After watching Prophets of Science Fiction on the Science channel about Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, I’ve concluded that Jules Verne is the father of science fiction with H.G. Wells being the godfather of science fiction. Jules Verne gave us spectacular machines and devices. H.G. Wells gave us concepts that endure to this day. We science fiction fans owe Jules Verne for showing us that the technology we can dream can become reality if we study hard enough. H.G. Wells showed us that we need to be careful stewards of that technology.

It is becoming very clear that Facebook and Twitter are taking over the internet. I can not go anywhere on the web these days without encountering a Facebook or Twitter button to “like” or “follow” someone or something. I remember when sites only asked me to bookmark them or add them to my favorites. There are people who use the internet now who do not know how to write a basic web page, but they would not be satisfied with just plain static text. They crave interactivity, which is good, but they crave it on a large scale which a simple web page might not be able to give them.

Companies are now putting their Facebook or Twitter accounts or both in their advertisements, eschewing their own websites. If I need a product or service, I would rather read about the product or service on a corporate website. If I am pleased with what I see and subsequently make a purchase which end satisfactorily, I may follow that comapny on Twitter depending on the level of excitement the company engenders in me.

It is sad that more and more companies are going the the Facebook and Twitter route. Those who do not use those services may be denied valuable savings and possibly entry into contests for free items. Another problem is the decline of web design services that this can cause. How many web designers will be put out of work because companies decide to use Facebook as their only contact with their customers?

You can put Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and other social networkds’ feeds on your website, but don’t let them be your website. If your company runs a robot, you need to keep watch on your robots that follow people. I will not buy something from your company just because you follow me. Your follow bots will not be effective if all they do is sit idle as a silent follower. Mostly they annoy the Hell out of people.

The bigger your company gets, the more pointless it appears to be to communicate with you. I will not deny that Facebook and Twitter may be easier ways to communicate with your customers, however, what about your customers who do not use any of those services?

When you use the word hate, stop and really think about how you really feel. Do you really feel so passionately negative about the subject of the feeling that it has built up to hate? Most of the time I find myself using hate when in reality the subject either annoys, disgusts, or scares me or just makes me angry.

Let’s look at the passion that it takes to hate something. You first find out about a subject. You find it interesting enough to study, but you start feeling negatively about it. You want to know more, but the feeling you have keeps getting more and more negative. You keep studying the subject even though you feel so negatively about it. Your negative passion increases exponentially with every new fact you find. That is when you really hate something. If you have stopped before you study the subject in depth, you do not really hate the subject.

There are so many other words that could describe your lesser passion such as dislike, despise, abhor, or loathe. There are plenty of dictionaries around to help you describe what you are really feeling.

Sometimes I see a person asking someone “If you hate it so much, why do you stick around?” Well, the answer is simple. The “hater” is passionate about the subject, so wants to know more about it.

We have seen on film and television two characters who start out hating each other, and we the audience wonder why they stay around each other. Well, its the passion all over again. Normally by the end the two characters fall in love. Isn’t that sweet?

It takes the same passion to hate something that it does to love something. If you can find at least one redeeming quality about a subject, that will lessen your negative feelings about it. So, instead of looking for more negative about a subject; look for something, anything, positive. It is not easy to start feeling positive about something you feel very negative about, so you have to ask yourself what keeps you so passionate about the subject? Also, authors and script writers, do your characters really feel that passionate?

A discussion on Twitter got me thinking about what I want to happen to my body after death again. First and foremost I am an organ donor. If any part of my body can save lives or even enhance a physically miserable life when I die, I want the parts disbursed immediately.

I know that my lungs will probably be useless because I smoke heavily. To discourage children from starting, I would like them frozen and sliced to be put on display to show children what happens to lungs because of smoking. (I got this idea from the Visible Human Project.) I know it is a bad habit I should quit; but not only am I physically addicted, I am psychologically addicted.

If I am dying in a place where measurements could be taken, I would like to be weighed before, during, and after death to see if there is any physical signs that a soul is present. (I got this idea from the aforementioned Twitter discussion.) If it could help gain quantitative proof of a soul’s existence or lack thereof, I am for the use of my body to find out either way.

After all of that, if there are any further uses for what remains other than burial, I am not against my body being used. Anything unusable should be put into the cheapest coffin that can be found and buried in the least expensive grave; unless cremation is less expensive than that. I will not be there anymore, so please do not put any special significance on my body, memorialize me without it. Please?

I’m starting this off with a true story of what I did in the middle of the night about ten years ago when a friend, at the time, threatened suicide.

(Note: This was before Windows was automatically installing Internet Explorer, so I had not installed a browser with which to search for the web for more detailed information.)

Prior to her suicide threat, we had exchanged physical addresses for reasons I can’t remember. When she threatened suicide; I called my local police, told them that a friend of mine had threatened suicide, gave them her out of state address, and hoped for the best. The next night she was online and told me of her surprise of having her local police showing up at her door to check up on her.

I was happy that I did not lose a friend that night, even if she had never spoken to me again.

So, you must know that I would do the same for anyone I talk to online anywhere. I would swing into action the moment I read a suicide threat. If I know your street address or only your town, I will call your most local police (some towns do not have a police force, so usually it falls under county jurisdiction). If I only know your state, I will call your state police. If I know only that you live in the United States (or country unknown), I will more than likely call the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI). If you are outside of the United States, I will call your country’s embassy here in the United States.

I do not care if you never speak to me again, unfriend or unfollow me afterwards. I will do everything in my power to save you from yourself. So, do not ever jest about committing suicide unless you use a clear qualifier. Even then I will still be concerned.

(I wrote this after I got a little scare today from someone.)

A little over a month ago, I wrote a petition to temporarily suspend the production of film and television remakes. It says…

Your audience who uses Twitter (we, us), for the period beginning 1 January 2012 at 12:00 a.m. (UTC +12) and ending 1 January 2013 at 12:00 a.m. (UTC -12) (the period), request that the motion picture and television industry (you), not approve nor start production on any film, miniseries, or television series (work) which is a remake of a previously produced work. We recognize the terms reboot and reimagining to be alternative vocabulary for remake.

We ask you to not approve nor start production on any sequel, prequel, or sidequel to a previous work which is greater than the second work in a series of works.

We ask for more original works. We ask you to send artists to libraries and book stores to find written materials that have never been adapted into works. We ask that artists produce ideas that we have never before seen. We ask that you communicate within your industry to ensure that two works which are similar are not released within 30 days of each other.

We believe as the fictional Vulcans of Star Trek believe that there is “infinite diversity in infinite combinations”. We ask you to show us more of that infinite diversity. As Frank Herbert wrote in his Dune novels “fear is the mind killer”, so we ask you to not fear the infinite diversity. We are more intelligent, critical, and savvy today than we have ever been before now. We ask you to tell your accountants that when making decisions about what to produce.

While remakes might make you more money from being easy to produce, they are far more forgettable than an original work and are “creatively bankrupt”. Change is as good as rest, so will you please let us rest.

On television, we’ve seen several attempts fail such as The Bionic Woman and V. There is currently a new Hawaii 5-0 with a new Charlie’s Angels and Bewitched coming. Do we really need to see those all over again?

Coming to theaters is a new Footloose. I also have seen a new Dirty Dancing mentioned. Fame has already been remade too. The list of horror remakes is truly horrifying. Do you really want to pay for something that was easy to make because all the original scripts needed were a few tweaks to update them?

You can see the petition here on Twitition. It has less than 50 “signatures” on it. If you read this, have a Twitter account, and agree please sign it. If you do not have a Twitter account, you can still “like” this post. It will take a great outcry to make the production companies to even think about this issue.

Anyone who watches the Syfy channel knows that on Monday nights they air three television series Eureka, Warehouse 13, and Alphas. Some might be aware that these three series have formed a new crossover cosmology which I have begun to call EWA.

Let’s look at the three crossovers between Eureka and Warehouse 13. The first crossover between the two is Warehouse 13 “13.1”. The second crossover is Eureka “Crossing Over”. The third crossover is Warehouse 13 “Don’t Hate the Player “. The two series are now indelibly linked.

Now, there is only one crossover between Warehouse 13 and Alphas with Dr. Vanessa Calder, who recurs on Warehouse 13 appearing on Alphas “Never Let Me Go”. This may not be a strong crossover between the two series, but it does create a tie.

With many Eureka fans lamenting about the cancellation of the series, I can offer only scant comfort. We could see Eureka characters showing up on either Warehouse 13 or Alphas after Eureka is over. The chances are not good, but that is all we have.