catalogue |PDF| which includes a biography of Nikola Tesla, A Treatise Concerning the Principles of
Human Knowledge
(George Berkeley) and a new novel by Jack McDevitt!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Recent Arrivals: Blackstone Audio, Penguin Audio, Macmillan Audio

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

The Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson, read by Michael Kramer
The Hum and the Shiver by Alex Bledsoe, read by Emily Janice Card and Stefan Rudnicki
The Apothecary by Maile Meloy, read by Cristin Milioti
Why Read Moby Dick? by Nathaniel Philbrick, read by the author
The Walking Dead: The Rise Of The Governor by Robert Kirkman and Jay Bonansinga, read by Fred Berman
Psycho 2 by Robert Bloch, read by Paul Michael Garcia
Steel and Other Stories by Richard Matheson, read by Scott Brick
We’re Alive: Season Two by Kc Wayland, performed by full cast
Bad Moon Rising by Jonathan Maberry, read by Tom Weiner
Beggars Ride by Nancy Kress, read by Judy Young
Vacation by Matthew Costello, read by Peter Macon
To Sail Beyond the Sunset by Robert A. Heinlein, read by Bernadette Dunne

Posted by Jesse Willis

What to know what new audiobooks have arrived?

SFFaudio News

metaSFFaudio LogoHere at the SFFaudio Research and Development Lab, we’ve been watching TV hard at work on innovative solutions to match you with your audiobooks.

That’s why, when we noticed that Scalzi started to use Twitter to list his incoming books, we immediately spent hours reading his list leapt into action. We stole his idea, called it our own, and started our own feed called NewAudiobookIn. Turns out that is a very quick and easy way to note everything that comes in.

For those that aren’t on Twitter but use RSS readers to read blogs, I suggest you use this link to read the new Twitter feed as an RSS feed:
http://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/user_timeline.rss?screen_name=NewAudiobookIn

Our regular Twitter feed, @SFFaudio, will not be changed.

Stay tuned for other copied innovations, like the new SFFaudio Grill. We’ve also been playing with a new thing all the kids are doing called YouTube. Coming soon!

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Inkstuds: Interview with Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra of Y: The Last Man

SFFaudio Online Audio

InkstudsThere’s an interesting 2008 interview with Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra, the writer and artist behind Y: the Last Man, right here |MP3|. Here’s the description:

The inkstuds were joined by two stellar creators today. Brian K Vaughan and Pia Guerra have been doing Y the Last Man for the 5 years, and just released the last issue of their acclaimed series. It was a really neat chat about there collaborative work and the series.

Y: The Last Man - Collection 1

Posted by Jesse Willis

Heinlein speaks (briefly) from the set of Destination Moon

SFFaudio News

An older post, called The Sound Of Robert Heinlein’s Voice, has finally turned up some of that very stuff!

Check out this wonderful video a 1949 group interview from the set of Destination Moon! Robert A. Heinlein is there, on set, as he served as a technical adviser.

Heinlein appears at about 5 minutes into Part 1. He reappears again, briefly, at the end of Part 3.

[immeasurable thanks to Robert, Bill Higgins and CrowTRobot1313]

Posted by Jesse Willis